Do gravel race participants care about "lining up with the pros"?

[BRad704]

Originally Posted by shoota

No chance Bobby will do a staggered start. It's not in keeping with the spirit of gravel

I don't think Bobby's voice could last through 3 starts in 1 day.

Originally Posted by Alistair

This makes the most sense. The only problem is you’d have to cap the men’s pro field to avoid the slower men being caught by the fastest women (which puts us back at square one - men impacting the women’s race). Looking at Sea Otter 2024, you’d have to cap around ~50 men - men in the mid-50s were slower than the women’s winner.

As for me, as a barely mid-pack age-group nobody, I like the atmosphere of mass start and having the pros on course at the same time. If they start 20 minutes ahead of me that makes no difference. The only time I see them is neutral rollout and when they lap me.

Originally Posted by spoonrobot

The fastest amateur men are as fast as the lead pack of pro/elite women and 10 minutes isn't enough time. The top 20 non pro/elite men at Unbound 2023 would be intermingled with the top 10 pro/elite women. The issue is that the outspoken (maybe majority of?) pro women don't want to have any tactics with the men, they don't want to race with them at all.

Once the women get 3-5 miles on their own to ride together and take inventory of who to watch in their own women's field, I think getting pulled into men's groups becomes part of the tactics. At least they can't say "I didn't even know where So-and-So was until halfway when they told me I was in 3rd place" (paraphrasing...).