Road racers off road

ROAD RACERS OFF ROAD

For 2024 the Café du Cycliste women’s gravel team have some new teammates: four men from Team Nice Métropole Côte d’Azur, a UCI Continental team based in our home city of Nice. They will be seconded from their usual road racing duties to explore with us both the amazing gravel tracks of the Côte d’Azur backcountry and the growing calendar of competitive gravel events across the globe.

Like the women (and we will be announcing the 2024 women’s team very soon) their programme will be based around the Gravel Earth Series, and will take in the Traka one-day race and Ranxo stage race in Spain, plus two other events from the global series. Given our long-time love of gravel, we’re excited to see the scene grow and evolve, and are super pleased to be sending along a double contingent of racers to this year’s Gravel Earth Series. We’re also sponsoring some key events – firstly the season opener Santa Vall stage race in Girona in February, and Ranxo, the finale, in October.

Our women’s team has been winning gravel events since 2022, so perhaps they’ll be able to give the guys some tips – the four men, ranging from 21 to 25 years old, have long experience racing and are now in the upper echelons on the road, but are new to competing on the rough stuff.

“I love gravel when I’m bikepacking, but I’ve never experienced it competitively,” said team rider Noah Knecht, a 23-year-old originally from Monaco just down the coast. “I don’t know how I’ll measure up, but I know I’m going to love it!”

Gravel has been Café du Cycliste’s thing since before gravel bikes even existed, and we’ve also long supported local riders. Another team rider, in fact, recalls being given a jersey by Rémi, Café du Cycliste’s founder, at the (cycling) Grand Prix in Monaco when he was just 13 years old. It just shows that in cycling what goes around comes around, and that, sometimes, you really do get back out what you put in!

Nice Métropole Côte d’Azur rose to the professional ranks after Nice hosted the Grand Départ of the Tour de France in 2020. Since then, it has represented the city over 90 days a year on the UCI calendar, investing in local talent and the future of cycling in the region, so it seemed natural for us to partner with them.

More than just teammates, our four conscripts to the wild side are friends and true comrades on the bike, and are looking forward to expanding their horizons beyond the tarmac and getting lost in a new world of adventure.

To find out more about the guys, their thoughts on gravel and hopes for the season, read our interviews here.