ZURICH — Swiss 18-year-old bike owner Muriel Furrer died on Friday, someday after sustaining a head harm in a crash on the highway world championships.
“Muriel Furrer sadly handed away in the present day at Zurich College Hospital,” race organizers mentioned in an announcement.
Furrer was competing within the junior girls’s occasion on rain-slicked roads Thursday morning when she crashed in a forest space south of Zurich. She was airlifted by helicopter to the hospital.
At a information convention Friday, a director of the Swiss organizing committee, Olivier Senn, mentioned no official info might but be given to substantiate precisely the place the crash occurred.
Police and the general public prosecutor’s workplace are investigating, Senn mentioned.
“Now we have misplaced a promising younger athlete with the total life forward of her which could be very arduous to take,” he mentioned. “We can not think about the way it should really feel for the household and associates.”
Furrer’s household had requested that the championships — which run for 9 days via Sunday — proceed on schedule, Worldwide Biking Union (UCI) sports activities director Peter van den Abeele mentioned.
A gala occasion for the UCI scheduled on Saturday night has been canceled, as have been public occasions to rejoice the races deliberate Friday in Zurich.
The ladies’s and males’s elite races scheduled Saturday and Sunday, respectively, will use the identical stretch of highway the place the deadly crash occurred.
“The downhill was checked out once more simply in the present day,” Senn mentioned. “Now we have barely amended the workers on web site. We consider we at all times do the utmost on the protection and safety of the riders.”
The UCI paid tribute to the Swiss teenager in an announcement: “With the passing of Muriel Furrer, the worldwide biking group loses a rider with a vivid future forward of her.”
Furrer is the second Swiss bike owner to have died after crashing on dwelling roads prior to now two seasons.
Gino Mäder suffered a deadly crash on the Tour de Suisse in June 2023. The 26-year-old rider went off the highway and crashed down a ravine throughout a descent and died from his accidents the subsequent day.
“Clearly it’s one other tragic loss of life,” Senn mentioned. “There’s a number of similarities, comparable emotions. At present is about Muriel.”
