Inside the UCI Gravel World Series: Why Elite Women Still Don’t Have a Fair Race
- James Ion
- Nov 6
- 9 min read
Words James Ion - Photography provided by different sources (see credit)
UCI Gravel World Series Women's search for Fairness
Since its launch in 2022, the UCI Gravel World Series has given amateur cyclists a way to race inside a professional-style structure — the first attempt to turn gravel’s free-form spirit into a global, points-based calendar.
Alongside independent movements like the Gravel Earth Series and the Life Time Grand Prix, it forms part of a rapidly maturing ecosystem: thousands of riders, 25 events across five continents, and an official UCI World Championships at season’s end.
It’s a remarkable achievement for such a young discipline. But for the elite women competing at the sharp end of the UCI gravel world series, the structure built to democratise gravel has exposed deep flaws regarding fairness. Collisions, blurred finishes and inconsistent starts have left riders questioning what kind of series this really is.
From organisers juggling permits and politics to the UCI’s cautious approach to regulation, this investigation explores how gravel’s open-road freedom has become its greatest obstacle — and what it will take for the strongest woman to finally win her own race, to finally find fairness in the Women's UCI Gravel World Series?
“It’s not a man problem — it’s a rules problem.” — Morgan Aguirre
Chaos at Gravel One Fifty
The women’s race is only ten kilometres old when it begins to disintegrate. The lead moto zigzags through the bunch, horn urgent, as shouts ripple up a narrow Dutch farm track. The 19–34 men are already on them.
Carbon wheels overlap, bars tangle, and in a cloud of dust, the elite women’s front group is swallowed completely. For a few seconds, it’s chaos — then silence again — the sound of a race that no longer belongs to them.
This is Gravel One Fifty, one of the UCI series’ showcase events. It’s also one of its best: impeccably run, well-attended and universally loved by riders for its atmosphere and organisation. Yet in 2025 it became, unfairly, the final straw — a single unlucky moment that crystallised a pattern of frustration felt across the elite women’s peloton.
“It kills the women’s race ... it stops being tactical and becomes survival.” — Nicole Frain
A Pattern, Not an Exception
“It’s not an isolated thing,” says Nicole Frain. “Gravel One Fifty was just the moment everyone saw it.”
From Turnhout to Aachen, Girona to the Ardennes, elite women have spent two seasons describing the same experience: being swamped, jostled or even taken out by age-group men chasing their own qualification times.
At several rounds, elite women’s groups have been caught within the first 10–15 km by younger male categories starting just five minutes behind, losing minutes, and any sense of fair competition, before the race has even settled.
In some events, the elite women’s field numbers fewer than 40 riders among fields of 2,000–3,000. It’s a tiny fraction of the total, but the one most affected when the structure fails.
The question keeps surfacing: is the UCI Gravel World Series a community event, or elite competition?
When the UCI designed the series, it borrowed the Gran Fondo template: open entry, local organisers and mass starts feeding into a World Championship. That structure works for participation. But at the top level, it has never evolved. There is no prize money, no fixed standards for start gaps or drafting, and minimal on-site enforcement.
Too Much Freedom
“We gave a lot of liberty to organisers to set up their own starting procedure.” — Erwin Vervecken
Erwin Vervecken, three-time cyclo-cross world champion and now the series manager, sits at the intersection of idealism and bureaucracy. A racer’s instinct tempered by an administrator’s caution, he is both the defender of organisers and the reluctant reformer pushing for gradual change.
“In the first year, events were small — three or four hundred riders. Now they’re two or three thousand. That changes everything,” he says.
Autonomy was meant to empower organisers to adapt to terrain, police requirements and local laws. In practice, it has produced inconsistency bordering on chaos. Some races separate elite women by an hour, others by five minutes, and others not at all. Drafting rules vary race to race.
“We cannot compare a race in the Netherlands with one in Scotland or the US,” says Vervecken. “In some places, you can close roads for ninety minutes; in others, only forty-five. If we make one strict rule, we lose organisers.”
