• The Cycling News forum is still looking to add volunteer moderators with. If you're interested in helping keep our discussions on track, send a direct message to @SHaines here on the forum, or use the Contact Us form to message the Community Team.

    In the meanwhile, please use the Report option if you see a post that doesn't fit within the forum rules.

    Thanks!

UCI Gravel World Championships 2023, October 7-8, Italy

Page 10 - Get up to date with the latest news, scores & standings from the Cycling News Community.
Frankly, it's a marketing gag for bike companies to sell even more gravel bikes, the flavour of the month.
I can see why people would buy them in flat regions, but the amount of people buying them in the Alpes instead of an actual MTB is mind blowing...
Remember that a major component of gravel bikes is bike packing, bikes w bigger tires and wheels that give tire size and tread patterns that will have many gravel bike riders and buyers possibly never getting a flat tire.
The off road and beers and gears vibe is drawing people who are either not interested in the $10,000 bike uber serious road crowd.. The biggest arguments and conflict are as road level seriousness has come on strong in the organic, everyone can enjoy the outdoors, we are doing this for fun,everyone is welcome, environment of gravel.I see road,gravel and mountain bike sectors all having a space for use and sales..
 
Keegan got taken out by someone that was less than an elite bike handler
The overall outcome of this new championship was great in my opinion. As a US based fan, Keegan absolutely crushed it, he simply silenced me and anyone else questioning the caliber of what is on offer in the US scene. The race winner rode as if possessed.. Great effort, great crash, fantastic recovery. Valverde didn't disappoint, he came as prepared and professional as ever.. If they add some single track and more climbing it could be perfected.. Think that the UCI needs to start picking winners and just select from 5 or 6 places for the worlds and abandon moving to a new or semi new place every year..
 
The story on Velo gives some good insight into Keegan’s race. It sounds like the main help he got from USA teammates, especially Luke Lamperti, was getting from mid-pack to near the front of the race. After that he was on his own. He did crash and lost time and then had to chase back on for a ways, so that definitely cost him some time and energy, but part of racing.

Job well done by Keegan. Right there mixing it up with the best. In a field like this I think most were seeing if he would be able to keep himself in contention and not become pack-fodder.

The fact that even such an elite bike handlers like Keegan or WVA crashed shows that it was not an easy bike path course like last year. And people who still think otherwise just need to chill because the spirit of gravel is messing with their minds :)
...but also read Keegan's comments that he chose road like tires, which is why he fell. He forgot he didn't have knobs.

But, fair points. :)

I would like to see a longer, altitude course in the US at some point for this race.
 
Last edited:
Frankly, it's a marketing gag for bike companies to sell even more gravel bikes, the flavour of the month.
I can see why people would buy them in flat regions, but the amount of people buying them in the Alpes instead of an actual MTB is mind blowing...
To be honest, unless you race, most people would be better riding a Gravel bike than a full on road bike. Far more versatile, you can have both road and off-road wheels/tyres and you're good to go. They also make a great winter bike with 35mm GravelKings.
 
...but also read Keegan's comments that he chose road like tires, which is why he fell. He forgot he didn't have knobs.

But, fair points. :)

I would like to see a longer, altitude course in the US at some point for this race.
If you follow his career then You know it is not the first time he is using slicks for gravel races. Remember there are other races and surfaces then just Unbound... Even in USA the home of gravel :)

Seems like this time he made a mistake and underestimated the course, not as much as You do, but still to a little degree :)
 
The overall outcome of this new championship was great in my opinion. As a US based fan, Keegan absolutely crushed it, he simply silenced me and anyone else questioning the caliber of what is on offer in the US scene. The race winner rode as if possessed.. Great effort, great crash, fantastic recovery. Valverde didn't disappoint, he came as prepared and professional as ever.. If they add some single track and more climbing it could be perfected.. Think that the UCI needs to start picking winners and just select from 5 or 6 places for the worlds and abandon moving to a new or semi new place every year..
What is mindblowing is s fact that Valverde on retirement is having 26000km in the bank this year 🙃

I think dude really likes to ride a bike.
 
