Start grid slots key as Team USA shapes Gravel World Championships strategies

Alexey Vermeulen, Sarah Sturm and Paige Onweller are three of the gravel ‘specialists’ on Team USA who are locked and loaded for explosive racing this weekend at UCI Gravel World Championships. They had pre-ridden all or most of the course, all said it was a challenging and technical for ‘worthy’ gravel world titles, and the winners would most likely be determined quite early, from the front of the race start.

“It’s a proper course. It’s tight, it’s technical. It has very, very, very steep climbs, it has paved climbs and loose climbs. It has paved descents, loose descents. There will be a true gravel winner at the end. It will be very intense all day. It will not play out like a road race. No one is gonna be on 35 millimetre slicks. This is a true gravel race,” Vermeulen told Cyclingnews, who traveled to Italy fresh from back-to-back wins at The Rad Dirt Fest and Chequamegon MTB Festival, putting him second overall in the Life Time Grand Prix series.

Coming from a pro road background that included two seasons on the WorldTour with LottoNL-Jumbo, Vermeulen said the new grid positions will characterise how the contest will play out. However, Team USA will have 169km to sort things out for the elite men’s contest, 140km for the elite women, but tactics could go sideways early on.

“I think one of our biggest issues is going to be the start on Sunday. This course is going to make it a little bit of luck of the draw," Vermeulen told Cyclingnews.

The start grid rules were rejigged for this year's race, as last year the initial grid plans had to be altered when there was considerable consternation when it was discovered that those who excelled in the qualifying UCI Gravel World Series were relegated to positions behind riders that had gathered UCI points on the road or in mountain biking and cyclocross.

This year when it comes to start positions the UCI Gravel World Series points are being fully factored in along with those earned during the 2022 UCI Gravel World Championships while 50% of the points in the UCI rankings for road, cyclocross plus mountain bike cross country and marathon are being taken into account. Prestigious US gravel races, such as Unbound, however count for nought when it comes to the start grid ranking system outlined in the technical guide for the race leaving the US team on the back foot.

“So there’s 235 guys on the start list, maybe guys missing, that is just a lot of riders. It starts gridded like a cyclocross race, and literally, from the gun, you go up the hill and it’s pretty much a cyclocross start," said Vermeulen. "If you line up 150th, you’re not going to move very far in the first 3k. There’s going to be a majority of us who never get a chance. With 8,000 feet or a little less over 100 miles, the climbing is not going to be what changes the entire race.”

Sturm, who has a background in mountain biking and cyclocross, was among three US women finishing in the top 20 at the inaugural Worlds. This year she was third overall at Unbound Gravel 200 and is currently fourth overall  in the Life Time Grand Prix standings. She was in agreement on the course layout, which eliminates some climbing for the elite women, as well as on a forecast for a chaotic start.

“I think the start is going to be pretty definitive. The terrain itself is going to make some selections for positioning, but call ups, of course, will be important. Maybe they're calling up national champions so hopefully Lauren [Stephens] gets a good spot,” she said, noting that the grid positions had not been provided to Team USA riders.

“Last year, they were unclear until the morning of the race if they were doing call ups. Then Sophia [Gomez Villafañe] got a call up for winning Unbound, Pauline [Ferrand-Prévot] got a call up for being world mountain bike champion. And then I got called up second row, I don’t know how I got up there. 

“It’s less of a shit-show this year, for lack of better terms, but there’s more high-profile names so people are taking it more seriously.”

Onweller, who competes domestically on the road and on gravel, takes her first run at the rainbow bands for the Team USA women. She won last year’s Big Sugar Gravel and is ninth overall in the Life Time Grand Prix series.

“The course is more technical compared to US gravel events, mostly due to how tight it is which will make positioning more difficult for those who lack European racing experience. Additionally, the way the UCI is determining the start positions certainly disfavors the US pure gravel riders but we remain optimistic,” Onweller told Cyclingnews.

“Thankfully the course is very different from last year, with plenty of ‘true gravel’ and challenging climbing, which will make for a worthy winner.”

Women's race

In just its second year, the field for elite women at the Gravel World Championships had more than doubled, with close to 112 riders expected at the start in Spresiano, up from the 50 that were on the start list in 2022. The largest contingent is coming from the Netherlands with 15 riders, Italy has 11 and Great Britain 10. 

“Both the US men’s and women’s teams are excited to be here and eager to work collectively. The women’s side has several strong women with a solid mix of backgrounds in which we can lean on each other for,” Onweller summed up.

This year there are almost double the US riders on the women’s team, nine expected to start versus five last year, so Sturm surmised “if there’s two American women in the mix, it’s a lot more inspiring than just one of you getting bullied”. 

Will the nine US women form a plan and execute?

“Lauren Stephens and Heidi Franz, both have a lot of European road experience racing, and gravel, so I would be happy to work for them. I've raced with both of them. And it's my dream, as someone who never raced road, to be a domestique. Like I feel like I could crush it as a domestique,” Sturm admitted. “Do I think it’s going to be helpful or work? I want to believe it will. But I don’t know if the course is going to lend itself to any team tactics, for anyone. I don’t think the [course] is wide enough at any point to really benefit drafting. 

“The thing that Team USA is dealing with is the same thing that most of the other teams may be, aside from the Dutch team. The majority of us haven’t raced on the road, have been working together all season and know this course really well. There's none of that because they just released the course a couple of weeks ago.”

As a US racer who performs at a top level on the more traditional gravel courses in North America, Sturm thought it was important to go to Worlds to perform on the international stage and represent the roots of gravel.

“So far, I’m more excited about it than last year. Last year was definitely about the experience, ‘okay, let's see what this is about’. Obviously, gravel is changing a lot from year to year. I’m disappointed that the US isn’t hosting the first two or three World Championship events. It can really change the  sport, and it is. It’s just sort of like handing over the keys, in some way.”

Men's race

Vermeulen was positive about getting a team vibe back from the traditional path of ‘privateer’ gravel pursuits. His recon of the course on Wednesday was done in a leisurely fashion with usually adversaries – Swenson, Brennan Wertz, Tobin Ortenblad, Zach Calton and Payson McElveen – now teammates.

“It's a very weird thing to come together with people you race against most of the year, and be able to co-exist and have a plan together about how to best attack a race. We have a chance to go and show what the US can do in a sport that was somewhat created on our home soil. We’re not walking in here thinking we’re gonna wax anybody, or there’s a guarantee of a top 10," said Vermeulen, who starts on Sunday marking his sixth appearance for the US at a World Championships. 

It’s just awesome to find that road team feel again, and feel like everyone’s helping everybody at any given moment. Being part of Team USA for me, it’s exciting. That team camaraderie doesn't, and I don't think will ever, really exist in privateer gravel racing.”

If a bunch from the 10 US riders could survive a challenging start to the race on Sunday, would they work as a team, and who would the group support? It was a fluid topic.

“I think Luke Lamperti being here is awesome. He’s a very good finisher,” Vermeulen said about the three-time US pro criterium champion. “But Keegan has shown time and time again that he is the one who can finish a race at the front. So if there's a chance that we can put them in a position to make it easier, that's the overarching goal.

“I think, like with a lot of people, we all want to see what Keegan [Swenson] or our team is capable of. So there’s a big emphasis on how can we support Keegan. It’s also a gravel race and it is not going to be easy for anybody."