Top 5 Ways to Improve Gravel Worlds

The first ever UCI gravel world championships were this weekend, and while there were some positives, there was also some room for improvement.


The UCI puts on many legit world championships - road, track, MTB, cyclocross. I’ve covered many of these and they are thrilling. The UCI also puts on world championship events that are test balloons of sorts, such as an e-mountain bike worlds and a cyclocross team relay. Can you name who won those? I can’t - and I was at 'cross worlds this year in Arkansas. I do clearly remember Marianne Vos and Tom Pidcock winning the elite worlds, though!


On the plus side for gravel worlds, it was cool to see some of the world’s best riders take the start line, with Pauline Ferrand-Prevot and Gianni Vermeersch taking the wins. Conceptually I’m not against a gravel worlds if the world’s best athletes are present and are all in on racing it.


On the minus side, the event just failed in many ways to capture the imagination. It looked at many times more like the bike path world championships than the gravel world champs. And it was in Italy! Home to gorgeous gravel roads like those used in L’Eroica and Strade Bianche.


To state the obvious, the health and the spirit of gravel absolutely do not depend on the UCI. Gravel was a very healthy robust thing developed completely separate from international governance, and will continue to do just fine if the UCI gravel worlds dries up and blows away.


But in the spirit of communal improvement, I present to you my top 5 suggestions on how to improve the gravel worlds for 2023.

Afterwards we’ve got a quick check in with 2022 Badlands winner Sebastian Breuer, who raced the gravel worlds in one of the many age groups.

[iamlyam]

OMG, yes. Bike path world champs indeed. I was laughing the whole race. I do agree with all your suggestions. Thanks for another great video Ben. Cheers!

[PatrickJamesKiernan]

A great follow up to the interview on Dave’s channel. Message loud and clear here!

[AnvilAirsoftTV]

Looked like the world commuter champs to me.

[georgetapley]

Hi Ben, George Tapley here from Albuquerque and a lifetime ago for both of us. So much for the cordialities, you are so correct in the whole summation of the UCI Gravel Worlds.
While, lets be honest it was not until the early to mid 70's that many of the iconic climbs in the TdF were paved, and even to the 80's for many of the climbs in the Giro. That said, for
decades "gravel/dirt" was way off the radar in the UCI's mind. It took folks here in the states to make gravel popular, the UCI should have honored that and at least had the first Gravel Worlds here in the US to honor the birthplace of this discipline. While I can understand that the UCI needs to create events that are exciting to the spectator and the epically long gravel races like Unbound, Steamboat and say Mid South just to not have the mass media in mind for filming. So, I can kind of get the venue....sort of, though, a huge disappointment overall. It is my opinion that while gravel is all the rage, it is not all that unique, one does not have to have a rather specialized skillset as required for mountain biking or cross. Gravel except for certain cases is very untechnical and most everyone who can ride a bike can do it. Here is my biggest question, did we really need a "Gravel World Championship??"

[spencerpowlison]

Honestly the course is consistent with other UCI WC races — XC MTB is on a short, man-made track; road does multiple circuits in the second half of the event. Not inspiring for us but better for spectating. The counterintuitive thing is that a circuit like this resembles a normal daily gravel ride for most people. That can be inspiring in a different way. It was a UCI event first and a gravel race second, which we all should have known from the start.

[Solarsystem]

They should have the pros fixing their own punctures on camera. Peter Sagan and Van der Pol throwing their hands up in the air after the spare tube gets pinched by the rim... Good stuff

[MarrafaProjects]

Thanks for this sharing. It was a tarmac race with some dust. I felt that this gravel race route was more thought for pro cyclists that are comfortable with the road. I find it a pity that it was not a technical gravel race. I would love to see their skills on real gravel and also an important remark that the elevation was almost nothing compared with the Millau gravel race in France or in Houffalize in Belgium and others competitions of this season. UCI should think about this matter.

