Whereas we’re nonetheless reliving the thrilling battles for the street world championship title from this previous weekend, rainbow fever continues as we prepare for the third-ever UCI Gravel World Championships in Leuven, Belgium, this weekend.
These we missed out on the rainbow bands in Zurich will get a second probability at a jersey, whereas Lotte Kopecky and Puck Pieterse will probably be vying for a second world title, or in Pieterse’s case a 3rd title, so as to add to their palmarès this season.
Kopecky and Pieterse are simply two of many WorldTour stars flocking to the beginning line in Halle. Whereas official begin lists have but to be printed, we’ve seen confirmed attendance from Mathieu van der Poel, Greg van Avermaet, Tiffany Cromwell, Marianne Vos, and defending Gravel World Champions Matej Mohorič and Kasia Niewiadoma.
What makes these gravel world championships distinctive is that professionals and amateurs will compete aspect by aspect. In contrast to conventional race applications with males’s and girls’s juniors, U23 and elite classes, the UCI Gravel World Championships are damaged up in age classes and an Elite class. Newbie riders —together with skilled race automotive drivers— might qualify by ending within the high 25% at one of many 25 occasions within the Trek UCI Gravel World Sequence held this 12 months. Qualifying races spanned from Kenya and Poland to Canada and the U.S. For the elite race, nationwide biking federations have been allotted as much as 20 slots for his or her high women and men, chosen on the federation’s discretion.
The course is about, the competitors guarantees to be fierce, and this 12 months, we are able to watch all of it stay. Each elite races — males’s and girls’s — will probably be live-streamed, a welcome enchancment after final 12 months’s shameful lack of protection for the ladies’s race.
Right here’s your information to the 2024 UCI Gravel World Championships.
The UCI Gravel World Championships at a look
(Picture credit score: Thomas Maheux / SWPix)
After the success and big development in unregulated gravel occasions throughout North American and Europe, the game’s governing physique, the UCI, determined it needed a slice of the gravel pie as properly. At the beginning of 2022, the UCI debuted the UCI Gravel World Sequence and introduced the first-ever UCI Gravel World Championships, the place an ‘official’ rainbow jersey could be on provide.
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The earlier two editions of the UCI Gravel World Championships passed off in Italy, the place the placement, shorter distances, and totally different model of racing have largely favoured European WorldTour racers accustomed to the excessive tempo and bumping elbows on slender paths.
The transfer to Belgium brings with it some Flemish flare. The course winds its method by woodsy Brabant and traverses throughout gravel, cobblestones, unpaved surfaces in addition to paved roads.
When:
– Saturday, Oct. 5, 12 p.m. CEST / 6 a.m.EDT – ladies’s elite race
– Sunday, Oct, 6, 12 p.m. CEST / 6 a.m. EDT. – males’s elite race
Begin: Halle, Belgium
End: Leuven. Belgium
Race distances: 135km for the elite ladies, 182km for the elite males
Previous winners: WorldTour roadies Kasia Niewiadoma (Poland) and Matej Mohorič (Slovenia) in 2023, and multi-discipline riders Pauline Ferrand-Prévot (France) and Gianni Vermeersch (Belgium) in 2022.
The Course
(Picture credit score: UCI)
All races begin in Possozplein in Halle, a city some 15 kilometres southwest of Brussels. From right here, the peloton will full a small native loop (as soon as for the ladies and twice for the lads) earlier than heading east by a forested area referred to as Brabantse Wouden, which begins with a pitchy run up the Krekelenberg. The Forests of Brabant is a community of forests and inexperienced areas all through Flemish Brabant, characterised by its tall bushes, worn and sunken roads, and heathlands. Because the course nears its end in Leuven, the peloton will full one other native loop—one or two, relying on the race class. On the best way to complete line, the peloton must conquer the steep and cobblestoned Ramberg climb in addition to one closing gravelly part earlier than racing to the center of the town the place the rainbow jersey awaits.
The UCI Gravel World Championships up to now have eschewed the 200-320 kilometre-long distances popularised by American gravel races, and the routes for the 2024 occasion aren’t any totally different, with the elite ladies’s discipline tackling 135 kilometres (82 miles) on Saturday, October 5, and the elite males overlaying 182 kilometres (113 miles) the next day. However the place the programs lack in distances, they make up for in punchy climbs and slender, twisty-turny paths.