He pauses. “But of course, on flat races, starting women directly behind the elite men is not a good idea. That’s for sure.”
The will is there — the frustration just as strong — yet the outcome is the same: elite women without a race of their own.
“It’s not as easy as some suggest. We can’t just start one hour later — permits don’t allow it.” — Erwin Vervecken
Professionalism Without Parity
For Hayley Simmonds, one of Britain’s most experienced professionals, that pragmatism comes at a cost.
“You pay hundreds in entries and travel, but can’t guarantee a fair race,” she says. “If this happened to elite men, the outrage would be huge.”
She recalls being pushed from behind by a male rider at Turnhout and taken out by another cutting a corner. “Being swarmed by aggressive male riders on descents is intimidating. For many amateur women, that’s enough to never come back.”
“If elite men faced this, the outrage would be huge.” — Hayley Simmonds
The danger isn’t only physical. American rider Morgan Aguirre calls it psychological labour — the invisible work of managing male behaviour mid-race.
“I have to network in a race and act a certain way not to be dropped, which is mad.” — Morgan Aguirre
Intentions vs. Outcomes
No organiser sets out to fail. Berend Slagter, coordinator of Gravel One Fifty, still sounds bruised.
“We wanted to give the women a spotlight,” he says. “The only thing we didn’t do right was give enough space between the elite women and the first age-group men.”
He’s right. The start line looked progressive — women front and centre, cameras rolling — but within fifteen kilometres, they were engulfed.
“We wanted to give the women a spotlight.” — Berend Slagter
In the Netherlands, multiple municipalities mean multiple permits; police limit road closures to ninety minutes, sometimes less. When 2,500 riders take part, those minutes vanish quickly.
When Structure Meets Standards
Maximilian Wussler, who runs The Gralloch in Scotland, recognises both the challenge and the opportunity.
“Look, there’s certainly a lot of factors,” he explains. “It would be disingenuous to say it’s purely down to our good relationships with the council and working with them, but obviously that’s a big factor. I think what councils and local stakeholders look for is a professional organisation that prioritises safety.”
“It was a no-brainer that safe and fair racing must be the expectation,” he adds. “There are road closures across Europe for sporting events that far exceed one hour. So it’s not an impossible thing to do, but I totally appreciate the challenges other organisers face.”
This issue of road closures is often cited as the reason why separate starts cannot be guaranteed. It also feeds into the UCI’s belief in organiser autonomy — a rule impossible to standardise across different regions.
So how can an event like The Gralloch be different?
“I think with events like this, there’s a certain standard you have to aspire to as an organiser — in quality, safety, fairness,” says Wussler. “If a venue can deliver that, it needs to be reflected on. Otherwise, you’d ask, why hold the race here if you can’t meet the minimum threshold for safety and fairness?”
To be fair to events such as Gravel One Fifty, which uses a large 150 km loop through multiple towns, they too are examining course changes to lessen the impact on residents and improve race integrity.
The Gralloch’s solution — starting the elite women more than an hour after the men — has become the gold standard.
“If we’re going to grow gravel from the elite end, you have to treat it as an elite race.” — Maximilian Wussler
Vervecken quietly agrees. “The Gralloch is the ideal. But not every region can do it. In Aachen, you can only close roads for forty-five minutes; in Belgium, maybe ninety. We need to take it step by step.”
“Women deserve all attention, but we must take it step by step.” — Erwin Vervecken
And at the UCI Gravel World Championships, held each October, that separation already exists — men and women race on different days. The template is there; only the commitment to replicate it at the qualifier level is missing.
The Missing Standard
The UCI’s position is to encourage best practice, not enforce it. Vervecken says a rider survey will be conducted after the current season to gather data on speeds, start gaps and drafting effects — the basis for new regulations.
“We plan to do that,” he says. “We want their input before changing anything.”
None of the riders interviewed recalls receiving such communication, though all support it if it finally happens.
