Final podium of top 3 pro men in 2022 Life Time Grand Prix (L to R): Alexey Vermeulen in second, winner Keegan Swenson, Russell Finsterwald in third(Image credit: Jackie Tyson/ Cyclingnews)
Men's overall podium in 2022 Life Time Grand Prix (L to R): runner-up Alexey Vermeulen, winner Keegan Swenson, third-placed Russell Finsterwald(Image credit: Wil Matthews/ Life Time)
Final top 10 series winners for pro men celebrated shares in $250,000 prize purse, split equally with pro women's top 10(Image credit: Wil Matthews/ Life Time)
Haley Smith (left) won the pro women's overall and Keegan Swenson won the men's pro overall of the 2022 Life Time Grand Prix(Image credit: Jackie Tyson/ Cyclingnews)
2022 was a year of novel career achievements for Keegan Swenson. The mountain bike pro has won US national titles in cross-country and short track XC disciplines, including all three levels of cross-country as a junior, U23 and elite rider.
He has won Leadville Trail 100 MTB twice, Telluride 100, Breckenridge Epic, and Pikes Peak Apex. And he has the fastest time in the 100-mile White Rim Trail in Moab, Utah, completing the ride in under five and a half hours. What else did he need to prove this year? Apparently, a lot.
“This year was a lot of firsts. You know, I did a 24-hour solo, I did Road Worlds, Unbound,” Swenson told Cyclingnews as the newly-crowned men’s pro champion of the Life Time Grand Prix off-road series. “Honestly, I don't I know yet what next year brings, maybe some new stuff.“
His big firsts of the year included a last-minute invitation to join Team USA at the UCI Road World Championships in Australia, where he was the second-best US finisher, trailing the race winner Remco Evenepoel (Belgium) by 6:20, in 73rd position. The top US rider was Neilson Powless, 18th overall.
“Road Worlds was a great experience. I think I learned a fair bit there. And man, it was just crazy,” he recalled about the 266.9km men’s road race.
“It was such a different style of racing than I've ever done. I've only ever done small kinds of domestic road races. So to race on a stage that big was pretty cool. It was a great time and I would do it again if I had the opportunity.”
The feat in the Old Pueblo Race set the tone for his fitness for the rest of the year. In his inaugural appearance there, he netted 336 miles (540 km) with 15,855 feet (4,832 m) of climbing for the current 24-hour record.
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His ride at Unbound Gravel 200 landed on his calendar as the second stop on the Life Time Grand Prix series. He took second at Unbound, but grabbed top points as the best Grand Prix rider in the event.
He mathematically secured his victory at Chequamegon, using Big Sugar as a victory lap. In all, Swenson was the top male finisher at four of the events in the Life Time Grand Prix and never had a race finish out of the top four. The $25,000 cash prize was the biggest overall check he has received for an overall win.
There’s not a lot of ‘new stuff’ that Swenson can do on two wheels.
“Yeah, I had it locked up going in today. So there was no pressure. The last few weeks I have been relatively chill, we just have to finish, or just roll across the start line today. And it's done,” Swenson said just before he accepted the first-place prize from Life Time, which provided a total of $250,000 shared among the top 10 women and top 10 men.
“But, you know, I raced to win. And, I just wanted to race and make it hard today. It was a good time. It was awesome.”
Going gravel
It might have been Swenson’s first time racing Big Sugar Gravel, but not his first time in Bentonville. His last visit to north-west Arkansas was at OZ Trails Off-Road, with a victory in the cross-country endurance event after a nasty crash that resulted in a broken bone in his hand, a broken tooth and gnash in his lip. On social media he referenced this near-disaster on a wet bridge as “one of my favourite moments of my career”.
This time around in Arkansas, on his Santa Cruz drop bars gravel bike, he faced an all-star multi-discipline field of contenders and knock-down gusty winds. He was part of a select group of six riders with 20 miles to go in the 104-mile Big Sugar Gravel, which included road specialists turned gravel grinders Alex Howes (EF Education-EasyPost), Nicholas Roche (Team DSM), Alexey Vermeulen (Jukebox), Adam Roberge (Jukebox) and 2019 XC Marathon National Champion Russell Finsterwald. It was Finsterwald who launched a surprise attack with one kilometre to race and took the victory, ahead of his friend Swenson.
“There was not a whole lot of tactics, just went pretty much full gas from the start. And Russell [Finsterwald] and a few others had that same mindset. So it worked out,” Swenson told Cyclingnews after the race.
“Russell and I pre-rode the course Tuesday, and I rode Wednesday, Thursday. It's kind of a unique course in the sense of there's lots of short, hard climbs, and the surface was really loose and kind of blown out just super dry. So I thought it was gonna be a unique race. There was drafting, but it wasn't like road tactics were a huge part in this race.”
With the victory, Finsterwald moved up two places in the Grand Prix standings, from fifth to third overall. Vermeulen was fourth at Big Sugar and held on to second overall in the series.
“I'm really loving gravel just because it's kind of a new thing for me. I love the mix of tactics, fitness and skills that play into gravel. Like it's kind of a nice hybrid of road and mountain bike,” the Heber City, Utah rider said.
“I love tactical mountain bike races, and most gravel races are pretty tactical and require a little bit of thinking and a little bit of strategy. So I really appreciate that. And I love that aspect of gravel.”
Jackie has been involved in professional sports for more than 30 years in news reporting, sports marketing and public relations. She founded Peloton Sports in 1998, a sports marketing and public relations agency, which managed projects for Tour de Georgia, Larry H. Miller Tour of Utah and USA Cycling. She also founded Bike Alpharetta Inc, a Georgia non-profit to promote safe cycling. She is proud to have worked in professional baseball for six years - from selling advertising to pulling the tarp for several minor league teams. She has climbed l'Alpe d'Huez three times (not fast). Her favorite road and gravel rides are around horse farms in north Georgia (USA) and around lavender fields in Provence (France), and some mtb rides in Park City, Utah (USA).
