The thing I find strange about the course is that it seems to completely miss the point of the US gravel scene. As far as I know the biggest races are closer to the ultra-endurance category than your typical one day race. Of course getting road pros to make more than a token appearance at that sort of event would be a hard sell because preparing for and recovering from a 9+ hour effort is a lot more disruptive than the racing they're used to.
maybe, Tiffany Cromwell seems to enter a few gravel races every year whilst in the US that arent quite ultra endurance length, just with lots of climbing, and Valterri has created a kind of gravel sportive event in Finland which seems to be that same kind of mix, so its doable.
Id prefer it not to turn into just another event a bunch of roadies turn up at, I like it to be more a specialism that requires bike skills that dont make you the best road racer.
as for the tv coverage Id guess the problem, which may link into the course format, is youve got to use vehicles that can cope with off road, that means chunky tread tyres, which inevitably rips up the surface especially if the route is laps of the same course, so it starts to become a bigger influence in the race , if the tv bike sits infront of the riders, its potentially hampering or even destroying the lines they want to take, if it sits behind its affecting them less though not giving you the coverage you are used to.
I kind of see it as an experiment really for the UCI to learn what works and what doesnt with it