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UCI Gravel World Championships 2024: Routes, how to watch and start lists
The third edition of the UCI Gravel World Championships takes place in Belgium this weekend. Slovenian Matej Mohorič will be looking to defend his men’s title against some of the world’s best cyclists from across multiple disciplines including Mathieu van der Poel, and a stacked women’s field includes Lotte Kopecky, Marianne Vos and former champion Pauline Ferrand-Prévot. At the same time, the Gravel World Championships offers amateur racers from across the world a chance to bag a rainbow jersey of their own.
A host of big names from professional road racing, cyclocross, MTB and gravel – though not many from the US this time – are descending on Flanders to fight it out for the sport’s ‘coolest’ rainbow stripes.
The event, and the UCI’s adoption of the discipline, has been controversial as part of the success of gravel racing over the last few years has been the lack of a governing body and the rules, teamification and closed system that tends to follow.
Gravel resisted the UCI to such an extent that there is already a well-established event in the USA called ‘Gravel Worlds’, which is essentially a parody of traditional World Championships.
To attempt to maintain part of this ‘Spirit of Gravel’, the UCI’s #gravelspecific races in the Gravel World Series and World Championships have been drawn up along similar lines to its Gran Fondo events, meaning amateurs have the chance to line up in the same races as professionals. They will wear different coloured race numbers to distinguish them.
Riders are also expected to compete individually rather than in teams, although that is easier said than done, especially given they will be racing in their national colours this weekend. It’s certainly interesting to see how the year-round gravel specialists compare to road pros who will once again dab their hand in gravel. Over the past two years, WorldTour pros have taken the title on the men’s and women’s elite level.
UCI Gravel World Championships 2024: Key information
Dates
Saturday 5th October: Elite Women, all women’s age groups and men’s 50+.
Sunday 6th October: Elite Men and men’s under-49.
Location
The UCI Gravel World Championships takes place in Flanders, Belgium. All races start in the town of Halle and will finish in the university city of Leuven, host of the 2021 UCI Road World Championships.
TV coverage
Live coverage will be broadcast by Eurosport and Discovery+ with coverage hosted by Flemish TV station Sporza, which will be showing the event live in Belgium.
Women’s: 13:00-15:10 BST
Men’s: 13:20-16:30 BST
Former winners
2023 men’s elite: Matej Mohorič (Slovenia)
2023 women’s elite: Kasia Niewiadoma (Poland)
2022 men’s elite: Gianni Vermeersch (Belgium)
2022 women’s elite: Pauline Ferrand-Prévot (France)
UCI Gravel World Championships 2024: Route, profile and surface
There are four slightly different routes to be ridden at this year’s championships. These routes are varied based on age and gender categories. That said, they all start in Halle and end in Leuven, covering the same opening phase of 88km.
The longest continuous gravel sector will be around 5km long which comes in the Brabantse Wouden national park just south of Brussels. Towards the end of the elite races, the riders will negotiate a series of laps around the Meerdaalwoud forest. This circuit is very similar to the one used at the 2023 European Gravel Championships. The approach to the line in Leuven includes the Ramberg cobblestone climb, followed by one final gravel section from 1.5 to 1km from the finish.
For the men, the parcours is 182km in length and 135km long for the elite women. According to the race organisers, 54% of the race is on unpaved roads.
Women elite, men’s 50-64 and women’s 19-49 route
Men 65+ and Women 50+ route
Men 19-49 route
Men elite route
UCI Gravel World Championships 2024: Favourites and start lists
Riders can qualify for the World Championships by competing in UCI Gravel World Series races throughout the year. The top 25% of finishers in each age group category qualify for Worlds and the top three in each one qualify for the championships regardless of the number of entrants.
There are also places for the previous World Champion as well as national champions, such as British champions Connor Swift and Annabel Knight. National Federations also can enter 20 riders across all categories and the host country can enter 40 riders.
Finally, Wild Card entries are available in the Elite categories for riders part of UCI-registered teams, these are ‘at the discretion of the UCI’ but for the most part, this includes road riders who can bypass the usual qualification process.
According to the UCI, ‘the starting order for the elite categories in next week’s World Championships is determined by a combination of points earned in the UCI Gravel World Series, the 2023 UCI Gravel World Championships, and 50% of the points from the UCI rankings in road, mountain bike marathon, mountain bike cross country, and cyclocross.’
Men’s favourites
Defending champion Matej Mohorič of Slovenia is certainly not the favourite to retain his title. He has had a turbulent road season with few headline results. He’ll be hoping this road form doesn’t spill into the gravel tracks of Belgium.
A host of cyclocross stars are taking to the start including Eli Iserbyt, Joris Nieuwenhuis, Michael Vanthourenhout and Laurens Sweeck. However, they will most likely be overshadowed by the presence of reigning UCI Cyclocross World Champion Mathieu van der Poel.
For home interests in Leuven, Jasper Stuyven will start the race as the reigning European Champion. He grew up in Leuven and won on a similar route here at those very championships. He will be joined in baby Belgian blue by riders including Tiesj Benoot, Greg Van Avermaet, Jan Bakelants and Quinten Hermans.
Petr Vakoč, a former QuickStep and Alpecin-Deceunink roadie, will line up as one of the favourites having won the Gravel World Series this year. Paul Voss of Germany will also be a gravel specialist to watch. He rode a strong World Championship last year and has spent the year deeply embedded in the gravel scene. Unbound runner-up and former Giro stage winner Chad Haga from the USA will be expected to compete for a medal this weekend too.
A smattering of WorldTour road pros will be trying their hand off-road including Tim Merlier, Isaac Del Toro, British Gravel Champion Connor Swift, Jan Christen, Matevž Govekar, Luke Lamperti and Jasha Sütterlin.
Women’s favourites
The reigning champion Kasia Niewiadoma will not return to defend her title, so it’s wide open.
The winner of this year’s Unbound Gravel Rosa Klöser and the winner of the women’s Gravel World Series Carolin Schiff will be the headline name from the gravel world. Lauren Stephens will be leading for the US team alongside Morgan Aguirre. Stephens won the US Gravel Championships last month and has spent the past week in Zürich tuning up at the UCI Road World Championships.
The women’s start list will be bolstered by road World Champion Lotte Kopecky of Belgium who has stated that ‘she has never raced on gravel’. She has won Strade Bianche in the past, however, a road race that covers gravel tracks. Mountain bike superstar and Tour de France Femmes stage winner Puck Pieterse will star for the Netherlands alongside European road and gravel champion Lorena Wiebes. Other cross-discipline names include former UCI Cyclocross World Champions Sanne Cant, Lucinda Brand and Fem van Empel. Plus, it is expected that Marianne Vos will attempt to win a gravel world title to add to her cyclocross, track and road titles.
WorldTour pros to watch for also include Silvia Persico, Shirin van Anrooij, Yara Kastelijn, Riejanne Markus, Neve Bradbury, Emma Norsgaard, Alison Jackson, Justine Ghekiere and Sarah Gigante.
Find the full start lists for all races here.
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