[roberthealey]

Shooting straight as always, and I think all five points were spot on the mark - at least if we want a gravel worlds more true to the spirit. Is this possible with the UCI involved? Probably not unfortunately. 😢

[robbchastain]

I'm enjoying the banter over all of this, Ben, all the tips and thoughts to help the UCI get dialed on gravel. And why not a two-event series in the spirit of the Motocross des Nations to declare a Gravel World Champion, with one race hosted by a European nation and one hosted by the Home of Gravel. And a multi-class, pro-am field with that come-as-you-are vibe of last weekend. No gravel bike, no problem, just run a road bike. Or on second thought, make it rough enough to require a proper gravel bike. Those bikes are beautiful and it's messing with my head, roadies getting rowdy on their regular bikes. And it could all be the party the UCI is looking for. 😀

[ilanpi]

I agree with many of your points. In particular, in my opinion, Paris-Tours last Sunday had more selective gravel than "gravel worlds" and was a more interesting race. At UCI gravel worlds, the winners and most of the top 10 in the men's and women's races were doing their first gravel race, as far as I can tell, which indicates that it was designed to cater to road racers (Sina Frei has been riding road). An issue you do not bring up is aero bars, which is the actual most hotly debated component in "real" gravel racing, here they were obviously not permitted, contrary to every other gravel race. The UCi here is doing its own thing regarding components. I would have been tempted to ride the thing on a full on tri-bike, which I assume you can use for real gravel races. This type of conflict occurred in the late 80's when the UCI decided to take over mountain biking. Regarding your points, I thought that Eroica was Strade Bianche. Finally, and most importantly, you failed to mention Puck Mooner, who finished 24th, after being definitively dropped in the first two kilometers.

[gabrielbyrne]

Awesome. A huge part of any gravel race is that you will be on the wrong bike/tire/gear for some portion(s) and choosing wisely. The fully-self supported nature forces you to make risk/reward decisions with tires, line choice, how much crap you carry and how hard you attack the descents. A few years back Carl Decker, who can really haul the mail downhill, talked about riding super conservatively on the Lost and Found descents to preserve his tires. This UCI race had none of that.

[CM-ftep]

I'd be very curious if you did one of these about all the ways existing events could improve, since they've been held up as the paragons of 'gravel spirit'.

-basic rider safety
-overlapping fields making spectating/televising basically impossible
-self navigation
-dangers of racing on open roads
-high entry fees for not very much

[robbchastain]

Great idea, Ben, the Bike Path Worlds and I'll bring my Sting-Ray for the over-60 class. And what's not to love about the pros showing up for a gravel race on their road bikes? A little something different for the marketing department to explain. 😀

[ilanpi]

Cycling News just published an article explaining that the front rows for the race were determined by MTB and CX world cup points, but not on the UCI Gravel Series points. That pretty much sums it up...

[carlosflanders]

The fact is that Womens Elite gravel racing in the US is a motor pacing race where the pace is set by the men and also bringing along stronger riders to pace you, carry spares and supplies and save time in aid stations is tolerated. Congrats to the UCI for putting on a separate Womens race where we saw some real eyeballs out racing, mano a mano, with chase groups working together to catch leaders and leaders working to keep a gap and drop those not working. Real racing and not motor pacing. I thought it was an excellent race with real racers who were rewarded for aggressive moves. Lasted the same duration as the World Road race and with much harder effort. Ben knows very well why it wasn't the same length as the Mens - it's for the same reason that road races are different lengths, even cx races and IP on the track. 80% of the mens race is more than adequate for a cracking race - no reason to extend the womens race to nearly 6 hours. UCI came up with a very competitive race format that also looked great on TV and was a great advertisement for womens racing. Can only attract more sponsors to womens racing and enhance the sport. Mens race could have done with being longer and harder.

[tonyoswald]

Chiara Teocchi [3rd women's] had a saddlebag and inflator/sealant can taped to her seatpost, Oss [2nd men's] had the same aerosol can strapped to his post. One of the GBR elite women had a Lauf fork. UCI mandates city laps for their approved course designs and I think has contracted the final to the same location for the next 2 years - but you might want to double check that. In my part of Yorkshire my gravel rides look almost identical - minus the fortifications - and those, plus the WC route I suspect, are completely different beasts in the rain.

[rudyelizondo]

Oh yeah man, I agree with you 100%! Do an extended strade bianchi or better yet a Paris Roubaix mixed with gravrel, now that would be a real tuff challenge!!

[maartends]

it's also hard because uci wants a live broadcast and on litle bits of single track or in forests thats dificult

[anthonyharris]

"Bike path" championships is exactly right

[itsianwood]

I totally agree. I was very disappointed with this race and I heard that it'll be the same next year too before it starts moving to other countries.