Unbound is one of the biggest things in cycling now, but I struggle to be interested in a race I can’t see

Adam Becket

News editor at Cycling Weekly, Adam brings his weekly opinion on the goings on at the upper echelons of our sport. This piece is part of The Leadout, a newsletter series from Cycling Weekly and Cyclingnews. To get this in your inbox, subscribe here. As ever, email adam.becket@futurenet.com - should you wish to add anything, or suggest a topic.

Kansas is known for many things. Err, there’s the Wizard of Oz, Brown v. Board of Education, being the home of Pizza Hut. Once a year, however, there is a new reason this Midwest US state attracts attention: Unbound Gravel.

The event has gone from being a strange and slightly unique event to one of the biggest things in cycling, a Mecca for the industry, for those among us who like big adventures. It’s where the hottest gravel tech is shown off, where the best gravel professionals, semi-pros and amateurs can all compete on the same stage, and it’s a huge deal.

At the weekend, Lachlan Morton and Rosa Klöser won the elite blue riband race, the Unbound 200, but a few thousand more descended on Emporia, Kansas, to either take part or join the carnival of off-road racing.

It’s clearly influential. It has been the most read-about thing on Cycling Weekly and Cyclingnews over the last week, and worth its weight in gold in terms of stories, from those about the bike industry to little nuggets. I love that the women’s race was won by Klöser, a German PhD student, and that Morton was successful. As our North American editor Anne Marije-Rook - who was covering the event live on the ground - noted, he’s the "people’s favourite".

I know it’s important. The interest is clear from the numbers, and from the plethora of inspiring stories brought to us by Rook. And yet, personally, I struggle to truly get swept away by the spectacle of the off-road peloton. 

That’s partly because I am a road cyclist at heart, and so that’s what I drift towards. It’s also because I grew up with an innate love of road racing, and I understand this, it’s what I like, so anything that’s different to that feels a bit odd, and I don’t welcome it with open arms. Gravel is the coming thing, and yet I feel a bit cold about it; I’m the Test cricket fan as Twenty20 rolls along, I’m the person defending the familiar in the face of the new. I am, perhaps, sliding into becoming the older generation. 

The Critérium du Dauphiné, the key Tour de France warm-up race, is happening this week, and that’s much more my speed - the best road racers in the world on the mountains of France. Yet I know that I’m not necessarily in the majority, especially not in the USA, where gravel is king. 

I know that elite gravel racing is no longer simply ex-road WorldTour professionals trying to stretch out their time on two wheels and that it is just a different form of cycling (although, Greg Van Avermaet did finish seventh) . I should love it. I think it’s great that it’s much more inclusive than road racing; basically, anyone can sign up and race, and you would be alongside the elites. It feels, refreshingly, a lot more mass participation, like a marathon, rather than exclusive as the WorldTour is.

Perhaps the greatest barrier to piquing my interest is the fact that the event is not readily available to view on my television. I can watch every stage of the Dauphiné pretty much in my time zone, at a time that is convenient to me, and crucially I understand it and know the main players too. 

The TV coverage aspect feels like the biggest issue with gravel racing right now. As domestic road racing in the UK has found, it’s difficult to get a large audience engaged with a sport if it can’t be viewed via a professional broadcast.

With gravel’s growing popularity, perhaps in time, all this will change - it may not be long before I can become captivated by the sight of dirt-stained riders zooming along peanut butter trails. As it is, the Tour de France, the Classics, they remain the pinnacle of bike racing for me. It might be a while until that changes. Sorry Kansas, I know that all of cycling has its eyes on you - and for good reason - but for me, you’re still just the home of the  Wizard of Oz, for now. 

This piece is part of The Leadout, the offering of newsletters from Cycling Weekly and Cyclingnews. To get this in your inbox, subscribe here.

If you want to get in touch with Adam, email adam.becket@futurenet.com.