Rebecca's Private Idaho: Stetina takes lead for men in gravel stage race

Peter Stetina won the opening round of the Queen's Stage Race at Rebecca's Private Idaho gravel race, taking a 2:36 advantage over two-time defending champion Joshua Berry. In third place for the men was Colin Strickland, who was the 2019 champion of the one-day Baked Potato gravel event. Stetina completed the 43.3-mile course at Sun Valley in 2:40:47.

In the women's division, Rose Grant, the two-time Leadville 100 MTB champion, took top honours on stage 1. In second place was Moriah Wilson, 4:29 back, and Serena Gordon in third, 9:19 back. Grant covered the course in just under three hours, 2:59:27, giving it high marks on her Instagram feed as, "it really was a mountain bikers dream with 16 miles of single track!"

Now in its ninth year, RPI Queen's Stage race is set in the Ketchum and Sun Valley, Idaho area, with three stages over four days for a total of 196 miles and 12,464 feet of elevation gain.

Stage 1 began at the iconic Galena Lodge, with athletes wondering if the race would take place at all. Recent wildfires in the western United States caused smoke to fill the air in the Ketchum area, but soon cleared for the competition to begin. 

"It was an eerie scene of devastation from recent fires, blanketed in a layer of brown smoke from current fires blowing in from other regions," Strickland posted on his Instagram feed.

Stage 2 will take place Friday with a 20-mile neutral roll-out from start, then there will be a 4.5-mile uphill time trial. Then the top 10 riders in each category will ride the TT, spaced at 30-second intervals. Organisers will have the rest of each field "line up and start when they wish at 15-second intervals."