Negative. That’s XC mountain biking. If you are promoting a gravel race and you put single track forest on the route…it’s because you don’t have enough good gravel.
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Here in the UK, even asphalt roads have grass growing in the middle if they don’t get used much.
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Well MVP, De Marchi and GvA were all chasing down either their trade or national teammates at the end.
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They were racing for third. They only started riding once it was unlikely they’d catch the front.
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I call that gatekeeping lol.
Gravel is a made up term encompassing a whole series of off road races.
At least in my opinion.
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This is why we have 5 different cycling monuments, L-B-L or Lombardia are totally different beasts. And winning a monument vs winning worlds?
Hard to say, but you may have added weight to my initial argument. There are not 5 different Unbounds, so there is space for other events while not detracting from Unbound itself.
What’s is the definition of ‘appropriate’ gravel?
Is it 5mm maximum chunk width or, 5.56mm chunks?
1.5 to 3.43m road width?
No single track, some single track, near single-track?
This is starting to sound a little gate keeperey…
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Yeah but that was when it was late enough that they could make a clean break and not tow a group of 20-30 riders with them
Yeah, you’ve got it exactly! Mountain biking is mountain biking. Gravel is gravel. Let’s not jam entry fees up the posterior of folks who want to ride gravel by sending them on MTB courses.
We always joke about how next year there will be a De Panne Gravel Race, too. What’s the course look like? Same as the Beach Race 
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I don’t know if Sagan could chase any other pro down at the moment tbh, but I definitely got the impression that Van der Poel was sandbagging rather than chasing his trade teammate.
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I thought it was a good first event. And I would expect it to fine tune the details and get better for next year. Even so, it had better coverage than any US gravel race. I don’t know why the US can’t figure out TV coverage that’s watchable with the technology we see with other sports. Yea, it’s a moving field but Europe has figured out how to cover road races. Even crits and CX are pretty bad.
And in my opinion, for everybody comparing it to Unbound and other US gravel races, I still think a huge (if not the biggest) factor in the quality of the race comes down to the racers, and this by far, had a better field than any race in the US. Hands down. So right there I think it’s already a step ahead of the US scene. This isn’t a knock on Unbound or the racing in the US, but it’s just not at the level that this had as far as the riders racing. Now, that’s not to say I’d love to see the worlds be raced on the Unbound course with this level of field, because I think it would be awesome. But as of now, I’d pick the higher quality of the field in a so-so course than an epic course with a lower quality field. Disagree with me if you want, but that’s my feeling.
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100%. Well said.
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Yes, it’s hard to be too critical of a gravel event that had the only TV/streaming coverage that was generally on par with road races. The commentary was professional but a little under-informed about gravel. That should improve with future events. I assume most people watching have some experience gravel riding/racing and don’t need the basics explained.
I don’t know whether you can pull off a decent coverage package without the helicopter shots. Most of the quality shots come from the motorbikes but the overhead shots give perspective on the area, course and scenery. If you can televise Paris-Roubaix, you can apply the same format to a gravel race.
The team tactics (both country and seemingly trade team) took away from the race quality. In privateer gravel, no one seems to let a lead group get up the road voluntarily. In my view, the “let a break go and watch it get caught” is the least exciting part of road racing.
I agree it was hard to call this a gravel race. This was a dusty road race. Nothing that required dismounting. Nothing that involved using a 50t cassette. If I’m not grinding for 10-15 minutes in a 38-50, its not a gravel ride
They can figure it out, it just isn’t economically feasible. No one is laying the big $$ required so they can find a helicopter / fixed wing so they can beam images to a satellite.
And the current technology basically relies on cell signals….but if you have raced or ridden in areas like the Flint Hills, there are a lot of dead zones.
I’ve said it before, but we would be much better served with a tape-delay, well-edited recap of gravel races. Capture them on video, edit out the boring stuff (which is a LOT) and then give us a tight, one hour recap.
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This is quite a good read. Sums up a lot of my thoughts on Gravel too really.
I travelled over 30hrs by car and plane to compete in Italy and loved every moment of it.
The course was enjoyable, the terrain was varied, plenty of crashes, the distance was good, and the atmosphere was fantastic. Sure there were teething issues, but nothing major.
But at the end of the day the event motivated me to get up and train 6 days a week, gave me purpose for grinding out the TR program, and I had a great sense of achievement at the end. For me that was a great success.
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Just listened to the German podcast Besenwagen which is hosted by ex-road-pros. One of them does gravel and participated at the world champs.
Yes, he did not consider the course very gravelly. Plenty of races in Spain for example which are more “authentic”.
However, first 3rd of the course was proper gravel racing but it was not really broadcasted.
Sagan rode 32 or 33s. He had real problems with this. Most rode 38s.
UCI actually reached out to US organisers but they refused.
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