The Trophy cycle routes are great fun

Lionel Mages at the finish of the last mountain stage on the Raten

Lionel Mages is completing all the mountain stages of the Zugerberg Finanz Trophy on his racing bike for the first time this year - ideal training for his upcoming competition.

Lionel Mages grew up on Lake Geneva and has lived in the canton of Zug for over 20 years: "I love it here. It's like Vaud, only the lake is a bit smaller," says the 44-year-old with a grin. He has been working as an asset manager in the iron ore business at Glencore for twelve years. Before the pandemic, trips to Africa were part of his everyday life. "These are very exciting, but they make it difficult to stick to a training schedule," says Mages. His training goal was always to jog around Lake Aegeri in less than an hour. And it was during one of these training sessions that it happened: he tore his meniscus. For Mages, however, this injury from jogging was not the end of the world, because: "Cycling has always been my great passion and main sport."

One-armed on the Zugerberg

Mages has been familiar with the Trophy since 2019. The family man thinks it's great that his employer Glencore supports this format: "It's allowed me to discover new, varied routes." The passionate cyclist also races, but then on a mountain bike because he generally prefers to ride in the mountains. Driven by ambition, Lionel even pedaled with one arm on his racing bike from Schmittli to Zugerberg on the last day of the Trophy. That worked surprisingly well. "I broke my collarbone in May, but I didn't want to miss a single stage this year."

Having recovered from the fracture, Lionel Mages is now looking forward to the Iron Bike Race in Einsiedeln on Sunday, September 26. If you ride up the Zugerberg with one arm, you don't do things by halves. That's why Mages is starting in the supreme discipline, the 101-kilometer race with 3,700 meters of altitude.

After around six and a half hours, Lionel finished the Iron Bike Race in a good 34th place in his category (66th overall).

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