Logan Owen and Kyle Trudeau have joined Floyd’s of Leadville Racing to amp up the group’s six-rider roster as a “PrivaTeam” programme for 2023. Returning because the chief of the US-based squad is 61-year-old David ‘Tinker’ Juarez, one of many nation’s best-ever BMX and MTB riders.
The Floyd’s of Leadville Racing group accomplished their first season in 2022 with riders competing throughout a various schedule of off-road occasions. Juarez earned a silver medal on the 2022 UCI Masters Mountain Bike World Championships in Argentina in cross-country, wherein he has gained three masters world titles.
On the US gravel scene, Owen and Trudeau are each a part of this season’s Life Time Grand Prix sequence for professional males. Owen, a former WorldTour professional with EF Training-EasyPost, completed seventeenth general within the sequence final yr, his prime outcomes a prime 10 at Chequamegon MTB Competition. Trudeau will compete within the seven-race off-road circuit for the primary time however has already excelled on the mountain bike opener at Sea Otter Traditional with a seventh-place end at Fuego XC final yr.
Cody Cupp is an skilled rider who returns, taking fourth in cross-country on the US Marathon Mountain Bike Nationals and on gravel ending tenth at each Gravel Worlds in Nebraska and Belgian Waffle Experience Utah. Andrew Blackstock and Ryan Johnson full the roster.
Ryan Jastrab and Andrew Giniant amongst new riders with ButcherBox Biking
ButcherBox Biking powered by LOOK return in 2023 with 17 new riders on the home elite groups for women and men.
“We’re centered on continued success competing towards different prime groups on the largest criteriums within the nation” stated Dino Piskopanis, director of ButcherBox Biking. He famous that the programme is likely one of the few US programmes to supply equal funding for males’s and ladies’s groups.
The group was largely revamped on the lads’s facet with six new riders. Ryan Jastrab, 23, joins from Wildlife Technology Professional Biking, the place final yr he earned the bronze medal within the U23 criterium championship on the US Novice Street Nationals. Veteran expertise was added with Andrew Giniat, who raced 4 seasons with CS Velo.
4 different new riders are Cesar Serna, Doug Frenchak, Dusan Kalaba and Evan McQuirk. Returning to the lads’s highway group is Sam Rosenholtz, Eddy Huntsman, Eduardo Cruz and Cameron Beard.
Final yr the ladies’s squad secured second general within the group competitors of the American Criterium Cup sequence, with the highest particular person sprinter, Andrea Cyr, scoring second within the particular person and dash standings. Cyr has departed the group, however 4 new riders have been added to hitch Paige Kostanecki, Rachel Plessing and Gillian Bennett. The brand new riders are Paola Panzeri, Kaitlyn Agnew, Melanie Wong and Bethany Matsick.
Functions open for ‘From the Floor Up’ and Leadville Path 100
Mountain biking is the place Alexey Vermeulen and Ryan Petry don’t have any downside excelling, each ending within the prime 15 at Leadville Path 100 MTB in 2021. That very same yr they launched a challenge to introduce the love of MTB with new riders and assist them “step exterior of their consolation zones” and “From the Floor Up” was launched.
A 3rd season for “From the Floor Up” was formally launched February 1 when the web utility course of opened for amateurs to provide the epic 104-mile mountain bike race a attempt. Thus far, 5 amateurs have taken half within the challenge, and three extra shall be chosen for 2023.
“In 2021 [Ryan] and I began this challenge geared toward supporting the brand new group of riders coming into the game in the course of the pandemic. Our purpose was to take three entry-level riders to the Leadville Path 100 and doc that course of in an try to assist make the game much less intimidating and extra accessible. We by no means may have imagined what it has change into and are centered on rising this neighborhood in 2023,” stated Vermeulen, who completed fourth within the professional males’s division final yr.
The pair of mates stated they selected the Leadville Path 100 MTB primarily as a result of it was later within the yr, giving the brand new riders time to organize, and the course is out-and-back, so it helps with fixed motivation to see different riders on the route. This yr’s Leadville Path mountain bike race shall be August 12.
Athens Twilight Crit launches seven races for 2023 Velocity Week
Velocity Week returns within the south-eastern US for one more spherical of seven criterium races over 9 days in late April. The sequence opens April 22 in Athens, Georgia with the Athens Twilight Criterium, which has been a staple on the US calendar since 1980. The finale will return to School Park, Georgia, this yr on April 30. Final yr these two races have been back-to-back on the ultimate weekend.
New to the lineup is a one-day race in Peachtree Corners, Georgia, positioned simply north of Atlanta. Spartanburg returns as a bunch metropolis, this time shifting to a Friday night time, April 28, and is the one race in South Carolina.
Final yr the mixed prize purse totalled $80,000 for particular person races, divided equally for professional males and professional ladies. There was additionally a $15,000 bonus purse to be shared by general Velocity Week winners, awarded to the highest 5 males and prime 5 ladies in addition to prime 5 males’s and ladies’s groups. Extra particulars shall be introduced within the coming weeks.
Velocity Week 2023 calendar
- April 22 – Athens, Georgia
- April 23 – Lagrange, Georgia
- April 24 – relaxation day
- April 25 – Union Metropolis, Georgia
- April 26 – Peachtree Corners, Georgia
- April 27 – relaxation day
- April 28 – Spartanburg, South Carolina
- April 29 – Hapeville, Georgia
- April 30 – School Park, Georgia
