Marlen Reusser: The Tour de France as the next big goal for the time trial world champion

After the season is before the season. And so Marlen Reusser still had plenty to do after the final races of 2025. As the newly crowned world champion in the individual time trial, she was a much sought-after woman during the days in her Swiss home in Hindelbank, where she grew up on a farm. She spent almost an hour and a half answering questions for the readers of TOUR magazine in an interview that will appear in issue 1/2026. TOUR met a cyclist who is back on the road to success after a deep crisis with exhaustion syndrome in 2024. Winning the title in Kigali/Rwanda - after several unsuccessful attempts and World Championship medals in the years 2020 to 2022 - is just the most visible sign. An alternative healing method using hypnosis helped her over the hill and out of chronic exhaustion. "It was a lifesaver," says Reusser in the TOUR interview.

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From time trial to tour specialist

The time trial specialist, who lives with her German partner Hendrik Werner in Andorra-La Vella in the Pyrenees, has also developed further in the mountains and therefore as a tour specialist. Last season, she won the Tour of Burgos and the Tour de Suisse. She came second in the Vuelta and the Giro d'Italia. In Italy, she said she was weakened by diarrhoea. In the end, she missed out on overall victory in mid-July by a whole 18 seconds in a duel with the Italian Elisa Longo Borghini. At the Tour de France Femmes less than two weeks later, she came off her bike during the first stage - her body was still too weak.

The big goal 2026: The Tour de France Femmes 2026

She wants to make a new attempt in France next year. The big goal for 2026: "Maximum performance at the Tour de France," Reusser tells TOUR. Her exact race calendar is still being discussed in detail and will be communicated at a media event organised by her team Movistar in mid-December. But the general direction of travel is clear. The world's best female time trialist will probably benefit from the fact that an individual time trial is on the programme again next year at the Tour de France Femmes (you can find the complete route hereOn stage 4, the only individual time trial of the nine stages will take place over 21 kilometres from Gevrey-Chambertin to Dijon. Here, Reusser could pull out a lead on strong climbers such as current Tour winners Pauline Ferrand-Prévot, Kasia Niewiadoma and Demi Vollering as well as Giro winner Elisa Longo Borghini, before the Mont Ventoux, an outstanding climbing test, lies on the route three days later.

Discussions about weight

In the TOUR interview, Reusser also poses the crucial questions surrounding the unhealthy weight of some cyclists. "I think science has a lot to clarify here," emphasises Reusser, who holds a doctorate in medicine, "what is healthy and what is unhealthy?" After the last Tour, there was a lively discussion about how to deal with an athlete like Ferrand-Prévot setting the standards with visibly extreme weight management. Nobody could even come close to following the lightweight Frenchwoman on the mountain. The 1.80 metre tall Reusser needs a good strategy to be able to successfully face the best female climbers at the Tour. And perhaps she will also work on her weight.