Lauren De Crescenzo (Cinch Elite) has already won a title at the Gravel Worlds in Nebraska and now aims for the UCI Gravel World Championships title as one of five elite women added to the national roster by USA Cycling.
De Crescenzo joins Cinch teammate Holly Mathews, EF Education-TIBCO-SVB teammates Lauren Stephens and Emily Newsom and Sarah Sturm (Specialized/ Rapha/ Wahoo) on the US team. Alex Howes (EF Education-EasyPost) leads the men’s elite roster, joined by Mat Stephens, Jacob Peterson and David Van Orsdel.
These nine athletes will join 49 other US riders who will compete at the inaugural gravel competition, October 6-7 in Veneto, Italy, after they earned qualification at UCI-sanctioned gravel events or through a petition process for amateur age categories.
The elite women, women’s age groups, and men’s 50+ categories will race on Saturday, October 8 on a 140km course that features 69% gravel. The elite men and under-49 age groups will race Sunday on the same route but the elite men will face an additional 25km final circuit completed twice for 190km. In the elite men’s contest, gravel represents 73% of the course.
The US has a stacked women’s team in the elite categories, led by Sturm and De Crescenzo. Sturm is currently second overall on the women’s leaderboard of the Life Time Grand Prix series. Having completed the first five events, with one to go in the series. Sturm was second overall at Crusher in the Tushar, had two fourth-place finishes at Leadville 100 MTB and Chequamegon MTB Festival, and was fifth at Unbound Gravel 200.
Cinch Cycling’s Holly Mathews supported Lauren De Crescenzo in her GC win at Tour of the Gila and a silver medal at the US pro road race championship. De Crescenzo then went off the road and took a second women’s title on the black course at SBT GRVL this year, after finishing second at Unbound Gravel 200, then took the title at Gravel Worlds. Mathews, who won The Rift Gravel in 2021, finished 16th at Unbound 200 and 10th at SBT GRVL.
EF Education-TIBCO-SVB teammates Emily Newsom and Lauren Stephens also had success across multiple disciplines.
Newsom, who finished 12th at US Pro in the road race and sixth in the ITT, was third overall at this year’s Unbound Gravel 200 and seventh at Crusher in the Tushar, then adding third at Gravel Locos in Pueblo, Colorado in early October. She is seventh overall in the Life Time series.
Stephens, who was strong at US Pro Road Nationals with the bronze medal in the…
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