Round 56% of the course encompass gravel, cobblestones or in any other case unpaved surfaces, a lot of which have been beforehand featured within the 2023 European Gravel Championship.
The paved sections will even be acquainted for some because the 2021 UCI Street World Championships passed off in the identical area, touring between Antwerpen and Leuven.
The Contenders
Even with out the supply of begin lists as of but, listed below are some riders to maintain your eye on.
Within the ladies’s discipline:
(Picture credit score: Canyon-SRAM)
Defending champion Kasia Niewiadoma (Poland)
Thirty-year-old Kasia Niewiadoma is not any stranger to the rostrum, however the high step had eluded her for years.The Canyon-SRAM rider credit final 12 months’s UCI World Gravel Championships with breaking her streak of near-misses and reigniting her confidence.
With the drought damaged, Niewiadoma secured a large victory at La Flèche Wallonne in April, after which went on to provide the most important upset of the season, and her greatest win but, when she beat race-favourite Demi Vollering in an absolute nail-biter of a showdown on the Tour de France Femmes.
Niewiadoma is in type and again to profitable, and she or he’ll absolutely be one to look at in Belgium this weekend.
(Picture credit score: Getty Photos)
XCO World Champion and U23 Street world champion Puck Pieterse (The Netherlands)
The 22-year-old wunderkind from The Netherlands can do all of it. She’s a high performer in cyclocross, turned the cross-country mountain bike world champion in September and netted the U23 street title final weekend in Zurich as properly. Why not add some gravel bling, too?
The Fenix Deceuninck rider was additionally one of the vital thrilling playmakers of this 12 months’s Tour de France Femmes, wherein she confirmed the flexibility of her biking expertise. In her first-ever stage race, Pieterse received a stage in a photograph end with Demi Vollering, led the Climber’s and Younger Rider’s classification, and even went into the ultimate stage sitting second within the total classification. In the long run, she misplaced the polka dot jersey however went house with the very best younger rider’s jersey, ending eleventh total, third within the mountain classification, and eighth within the factors classification.
“When Puck participates, she solely desires one factor, and that’s to win,” Workforce director Michel Cornelisse informed Biking Weekly. We can not wait to see what Pieterse can do on gravel.
(Picture credit score: SWPix.com/Alex Whitehead)
Street world champion Lotte Kopecky (Belgium)
Final weekend, Lotte Kopecky demonstrated that she is (nonetheless) the very best rider within the ladies’s peloton when she defended her Street World Championship title in Zurich. The 28-year-old Belgian is in high type and determined to benefit from that health by coming into in her first-ever gravel race at Gravel Worlds.
As a winner of Ronde van Vlaanderen, Strade Bianche and Paris-Roubaix, Kopecky is among the finest Classics riders within the ladies’s peloton, and thus, this punchy course ought to go well with her properly regardless of lack of gravel expertise.
Already a world champion on each street and observe, including a gravel title would additional solidify her multi-discipline dominance.
(Picture credit score: Getty Photos)
Sprinter Lorena Wiebes (The Netherlands)
Ought to the race come all the way down to a dash, Kopecky can have her work lower out for her towards her SD Worx teammate and high sprinter Lorena Wiebes. Wiebes is not any stranger to gravel, having received the European Gravel Champions twice and competed at occasions just like the Traka 100.
She additionally didn’t compete on the UCI Street World Championships final weekend, which suggests she’s had a little bit bit extra time to relaxation and put together than a few of her rivals have had.
And, as talked about above, lots of the roads and paths of the world championship course have been additionally featured within the 2023 European Gravel Championship, which suggests Wiebes is aware of easy methods to conquer them and are available out forward.
(Picture credit score: Getty Photos)
The GOAT Marianne Vos (The Netherlands)
The Dutch are lining up with a group brimming with expertise and evidently solely they themselves can get in the best way of securing the gravel title. Becoming a member of Pieterse and Wiebes is none aside from the GOAT herself, Marianne Vos.
With a profession spanning almost twenty years, Vos has claimed 11 world champion titles in cyclocross and street biking, and there are few races on the WorldTour calendar that she has not received. Revered for her distinctive racecraft, explosive energy, technical abilities and her capability to thrive in difficult situations, Vos is a contender it doesn’t matter what race she enters.
