The cyclocross season ramps up in October as the road season winds down, bringing out the off-road specialists before they're joined later in the season by multi-discipline stars like Wout van Aert, Mathieu van der Poel or World Champion Tom Pidcock.
Racing has already started in the United States and the first World Cup round arrives in Waterloo, Wisconsin on October 15.
UCI Cyclocross World Cup rounds run on 11 Sundays of the season between Waterloo and the World Championships plus three days during Christmas week, or 'Kerstperiode'. There are one-week breaks after the opening round, on November 4-5 during the Continental Championships and then in January for the majority of the national championships.
Other major race series include the Superprestige and X2O Trofee and other national race series such as the US Cyclocross Series, the British National Trophy Series, Coupe de France and the Toi Toi Cup in the Czech Republic.
World Champion Fem van Empel shows her skills with a 'superhero' celebration at the Krawatencross (Image credit: Getty Images)
Last year's women's races were the most hotly-contested, exciting contests of the season with Fem Van Empel winning seven of the World Cups, Puck Pieterse four and Shirin Van Anrooij the other three. They combined to take the top three spots, respectively, in the World Cup overall standings.
In the points-based Superprestige, it was former World Champion Ceylin del Carmen Alvarado who came out on top over Inge van der Heijden and Denise Betsema. Van Empel won the time-based X2O Trofee over Lucinda Brand, who spent much of the year recovering from a broken hand, with Alvarado third.
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Across the pond, Caroline Mani topped Raylyn Nuss in the women's USCX series in the absence of US National Champion Clara Honsinger.
All of these riders will be ones to watch again this season, although Van Anrooij has said she will limit her off-road pursuits to focus on the Spring Classics, and Betsema suffered a training crash and delayed her season in early October.
However, Van Anrooij will be racing the opening World Cup in Waterloo, Wisconsin thanks to her bike sponsor Trek. She'll be joined there by her rivals Van Empel and Pieterse.
Wout van Aert and Mathieu van der Poel battle at the 2023 UCI Cyclocross World Championships in Hoogerheide (Image credit: BAS CZERWINSKI Photo by ANP via Getty Images)
The men's field has a very different dynamic, with riders like Eli Iserbyt, Laurens Sweeck and Michael Vanthourenhout dominating in the early season until Mathieu van der Poel and Wout van Aert come out to play.
Sweeck did enough to win the UCI World Cup overall last year, but riders have complained about how long the World Cup is compared with earlier seasons and struggle with the logistics of racing across seven different countries and two continents.
Consistency is key to any of the top series, and Lars van der Haar didn't win a single Superprestige round but won the overall series ahead of Iserbyt by being in the top three for all but two races and in the top five for every race.
Iserbyt won the X2O Trofee in 2023 and will be the favourite again this season.
The men's US champion Curtis White topped Eric Brunner and Belgian Vincent Baestaens to win the USCX last year. This season, the USA's reigning U23 national champion Andrew Strohmeyer has stamped his name into the list of riders to watch with his speed and skill and a win in the second day of racing in the Charm City CX.
Van der Haar will be among the starters in Wisconsin, along with Joris Nieuwenhuis, Ryan Kamp and Pim Ronhaar.
How to watch the 2023-24 cyclocross season live streaming
Fans and riders at the Nommay Cyclocross World Cup (Image credit: Getty Images)
GCN+, Flobikes and a range of local broadcasters will show cyclocross this winter.
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GCN+ will provide live streaming of the Superpresite, X2O Trofee and Exact Cross cyclocross series from Belgium. A year-long subscription will set you back £39.99 while a month's subscription costs £6.99. Coverage will also be available on Discovery Plus/Eurosport at the same price points.
Equivalent figures for subscriptions are: $64.99 and $15.99 (USA), $59.99 and $11.99 (Canada), and $64.99 and $15.99 (Australia).
The main series of the season, the UCI World Cup, will be broadcast live and in full on the UCI's website and Youtube channel. Eurosport will host races in certain territories (excluding the UK and Ireland), while Flobikes has exclusive rights to the World Cup and World Championships in the USA and Canada, with a subscription costing $150/year.
Local broadcasters, including VRT/Sporza and Proximus (Belgium), Rai (Italy), NOS (Netherlands), and L'Equipe TV (France) will also broadcast the race.
Be warned, though, geo-restrictions may apply if you're outside your home country or on holiday during the race. You can get around that, however, by accessing the streams via a VPN.
ExpressVPN offers the ability to simulate being back in your home country, allowing you to watch the race live on various devices – including Smart TVs, Fire TV Stick, PC, Mac, iPhone, Android phone, iPads, tablets, etc.
The UCI rules limit bikes for cyclocross to drop-bars, road-style frames and tyres of a maximum of 33mm so over the years, specialized cyclocross frames emerged. In the years before the advent of disc brakes, the best cyclocross bikes had cantilever brakes and wide clearances to help keep mud from clogging up the spaces between tyre and frame.
These days riders almost exclusively use disc brakes and most employ 1X drivetrain setups due to the weight savings.
What kind of tyres are best for cyclocross?
A rider splashes through the mud (Image credit: Getty Images)
The best cyclocross tyre depends on the conditions - be it dry and dusty or wet and muddy, there's a tread for every kind of race. You'll see the video cameras pan across the front row starters, showing close of up each rider's tread choice. Between the tread and the tyre pressure, the choices can make or break a rider's race.
Although Dugast Tubular tyres have been the choice of champions for years, tubeless tyres are making inroads. Clinchers are rarely used because of they can't hold under the low pressures riders use. There is a fair bit of overlap between the best cyclocross tyres and best gravel tyres.
Laura Weislo has been with Cyclingnews since 2006 after making a switch from a career in science. As Managing Editor, she coordinates coverage for North American events and global news. As former elite-level road racer who dabbled in cyclo-cross and track, Laura has a passion for all three disciplines. When not working she likes to go camping and explore lesser traveled roads, paths and gravel tracks. Laura specialises in covering doping, anti-doping, UCI governance and performing data analysis.
