A change of colour on the trees and foliage in the US beckons the end of road racing season, and it is also brings a change of racing surfaces. Jordi Meeus and Cian Uijtdebroeks, Belgian teammates at Bora-Hansgrohe, made the trip to Arkansas to "the remote and rugged highlands of the Ozark Mountains", as the team described it, to compete in the second edition of Big Sugar Gravel on Saturday.
Uijtdebroeks said the event comes at the end of a longer trip to the United States where he and his teammate were doing wind tunnel testing.
"We are really excited to go off road this weekend," the Belgian winner of the Tour de l'Avenir said in a video.
"It won't be easy because it's the first time that me and Jordi will do a gravel race but we are really excited about it, and we really want to go for it from the start. We're excited to see how the other competitors are because we don't know them. We're full of motivation to go for it. Fingers crossed for tomorrow."
They aren't the only WorldTour pros with the gravel bug and a sense of adventure. QuickStep-AlphaVinyl will be represented by three riders in Arkansas - Tour of Flanders winner Kasper Asgreen, Mattia Cattaneo and the team's top finisher at Il Lombardia, 13th, Ilan van Wilder. Rémi Cavagna was expected to make the trip but will not be on the start line Saturday.
While none of these riders are part of the Life Time Grand Prix series which concludes on Saturday, both QuickStep-AlphaVinyl and Bora-Hansgrohe are supported by Specialized, who rolled out their new gravel bike, the Diverge STR, this week. The QuickTrip contingency will use Arkansas as a pit stop en route to their turn for wind tunnel testing with Specialized in Morgan Hills, California.
"They are just using the opportunity to come to the US to do this event, for fun," said team coach Koen Pelgrim in downtown Bentonville. "It's a nice, big race and it fit in well with dates after the season." No, he confirmed that the trio of riders are not looking to add a gravel schedule to racing in 2023.
Other notable riders from the road to start Big Sugar include the EF Education-EasyPost duo of Lachlan Morton and Alex Howes, both of whom are in the hunt for the men's top 10 in the Life Time Grand Prix series. Morton is seventh overall in the men's standings, 28 points behind series leader Keegan Swenson. His best results was fifth at Leadville 100 MTB, which Swenson won. Howes is 11th in the series, just 10 points behind his teammate.
Michael Garrison (Hagens Berman Axeon), Lance Haidet (L39ION of Los Angeles), Eddie Anderson (Alpecin-Deceuninck), Griffin Easter and John Keller (Team Illuminate) also will trade their slicks for knobby tyres on Saturday, along with Emily Newsom (EF Education-TIBCO-SVB) from the women's pro peloton.
Other former WorldTour pros will be racing the series finale in Arkansas, including Peter Stetina, Laurens ten Dam, Kiel Reijnen, Amber Neben and Ruth Winder.
Cyclingnews will have full coverage from Big Sugar Gravel.