If you follow his career then You know it is not the first time he is using slicks for gravel races. Remember there are other races and surfaces then just Unbound... Even in USA the home of gravel :)

Seems like this time he made a mistake and underestimated the course, not as much as You do, but still to a little degree :)
Look man, until you add something like this to the race, don't tell me how hard it was :tearsofjoy::tearsofjoy:

(I'm signed up for this race next February):

View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HK_cprYRLdU
 
Look man, until you add something like this to the race, don't tell me how hard it was :tearsofjoy::tearsofjoy:

(I'm signed up for this race next February):

View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HK_cprYRLdU
Bro just stop this nonsense because I'm preety sure I've ridden few harder races then you ever watched on Youtube. In Poland gravel race and ultra race scene is Big. We have over 60 big events (not counting the small ones) with many of them being 400/600 and even +1000km races, that the most competitive dudes ride in one go. And those are hard *** races on rough surfaces, with loads of turns and sketchy decents. We don't get wide, straight roads like you in US. But that does not change my stance that this WC race was hard. Seems hard enough that except Keegan all the other unbound superstars in both Male and Female category could not last with the front group for more then an hour. End of story.
 
Are You a part or a family of a disgraced promotor of last years race that you get so emotional and scream? Last year it was a joke, the race was ridden on road bikes. Not saying it is easy to do it at the speed of the pros, but that does not make it a good gravel course mate. It was a flat race full of easy bike path with no technical or challenging parts. Tottaly different then this years course.
Having reread my post I see that it got all wrong. Apologies.

My response was actually to agree with your statement that this year’s course most likely was quite difficult since for example Van Aert crashed out (yet got back). I rode last year’s race from Vicenza and THAT was an easy course. Sometimes written communication gets upside down.

One course that at least I found challenging was the one at the EC Gravel in Oud Heverlee. This time it was almost all dry. Add some wet and mayhem shall ensue!
 
All the bickering about what makes a 'real' gravel race just reminded me of Ash Sowman's two excellent documentaries about Jeffrey Herlings vs. Eli Tomac, and the differences in motocross in the European series and the US series where each treated the other series with some level of snootiness. Herlings rocked up to the US series and rather embarrassed the US series, winning races quite easily and even praising a course with multiple lines and easy overtaking opportunities that other racers had complained was too technical and made it too challenging to overtake - before Eli Tomac went and salvaged the reputation of the American series faster than anybody expected and restored a level of inter-series respect.

I suspect the UCI might be aiming at a sort of halfway house for the time being in the interest of having some recognisable names appearing, because with it being a new(ish) discipline, there aren't too many names known solely for gravel racing (if any at all), and those names that are recognised being the likes of retired road veterans or journeymen Conti pros and those that never really made it leads to many outside of the gravel scene to dismiss it unfairly, but also the exceptionalist attitude that it's only proper gravel racing if it directly clones the exact nature of the US races - down to the startlist - does no favours either. It needs more televising and better televising to be able to catch on to a wider audience, assuming this is the end goal. I'm sure it is for the UCI, at least, I'm not sure how widely that attitude is held across the gravel community though because I haven't really delved into it, but I wouldn't be surprised - given experiences with many other such communities - if there is an element within the fandom that kind of wants it to stay as their little corner of world cycling and don't really want to see riders from other disciplines come in and shatter that.

Maybe for the time being gravel does have a weakness in that the only riders it has with name value are journeymen or road also-rans, meaning that the active specialists are sort of dismissed as such too; but as long as the scene has such a reputation in terms of lax testing, you can't be surprised that the UCI designs its vision of gravel around those riders it already has in the testing pool and views as low risk.

For the moment, the gravel specialists who can actually contend against top pros are only going to come from places where gravel is more lucrative as a career move over a pro road contract at a Conti team, and for the time being that's a very restricted market. In time maybe this will turn into cycling's equivalent of the Ski Classics series, with the Loppet calendar where there are still significant numbers of veterans of the World Cup cross-country calendar who have migrated to the longer, flatter, open style of racing in the Ski Classics and being successful through their late 30s and early 40s - but there are also dedicated specialists who only race this kind of race and occasional moonlighting in endurance races or stage races at the international level, who make good money from their careers as Ski Classics competitors.

That's probably the long term ideal for gravel as a racing format I would anticipate, and what would probably be needed for it not to be seen as something of a novelty format.
Its a good point UCI not wanting to deviate from what they know and their drug testing pool so they have events that will attract guys and gals already in the UCI protocols.
Honestly, it just sucks tho that its basically a road race with some sections.
 
Jan Bakelants got 14th in Unbound after spending hours getting the mud off his bike in the first 20K.
He is retired, didn't train specifically and doesn't have a CX background.