In the meantime, guidelines exist without oversight. Organisers are left to interpret fairness on their own.
Geerike Schreurs, a regular podium finisher, puts it plainly: “They say they want to be professional but also don’t want to be professional. There are rules, but no one is there to enforce them.”
“They want to be professional but don’t want to be professional.” — Geerike Schreurs
At Turnhout, the elite women started behind seventy-year-old amateur men on single-track. “We had to pass hundreds,” she says. “One man crashed trying to let us through. It’s dangerous for everyone.”
Elsewhere, she cites Austria’s Wörthersee round as proof that listening works. “They asked afterwards, ‘How was it? What can we improve?’ This year it was even better.”
The Participation Paradox
Behind all the noise lies an awkward truth: the UCI Gravel World Series is two incompatible ideas sharing the same start line.
On one side, a tourism-driven mass event that funds itself through thousands of amateur entries and local government grants. On the other hand, a professional-level race where riders build their careers and reputations.
Frain calls it “the participation paradox.” The inclusive model that built Gravel’s identity is now the barrier to its elite evolution.
“It’s not a series — it’s a collection of races you buy into. Call it what it is.” — Morgan Aguirre
DATA SNAPSHOT: Across 2024–2025, the average elite women’s field size across UCI Gravel World Series events was around 37 riders — roughly 1.5 % of total participants. At flatter rounds such as Aachen or Gravel One Fifty, the leading men’s age group wave often closed a five-minute gap within 12 km, effectively ending the women’s race before it began.
A Blueprint for Change: The Elite Gravel Series
Across every interview — from UCI offices to start lines — the same issue emerges: separate starts. Perhaps it’s time to formalise it.
The Elite Gravel Series
A curated, professional circuit within the UCI framework — distinct but connected to the mass-participation base.
Core structure:
Six to ten races worldwide
Strict standards for safety, fairness and media delivery
Only these count as qualifiers for the Elite World Championships
Riders must race at least 2 of 6 or 4 of 10 events to qualify
Guaranteed separate starts (minimum 60-minute gap or different days)
No cross-category drafting (time penalties rather than DQs)
Equal distances, unified communications, professional coverage
“Keep the mass participation for everyone else — then you’d have a true professional competition that still connects to the grassroots.” — Hayley Simmonds
This model protects gravel’s inclusivity while establishing a credible ladder for elite competition.
Wussler agrees: “There’s a need for a strong commercial model that benefits organisers, the UCI and riders. A professionalised series would elevate the sport and attract sponsors and media.”
Vervecken echoes the sentiment: “In the ideal situation, we have separate races for women in the morning and men in the afternoon, or even different days. That’s where I hope to end up.”
“The ideal is separate races — but only a few places can do it.” — Erwin Vervecken
Hope in the Dust
Wussler’s Gralloch already meets that standard; Austria’s Wörthersee round isn’t far behind. Add Gravel Wales, a U.S. stop and a southern-hemisphere partner, and a credible professional circuit starts to emerge.
There would finally be a clear narrative — not just for the women, but for gravel itself.
“Guarantee fairness and the field will grow.” — Geerike Schreurs
And it’s already happening. Where organisers balance autonomy with structure — Scotland, Austria, Wales — the women’s racing looks and feels as it should: tactical, decisive, alive.
Still, the fact remains: pro-women do not currently have a fair race. Their frustrations are met with patience instead of progress.
If the UCI Gravel World Series is to be taken seriously as an elite platform, guarantees and standardisation are essential. Because everyone — pros and amateurs alike — deserves a fair race.
Closing Line
Somewhere between the dust and the data, a real woman’s race is waiting to begin —and for the first time, the road ahead finally looks open.
Thank you to everyone who participated. I want to emphasise that this article is not just a critique of the UCI, but an opportunity to spotlight the frustrations experienced by professional women in our dynamic sport. If you have any ideas or suggestions on achieving parity, feel free to comment below!
Comments