Guidelines to regulate drafting, specifically related to the different categories of riders in elite women's races, are coming to the Life Time Grand Prix in 2025. In fact, event organisers will begin implementation of new rules next week at the season's opening event, Sea Otter Classic Gravel in California and then assess if modifications are needed for the remaining five events.
"We're going to see a no drafting rule for women. In fact, we're going to announce in the next couple of days," said Kimo Seymour,president of Life Time Events, which owns and operates the Grand Prix series and the collection of six mountain bike and gravel races.
Seymour spoke at a virtual Life Time Grand Prix press conference on Wednesday and confirmed that drafting "has a huge impact" when elite women encounter elite men or other divisions of riders, during a competition. He said it has been an issue on the table since the inaugural season concluded in 2022, and Life Time has taken time to address the biggest hurdle for a rule – implementation.
"The biggest challenge, obviously with any new rules that we implement, and my biggest issue is how to enforce it and how do you enforce it fairly. It's really challenging on these remote courses where it's hard to get marshals, get people around to see. You just can't watch an entire race on these courses so it's really challenging but we're going to take it on," Seymour told the collection of media, which included Cyclingnews.
"We've gone round and round on this over the last couple years. We debated waiting until Unbound [May 30-31] to roll it out, but we're going to go ahead and roll something out here for Sea Otter. We think with the way the course sets up, with the separate day, it'll give us an opportunity to work through some of the kinks on enforcement."
For the first time in four seasons, the Grand Prix will switch from a mountain bike competition to a gravel event for the opening round in Monterey and provide the elite divisions a dedicated day of racing. The Sea Otter Classic Gravel races for elites will take place Thursday, April 10, with a 20-minute gap between the men's and women's fields. All other divisions will compete on Friday, April 11.
In 2023 Life Time implemented separate starts for elite women and elite men at all six races, though the time buffers between fields vary depending on the courses. There have been mixed feelings about how drafting still affects the dynamics of a true women's race, as riders from other categories can get absorbed with a lead pack, or most likely, the rest of the field.
In general, drafting within each category is permissible, but it is the drafting among riders in different categories that is being addressed. The key for Life Time was to use feedback from elite women, look at the courses and determine the implementation.
"There'll be a lot of feedback, a lot of criticism, a lot of input. Last year, we got a lot of input from a number of the female riders. We brought them together and got a lot of suggestions and a lot of guidance. You also get a lot of opinions. Sorting through that is probably the biggest challenge."
Unbound has modified rules over the last three years on other topics as well, including the elimination of mass starts and no permitting comfort bars in races. Many of the top women's competitors applauded Life Time for providing a larger gap between the elite fields at Unbound Gravel last year, increased to 15 minutes, and then the amateur fields were given the green flag 25 minutes after the elite women.
2023 Unbound Gravel champion Carolin Schiff noted last year that while the women's lead pack saw no interactions with other fields, the same was not true for riders in the back of the field and something more than a new rule may be needed.
"I think the only solution to avoid the impact of the men on the women's race are races on different days. A bigger time gap is nice, but in the end, the fields will be mixed again."
Seymour referred to the women's non-drafting topic as "guidelines" rather than firm rules and said details would be announced in the coming days.
