The short answer: Yes.
The long answer: Also, yes.
To steal someone else’s recent commentary - many races are taking the “out-suffer and out-epic” approach to courses. And there is definitely an appeal to that, to many people.
We have an event here that was using a stretch of course that was definitely a MTB segment. Then there was a big storm with erosion before the event and it ended up definitely not suited for gravel bikes on race day. I had thought about upgrading to that distance next year, but my inhouse DS said “There’s just no way.”