An Instant Classic
American Road Racing at its Best in West Virginia
It only took about ninety seconds of race time for both national championship road races to reach a fever pitch. After just a brief rollout on flat road the riders crossed the bridge over the Kanawha River and immediately started trading blows on the double digit gradients of the Bridge Rd. climb. Within minutes of the start, dozens of riders dangled off the back of the peloton and the favorites began to enter the fray. From there, each of the two major climbs per lap, Bridge Rd. and Wertz Ave., added a plot point in what would become tense, action-packed thrillers all the way to the finish line in both races.
Just a brief reminder of what the courses looked like:
The Women: One Moment Changes Everything
On each of the first three climbs of the women’s race, the field was cut almost in half. By the time riders descended off of Bridge Rd. on the second lap, there were barely twenty contenders left at the front. After that, the race dynamic seemed to switch from vicious attrition to a more tactical battle as teams with multiple riders still in the group began to trade attacks.
Fount Cycling Guild, coming off their heart stopping podium ride by Elizabeth Dixon in the criterium earlier in the week, were the most aggressive in those early moves. On the flat three-miles run along the riverfront between each climb, their riders Katherine Gregoriou, Alia Shafi and, of course, Dixon, launched several times in an effort to pull out a tactical advantage. The lesser known Goldman Sachs-ETFs team also invested in promising moves on back-to-back laps. Each move was different, many were solo attempts and some were joined by World Tour riders. The result was always the same, the powerful figure of Lauren De Crescenzo hauling the field back to the attackers.
De Crescenzo, a perennial force on the gravel racing circuit, was perhaps the strongest rider in the field on Sunday and had a massive impact in the first two hours of racing. On the flats, I don’t think I ever saw here in the draft of another rider for more than a handful of seconds. If an attack was made, she was the first to hit the wind to claw it back. When the pace lulled, she went to the front to apply horsepower. She displayed huge strength on the climbs, dropping riders without ever seeming to even get out of the saddle as she ground away at her own tempo.
It was an impressive display, but tactically it was a questionable use of energy in such an elite field. Every time De Crescenzo closed down an attack on her own, it was to the benefit of riders like EF-Education First Cannondale’s Kristen Faulkner and Human Powered Health's Rachel Edwards who didn’t have to use their precious few teammates to close the gaps. De Crescenzo’s relentless chasing effectively rode early attackers out of the race, making their efforts completely futile-Fount’s only finisher was Dixon in thirteenth. Inevitably, De Crescenzo faltered under the strain of this racing style in the final miles but still finished an impressive fifth. I can’t be the only one who thinks she may have won if she played a more cagey game in the first fifty miles.
The defining moment of the women’s race was foreshadowed as early as the first descent off of the Bridge Rd. climb. Faulkner took the downhill bends in a class of her own, calmly clipping apexes with apparent ease as the field scrambled to stay on her wheel.
In the closing laps, Lauren Stephens and her Cynisca team looked to have the race right where they wanted it as she and strong teammates like Nicole Steinmetz pushed the pace up each climb and reduced the group to single digits. Stephens seemed to be the strongest climber and was in position to deal the coup de grace to the competition on the final lap’s climbs.
That possibility evaporated in the blink of an eye on the penultimate descent off the Wertz Rd. climb as Faulkner railed the final corner and accelerated hard. Edwards closed the gap and added even more pace. Stephens seemed to hesitate slightly and a five-foot gap became thirty. She dug in hard recognizing the threat and held the World Tour duo there for what seemed like an eternity. But it was too late, the damage had been done. Faulkner and Edwards disappeared up the road and Stephens was weighed down by EF’s Coryn Labecki who stuck to her wheel.
Despite the thousands of feet of climbing, the race was decided on that seemingly innocuous downhill stretch. Faulkner would outduel Edwards for a solo victory and Labecki completed her flawless teammate performance with a clinical sprint for third. Stephens would have to settle for fourth ahead of only seventeen other finishers in the most brutal and breathtaking nationals road race in recent memory.
The Men: The Stars Shine Through
If Project Echelon wasn’t feeling the pressure of expectation before nationals week, they definitely were after their incredible 1-2-3 finish in Friday night’s criterium. From the first miles of the road race, they seemed to be cutting through the chaos and executing their plan to perfection. The first breakaways of the race were driven by riders like Visma-Lease a Bike Development’s Colby Simmons and gravel powerhouse Brennan Wertz of Mosaic Cycles,but always had at least one strong Echelon rider along for the ride.
The World Tour favorites like Brandon McNulty of UAE and Neilson Powless and Sean Quinn of EF Education First, remained in the ever shrinking field. It was a certainty that they would make an attack to bridge the gap, but that would be to Echelon’s advantage as team leader, Tyler Stites, could tag on and get a free ride up to his teammates in the break. But as Powless launched across to the front of the race with apparent ease, Stites remained behind. The World Tour riders like McNulty, Quinn, Craddock as well Legion’s resurgent squad of Murphy, Granigan and Carpenter followed suit but Stites never appeared on the broadcast.
If there was any doubt that the elite selection of the race had been made, it was erased when the chase group approached the next ascent of Bridge Rd. some three minutes back engaged in conversation rather than pace making. Stites had fallen victim to a rare off-day in an otherwise dazzling 2024 campaign and Echelon would have to rely on other weapons like Scott McGill and Stephen Bassett who were at the front of the race.
The laps that followed were a mix of daring long-range attacks and surprisingly cohesive group riding. On such a hard course, obviously suited to the power and durability of World Tour stars like McNulty and Powless, it was surprising to see almost every one of the dozen or so riders in the selection taking pulls on the front. Perhaps this was in an effort to keep the peace and ensure a top finish, but I would have expected less cooperation from domestic riders with opponents who specialize in searing efforts in the fifth and sixth hours of a race.
In the final laps, the lead group was reduced to five, then four and finally three with a handful of miles left to the finish. Aevolo’s Gavin Hlady finally fell off the pace on the penultimate lap, capping a spectacular effort that led to a sixth place finish after winning the U23 championship the day before. Echelon’s Scott McGill was the next off the back near the top of the final Bridge Rd. climb after hours of gritty, world-class racing on his part.
This left only McNulty, Quinn, and Powless to contest the podium spots. The EF riders attempted to use their numbers advantage to attack McNulty incessantly in the final ten miles. But they seemed almost hesitant in many of these moves, almost accepting that McNulty would pull them back. They probably knew that they could only hope to fatigue the time trial national champion and couldn’t realistically escape his seemingly automatic five-hundred watt closing pace.
As the trio entered the final corners through downtown Charleston, Powless made a final full gas attempt to breakaway. McNulty took his time to respond and there was an eerie moment of calm after he caught on for the final time as the riders anticipated the sprint. McNulty appeared to be winning his heads up drag race with Powless but Quinn bolted out of the UAE rider’s draft at the last possible moment to take the victory by the width of a carbon rim. Scott McGill grabbed fourth for Echelon, an inspiring result that will buoy the team when they aim for the title again at next year’s race
It was a stunning end to more than eight hours of captivating racing action on the day and a fitting climax for a nationals that in my mind, has to be considered an instant classic. EF-Education First closed the deal and took both titles but both races came down to the final finishing straight. It was truly wall-to-wall action and a much needed reminder of just how spectacular road racing can be on North American soil.