Even at 37 years previous, the Cannibal just isn’t slowing down. This season noticed her win an Olympic silver medal (her third Olympic medal) and take wins at Omloop het Nieuwsblad, Dwars door Vlaanderen, Amstel Gold and Vuelta a Espana Feminina. She additionally delivered an absolute masterclass in struggling and grit to safe the inexperienced jersey on the Tour de France Femmes.
Her palmarès is already overflowing, however with a museum being in-built her honour, I am positive they will discover area for yet one more rainbow jersey
(Picture credit score: Getty Photos)
Tiffany Cromwell (Australia)
Maybe essentially the most skilled gravel racer on this quick listing of favourites, Cromwell has embraced the off-road self-discipline to the purpose of co-founding her personal races—FNLD GRVO and RADL GRVL.
The Canyon-SRAM rider has lined up and received races like Unbound Gravel 100, Belgian Waffle Journey, FNLD GRVL and several other of the UCI Gravel World Sequence occasions. The 36-year-old additionally completed within the high 10 at each earlier editions of the world championships. She received the ultimate spherical of the UCI Gravel World Sequence simply two weeks in the past in Spain, promising good type for the race forward.
Within the males’s discipline:
(Picture credit score: Snowy Mountain Images)
Defending champion Matej Mohorič (Slovenia)
Defending champion Matej Mohorič (Bahrain Victorious) has but to efficiently carry his rainbow bands throughout the end line of a gravel race. The rainbow curse was in full impact for the Slovenian WorldTour rider who had a tough time becoming gravel occasions into his street calendar. His first race within the rainbow jersey was a mechanical-marred catastrophe at Unbound 200, and his second try at Sea Otter Europe Girona simply two weeks in the past noticed him pull out resulting from a hand damage.
Mohorič will probably be sporting his nationwide group colors on Sunday, and hopefully, he’ll expertise higher luck then.
(Picture credit score: Getty Photos)
Cyclocross world champion Mathieu van der Poel (Netherlands)
Like so many on this listing, Mathieu van der Poel is a multi-discipline star. The 29-year-old needed to give up his street world champion standing to Tadej Pogacar final weekend however stays the reigning cyclocross world champion. He completed third within the debut gravel championships in Veneto in 2022, and would absolutely like to maneuver up the steps this go round. He actually received the chops for it.
Along with his explosive energy and professional bike dealing with abilities that serve him so properly in cyclocross, Van der Poel can be top-of-the-line Classics riders males’s biking has ever seen with three Ronde van Vlaanderen wins, two Paris-Roubaix victories and wins at Milan-San Remo, Amstel Gold and Strade Bianche to his title.
He additionally confirmed nice type on Sunday, when he walked away with the bronze medal in Zurich.
(Picture credit score: Rene Herse)
Underdog choose: the Gravel Pioneer Ted King (USA)
American followers will probably be upset to not see the likes Keegan Swenson, Sofia Gomez Villafañe and Lauren De Crescenzo line up in Belgium. Whereas thought of the very best off-road specialists America’s received to supply, they’re all staying stateside to complete the Life Time Grand Prix sequence.
As an alternative, it is going to be retired WorldTour roadie and gravel veteran Ted King serving as gravel captain for Workforce USA. When King retired from the WorldTour in 2015, he went on to win Unbound Gravel and present his WorldTour contemporaries a viable off-ramp from top-tier street racing. An early adopter of the gravel self-discipline, King has since received Unbound twice and secured victories as SBTGRVL, Vermont Overland and the Final Finest Journey, amongst others.
King will probably be a wealth of data for the present U.S. nationwide gravel champion, Brennan Wertz, who’s new to the slender roads and European model of racing. And King isn’t the one one with European race expertise. Colby Simmons of the Workforce Visma Leas a Bike group will probably be becoming a member of the US roster as properly.
The best way to watch
(Picture credit score: Getty Photos)
In North America:
FloBikes will probably be internet hosting the livestream for these within the U.S. and Canada, with protection beginning at 8 a.m. EDT on Saturday and eight:20 a.m. on Sunday. Subscription is required.
In Europe:
Europeans ought to tune into Discovery+ and Eurosport: Discovery+ and Eurosport for stay protection.
In Australia:
The 2024 UCI Gravel World Championships will probably be accessible to look at on SBS. Protection begins at 22:00 on Saturday and 23:20 on Sunday.
YouTube:
The UCI YouTube channel: The Elite races could also be live-streamed on the UCI YouTube channel, however protection will probably be geo-restricted. Highlights will probably be accessible the next day.
