Unbound Gravel 200: Massive climbing and new safety measures added for 2024 event

Among the changes for this year’s Life Time Unbound Gravel presented by Mazda are new roads, more climbing and a dedicated finish chute for riders in the 200-mile event, which takes centre stage on June 1, 2024. 

The signature event for the weekend, Unbound Gravel 200, is considered one of the most difficult yet prestigious gravel races in the world and attracts an all-star cast of international riders. The 2024 course comes in at 202.9 miles with 11,850 feet of elevation gain, making it 2.6 miles shorter than last year but packing in close to 2,750 more feet of elevation gain. 

Unbound 200 serves as the second stop in the Life Time Grand Prix presented by Mazda, and is the longest course in the collection of seven off-road races. With the global focus on the 200-miler and points on the line for the Grand Prix field, organisers used feedback from athletes to amend both the start and finish procedures, including a 1.5-mile road closure and a dedicated path for a race recently defined with sprint finishes.

“It was feedback from the elite women, and it was lessons we learned from the first time we tried it last year, but we didn't get it quite right,” Kristi Mohn, Unbound Gravel's marketing manager, told Cyclingnews about decluttering the start of Unbound 200. 

“I think that's one thing I love about our team is that not only are we listening to the feedback, but we're all athletes ourselves. We've experienced these events and these start lines, and so we try to learn from mistakes and make improvements. That start time is an adjustment from trying to do it last year, and OK, that wasn't quite it. I think [this time]  it'll be good.”

At the start last year the elite women departed two minutes behind the elite men, then the avalanche of amateurs took off another eight minutes later. It only took a few miles for many enthusiastic amateurs to mix with the elite women and congestion occurred a several pinchpoints on the course, including a muddy climb at mile 11.

This time out, the elite women will start five minutes after the elite men, taking on the rugged roads of Kansas at 6:05 a.m. CDT, and the rest of the 200-mile field will depart at 6:30 a.m., providing a significant cushion for the elites to position at the front. 

For all riders in the 200-mile distance, a dedicated finish chute in downtown Emporia will be added. This will allow amateurs in the shorter routes to still finish on the same path but without adding congestion when the elite riders typically sprint to the finish. All competitors will enter Emporia on Merchant Street for the punchy paved climb on Highland Hill, avoiding turns through Emporia State University’s campus, and follow side-by-side lanes across the finish on Commercial Street.

“It felt better to remove the jaunt through campus because of the congestion that can happen there. So we are going all the way up Highland Hill to 12th Avenue, alongside the university. We are working towards providing a separate experience at the same finish line for the 200 milers and the other shorter distances,” Mohn said. 

“So we are going all the way up Highland Hill to 12th Avenue. So they'll be going right, right alongside the university. In fact, athletes will have a protected finish coming out of Highland, all the way to the finish line.”

It is the first time finish lanes have been used to this extent, which will separate the 200-milers from the other competitors for 1.5 miles. 

While last year’s women’s winner Carolin Schiff finished 15 minutes ahead of previous winner Sofia Gomez Villafañe as the women’s elite champion, she crossed the line among a large number of riders in the 100-mile division. The last three editions of the men’s Unbound 200 has come down to a sprint finish, last year Keegan Swenson reaching the line first in a seven-rider showdown. 

The route

Across 18 editions of the 200-mile race, the course has ventured north of Emporia several times, but only twice, 2019 and 2021, has it stretched as far north as Alma, which on roads suited for motor vehicles is 53 miles north of the start line. 

Riders will depart downtown Emporia under police escort, traveling north into Wabaunsee and Morris Counties. The single-loop format follows primitive roads strewn with tyre-slicing flint and chunky rocks across washed-out gullies and unrelenting punchy climbs, and less than 8% of the route on pavement. 

“We always say it's death by 1000 paper cuts. You finish one, and you think OK, and then you get to the peak of that hill and you're like, holy crap there's another seven you see rolling out in front of you,” Mohn said about the endless climbing. No, Kansas is not flat.

“It's the cumulative effect of a hill after a hill after a hill after a hill. And then you add the fact that a lot of them are chunky and rocky. There's no smooth line, so it just takes more to get it done.”

One of the hardest sections she said will be Divide Road, which hits at mile 45.5. The road has been used before, but “the condition is not in great shape”. Mohn described it as “there is an unknown component up until the race morning, and that is Mother Nature [at work]”. 

Most of the climbing, she said, comes in the first half of the route that includes the new Prairie View Road climb before the town of Alma, the first checkpoint of the race at mile 70.

“A section of rollers coming into Alma, that is where we’ve gained that climbing. That’s going to be the meat and potatoes in that north section,” she emphasised. 

The western route from Alma is also new and hillier than ever before with the addition of the Volland Road climb. The route skirts to the east of Alta Vista and will have a second and final checkpoint at mile 148 at Council Grove.

29 miles later is the longest climb on the route at Lake Kahola, an open stretch where the wind can create havoc. From there it is relatively flat to the final paved section at Highland Hill and the finish on Commercial Street.

This year Life Time will provide extended race highlights which will be posted on the official Life Time Grand Prix YouTube channel within 48 hours of the race’s conclusion. Cyclingnews will be on site for news reports, tech gallery and full race coverage.

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