Stand-out seasons for New Zealand’s Jack Moody and young Swiss athlete, Alanis Siffert have seen both athletes finish top of the 2024 Challenge Family World Bonus standings, each taking home a US$25,000 bonus to help support their career goals for 2025.
With five Challenge Family podium finishes from six races, including three wins at Challenge Taiwan, Challenge Gunsan-Saemangeum and Challenge Cap Québec, Moody said chasing the World Bonus had been a lot of fun.
“Going for the overall bonus this year has been a lot of fun and almost felt like a game of Texas Hold’em,” he said after his final race in Challenge Xiamen where he placed third. “Who was going to turn up to what races and when. I opted to play my cards early and thankfully still had a card to play come November. The prize money will set me up nicely to be able to travel more to race next season and help me achieve some pretty lofty targets for 2025. Winning the World Bonus was one my big goals for this season and I’m really happy to have been able to execute it well.”
Moody’s closest rivals were Ognjen Stojanović from Serbia who came in second with 1,150, just 100 points behind Moody, while Jesper Svensson (SWE) was third with 765 points. With seven races to his name, the win eluded Stojanović until his final attempt when he took victory at Challenge Xiamen. “It’s great to be able to perform my best at the end of the season,” said Stojanović. “To win has been a big goal of mine all season so it’s great to take the win. To win the World Bonus I would have needed to have a lot of good luck and Jack would have needed a lot of bad luck so I came here to Xiamen to fight for my second place in the World Bonus.”
For Svensson, it was his win at Challenge Almere-Amsterdam, taking the European title in the process, that cemented his third place in the standings, but it was close. Germany’s Tom Hug was just 15 points behind him in fourth with wins at Challenge St Pölten and Challenge Peguera Mallorca and Will Draper was 100 points further back in fifth after a solid season featuring seven Challenge Family finishes, including podiums at Challenge St Pölten, Challenge Wales and Challenge Xiamen.
There is no doubt for Alanis Siffert, 2024 was her breakthrough season. She rose from 148 to 28 in the PTO rankings with five out of her nine races in 2024 with Challenge Family. This included wins at Challenge Xiamen and Challenge Peguera Mallorca and second place at Challenge Almere-Amsterdam, Challenge Kaiserwinkl-Walchsee and Challenge Taiwan.
“It’s such an honor for me to win the overall ranking this year, I would have never imagined!” she said. “I enjoyed racing the whole year around the world and discovering amazing places and people. Thank you so much to the whole Challenge Family team for this opportunity and your support.”
Behind Siffert, Aurélia Boulanger (FRA) took second place after leading for much of the season, taking three wins from three at the beginning of the year at Challenge Cesenatico, Challenge Salou and Challenge Cagnes-sur-Mer. However, a disappointing DNF at Challenge Sanremo, followed by fifth at Challenge Vieux Boucau saw her slip into second, before finishing the season back on the podium in third place at Challenge Xiamen.
Dutch athlete, Els Visser overcame injury to secure her third place in the World Bonus. She too had a stellar start to the year with six podium finishes before the end of April, including wins at Challenge Taiwan and Challenge Wānaka. A fifth place at The Championship, followed by third at Roth cemented her place in the top five, with her third place at Challenge Xiamen securing her third in the World Bonus.
Rounding out the women’s top five was Rebecca Robisch (GER) in fourth who raced all seven of her 2024 races with Challenge Family, including a win at Challenge Israman and Anne Haug (GER), winner of DATEV Challenge Roth.
| RANK | ATHLETE | POINTS |
| 1 | Jack Moody (NZL) | 1,250 |
| 2 | Ognjen Stojanović (SRB) | 1,150 |
| 3 | Jesper Svensson (SWE) | 765 |
| 4 | Tom Hug (GER) | 750 |
| 5 | Will Draper (GBR) | 650 |
| RANK | ATHLETE | POINTS |
| 1 | Alanis Siffert (SUI) | 1,350 |
| 2 | Aurélia Boulanger (FRA) | 975 |
| 3 | Els Visser (NED) | 950 |
| 4 | Rebecca Robisch (GER) | 800 |
| 5 | Anne Haug (GER) | 600 |
Challenge Family’s World Bonus provides professional athletes with the opportunity to race for a share of a US$100,000 end-of-season bonus on top of the prize purses at races. Points are available at selected Challenge Family and started with Challenge Israman in January and ended with Challenge Florianopolis in Brazil on 24 November.