If he can do 14th, go figure what some of the current pros can do.
So what? Some dude from the denver disruptors (whatever that is) just won one of the biggest classic races in the cycling pro tour
 
Bro just stop this nonsense because I'm preety sure I've ridden few harder races then you ever watched on Youtube. In Poland gravel race and ultra race scene is Big. We have over 60 big events (not counting the small ones) with many of them being 400/600 and even +1000km races, that the most competitive dudes ride in one go. And those are hard *** races on rough surfaces, with loads of turns and sketchy decents. We don't get wide, straight roads like you in US. But that does not change my stance that this WC race was hard. Seems hard enough that except Keegan all the other unbound superstars in both Male and Female category could not last with the front group for more then an hour. End of story.
.

Dude, it was a joke...now, you're just being an a$$hole...what kind of person would believe that someone actually believes you need bulls hurting people, in order to be a proper gravel race? Just walk away, Sunshine, just walk away.

And Sunshine, I don't have a single "wide, straight road" anywhere near me...I'm not sure who it is that hurt you, but go freak out on them. I was trying to lighten the mood...if you need to measure d!cks, you're losing the battle...which was never a battle.
 
Last edited:
Just gotta love Wout. He has a crash, he has mechanicals, he has no hope of winning but no whining, no quitting and he still gets a top 10 position. What a fighter!
And if you saw his insta feed, his overall time (I'm assuming he has auto pause on his Garmin), was 2 minutes faster than Mohoric. Dude just loves to ride his bike fast.
 
It's about a lot more than that. Again, several WT pros have been on the start line for Unbound, and they're 0'fer.
Ofcourse it's about more than that.
But the main difference between gravel and e.g. Paris-Tours is that gravel is much more about your own strength. You can't win Unbound by drafting alone.
You need much more power for a gravel race.

Just one example, but it varies ofcourse:
Matthia De Marchi did 360 W weighted, Nicolas Roche did 330W weighted.

Paris-Tours was won in a breakaway while doing 290W NP. That's a 10-20% difference in power, and both races were approx. 5 hours.
 
Ofcourse it's about more than that.
But the main difference between gravel and e.g. Paris-Tours is that gravel is much more about your own strength. You can't win Unbound by drafting alone.
You need much more power for a gravel race.

Just one example, but it varies ofcourse:
Matthia De Marchi did 360 W weighted, Nicolas Roche did 330W weighted.

Paris-Tours was won in a breakaway while doing 290W NP. That's a 10-20% difference in power, and both races were approx. 5 hours.
I'm not asking to try and start an argument, but what gravel races have you done? I ask because I feel there are just a bunch of assumptions from people that watch bike racing and don't or never have raced. Not you specifically.
 
  • Like
Reactions: ChewbaccaDefense
But I think you also have to figure in that many of the Euro pros racing here have some background racing cross or MTB.

Vollering said she decided to do it just because she likes training rides on her gravel bike, she finished 3rd.

She might be a good bike handler and have some off road skill,and is obviously pretty good on the road as a pro, but she's as good as said there she did no prep for it, it was just about enjoying the experience last race of the season with some friends and she comes away with a medal, and could have conceivably won it.

That says to me however "hard" the race was, it wasn't a hard gravel course or one that needed off road specialists, and that's why the roadies did so well.
 
It's just good to see people like Ten Dem and Morton get in on something that appears to be financially quite lucrative. Hard to put your hand in the fire for people in this sport but I did believe them when they said they rode clean.
I had the pleasure of meeting Morton this past Saturday. We did the same race, and I got to talk with him a little after. He is as genuinely friendly as it seems he might be, from watching his videos. No pretense or ego. Dude just loves to ride his bike. He bought a house near here, so it's going to be cool to see him grab KOM's...though Jonahan Baker also lives here, and while he hasn't raced in awhile, he still has some blistering times out there. In fact, on the hardest climb of the day, neither Morton or Leipheimer beat his time, but Baker has a lot more experience with that climb.

And yes, I believe both of those riders, rode clean.
 
Yea, like Florian Vermeersch, avp 330, np 362, for tad under 5hrs. It wasn't "hard".
He is referring to the difficulty of the course surface, and terrain. The battle rages on about this subject, but I saw nothing from watching that suggests it is as difficult, surface and terrain wise, than many of the big US gravel races. This year's course was harder than last, and was won on a gravel bike (I do wonder if Wout was on an Aspero?), and I'm not saying that it was a cake walk, but it wasn't Unbound, or SBT, or Crusher in the Tushar, or Leadville, or severl others. Someone pointed out it was more like BWR CA, and I think that is a more apt comparison.
 
Last edited: