The second trial of the 2023 X-Trial World Championship will be held this coming Saturday in Wiener Neustadt. Official Vertigo team rider, Italian Matteo Grattarola, is confident to improve on his performance in the competition’s opening round.
One month after the X-Trial World Championship got underway in Barcelona, the indoor competition returns with the second trial of the calendar at Wiener Neustadt, with Matteo Grattarola hoping to give a display of his true level aboard the Vertigo Nitro. The Italian is now recovered from the injuries that hampered his debut at the Palau Sant Jordi.
The Arena Nova is the multi-event hall in Wiener Neustadt with a maximum 2600-spectator capacity. Over 2200 are expected for the X-Trial event which kicks off at 18:30 and will feature a total of six sections. The event is expected to conclude at around 21:30.
Austria, in X-Trial World Championship since 1998
Austria has hosted X-Trial world championship events on nine occasions. The capital Vienna made its debut as a venue in 1998 and staged the event for six years. After a break of over ten years the event moved southbound to Wiener Neustadt, where X-Trial world championship events were held in 2015, 2016 and 2017, while the 2020 edition was cancelled due to Covid-19.
The best result for a Vertigo rider at Arena Nova was in 2016 and 2017 with a fourth position for Jeroni Fajardo.
Matteo Grattarola (Vertigo Factory rider): “Competing in Barcelona was tough, because of the recent injury and the short time, generally speaking, that I had to adapt. Now I’m better, I’m still not at 100%, but I’m going to give it my best shot in Austria. We are striving to try to get the best result. A podium would be good, both for me and for the team, although we know that those positions are very difficult to achieve.”
