Former U23 ITT national champion takes aim at elite title after Speed Week relegation leads to runner-up finish
Michael Garrison (MGR p/b NICH SpeedClub) retained the Speed Week lead with a fifth place at Spin the District: Union City Criterium on April 30, 2024(Image credit: Adam Koble / USA Crits and Speed Week)
Former US under-23 time trial national champion Michael Garrison loves to go all out. He demonstrated that this past week by taking second overall at USA Speed Week, battling multi-rider squads from REIGN Storm Racing, Ribble Rebellion and others as a one-man show with MGR p/b NICH SpeedClub.
His season has consisted of a totally new configuration for training and racing, where he moved from four structured seasons with Hagens Berman Axeon and launched a solo career with a mix of mountain bike, gravel and road events. For the US Pro Road National Championships, he plans to bring fresh legs and renewed enthusiasm with a chance to upend defending champion Brandon McNulty (UAE Team Emirates) in a week’s time.
“So for US Pro, I'm excited for everything. I’m not the likes of McNulty, but I’m good,” Garrison told Cyclingnews about targeting a top finish in the race against the clock in one week. “I've won a national championship in the TT as under-23. This year, I’m fresher and more excited. I'm the fittest I've ever been because I'm the happiest I've ever been, with so much variation through the training and the racing.”
The Decatur, Georgia native has four medals in the ITT at US nationals, spread across years as a junior and U23 rider, the most recent the gold three years ago as the U23 champion.
Like 2023 in his first foray in elite competitions, Garrison will compete across all three disciplines at Pro Road Nationals in the men’s elite categories, the ITT taking place on Wednesday, May 15. He will also line up for the pro criterium on Friday night, May 17, and the road race on Sunday afternoon.
“Really, I think what's so exciting about this program is my training is diverse and my racing is diverse. And there's this childlike wonder of, you know, anything is possible. Even though the work I'm doing, where the balance some days means I can't train as much, I'm fresher and more excited,” the 22-year-old said.
Garrison said his independent programme not only allowed him to have “the most diverse calendar US racing has ever seen”, especially when compared to his former road-focused campaign. Off-road this spring, he won the Southern Cross mountain bike race and Border Wars gravel in early spring, then competed in “a blur of a weekend” with three consecutive race days at Sea Otter Classic, a DNF at Fuego XL 100k followed by second on the road in the Circuit Race and third back on dirt in Fuego cross-county.
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The USA Crits series, and the overlapping Speed Week collection of criteriums, eight races in 11 days, gave him the road competition he wanted, though he was not looking at an overall title, at first. But after making the decisive break in each of the first three Speed Week races - Greenville Cycling Classic, Spartanburg Criterium and Athens Twilight Criterium - he realised the overall was possible. After the fourth event at Curiosity Lab Criterium in Peachtree Corners, Georgia, he was the individual leader, slightly ahead of REIGN Storm Racing’s Alfredo Rodriguez.
The second half of Speed Week saw him keep the lead, lose the lead, and then because of a relegation due to a prohibited wheel change, his epic ‘David and Goliath” series victory faded to a second place overall.
Michael Garrison wore the USA Speed Week leader's jersey for two races (Image credit: Adam Koble / USA Crits and Speed Week)
“I won the series with my legs. Because I took a wheel from another team, which is against the rules and could result in a fine or warning, the jury chose a relegation to the back of the field. So the result was overturned on a technicality. I feel the relegation wasn’t necessary, but I should have taken the neutral wheel.”
Garrison was just 12 laps from winning a team-based Speed Week competition as a solo rider. But he had a puncture and pulled into the pit for a neutral wheel and the free lap. Matt Bostock of Ribble Rebellion was in the pit due to a crash, and he offered Garrison his wheel, which, according to Garrison, had a much better tyre suited to the rainy conditions and “I would’ve done the same for him”.
The REIGN Storm Racing duo of Rodriguez and Jordan Parra would surround Garrison on the final podium, Rodriguez on the top step.
“To feel like what was a win at Speed Week based on my legs is great. Again, it's frustrating. But the amount of support I've received, the people that have watched the live stream [Speed Week], and the people that have told me I've inspired them to get back on their bikes again, is it's been absolutely incredible,” Garrison said. “My kind of ethos around bike racing is I'm so passionate about it, and I love to go out and race, as hard as I can.”
Garrison put together his stable of corporate supporters, led by strategic consultancy and creative agency NICH out of Atlanta, and a retail and membership-based experience, SpeedClub, as well as Aptos and SnapCare. He still rides BMC bikes but has a new purpose for riding as he wants to engage more with his fans and supporters.
Time for rest after US Pro? No. He next travels to Winston-Salem, North Carolina for the sixth and final event in the USA Crits series, where he is third in the individual standings behind REIGN’s Rodriguez and Roderyck Asconeguy Diaz of MC Cycling. Then he stays on drop bars but with a set up for a second appearance at Unbound Gravel 200. In his Unbound debut in 2023 he finished 25th overall in the pro men’s division.
Jackie has been involved in professional sports for more than 30 years in news reporting, sports marketing and public relations. She founded Peloton Sports in 1998, a sports marketing and public relations agency, which managed projects for Tour de Georgia, Larry H. Miller Tour of Utah and USA Cycling. She also founded Bike Alpharetta Inc, a Georgia non-profit to promote safe cycling. She is proud to have worked in professional baseball for six years - from selling advertising to pulling the tarp for several minor league teams. On the bike, she has climbed l'Alpe d'Huez three times (not fast), and spends time on gravel around horse farms in north Georgia.
