When the second annual USA Biking Gravel Nationwide Championships return to Nebraska this September, the elite racers shall be vying not only for the coveted title and Stars and Stripes jersey however for some chilly, laborious money besides.
At this time, the Nationwide Federation introduced that the elite races may have a $40,000 prize purse. Whereas that is fairly a bit lower than final yr’s $60,000 prize purse, additionally it is considerably greater than most of the prime gravel occasions, like Unbound Gravel and Large Sugar, which supply no money prize in any respect, or SBT GRVL with its $22,000 mixed prize purse.
“We’re happy to supply a $40,000 prize purse for the Elite races, with an equal pay out for women and men. As a company, we’re dedicated to supporting the game of gravel racing, and this prize purse is testomony to that,” mentioned Kyle Knott, USA Biking’s Director of Nationwide Occasions.
The highest three finishers within the males’s and girls’s elite classes may also mechanically qualify to compete towards the world’s finest on the UCI Gravel World Championships in Belgium in October, with full help from USA Biking.
The 2024 USA Biking Gravel Nationwide Championships shall be held on Sunday, September 8, in Gering, Nebraska. Along with the elite classes, there shall be numerous age teams, para fields, a non-binary race, and a single-speed class. Podium finishers in these novice classes may also punch their tickets to the world championships, albeit with the help of USA Biking.
This yr’s programs are equivalent to final yr’s and are held on an enormous community of filth miles in Nebraska’s Landmark Nation. All programs characteristic no less than 90 p.c gravel and vary from 131.1 miles right down to 24.8 miles for the youth classes.
The lengthy course shall be contested by the elite, non-binary and singlespeed classes in addition to agree teams 19 by 49. The boys’s and girls’s elite races may have their very own begin occasions however race on the identical course. The route encompasses a bumpy profile with 5,715 toes of elevation acquire and a downhill, paved run-in to the end. The official course maps may be discovered right here.
The inaugural occasion drew extremely aggressive fields for elites and amateurs alike, with gravel execs like Keegan Swenson, Alexey Vermeulen, Pete Stetina, Payson McElveen, Lauren De Crescenzo, and Lauren Stephens vying for first-time honours and a slice of the substantial prize purse.
The primary-ever nationwide titles had been received by Keegan Swenson (Santa Cruz Bicycles/SRAM), and former U.S. nationwide street champion Lauren Stephens (then of EF-Schooling Tibco-SVB,now Cynisca Biking). Each represented the USA on the 2023 UCI Gravel World Championships, the place they completed fifth and sixth, respectively.
Registration for the USA Biking Gravel Nationwide Championships is now open and may be discovered right here.
