Unbound: The Race Recap

This race giveth, this race taketh.

Jun 02, 2025

Where do I start with Unbound? It’s the world’s biggest gravel race. Two hundred miles around the Flint Hills of Emporia.

It’s a month of prep. It’s hours spent training. It’s thousands of dollars in expenses. It’s an epic bike race. It’s tyre slashing. There’s mud. Decisions upon decisions. It’s a cruel mistress that can change a rider’s life forever.

Pre Race

The alarm goes off at 3:15am.

I go to the kitchen, still half asleep. My breakfast is a dentist’s nightmare and a kid's dream: fresh orange juice, and frosties topped with honey. While I wait for my coffee to brew, I gulp down my AG1.

There are five of us staying in the house. Two are already out racing the XL, Dan is the photographer and Logan, my journalist friend who’s also racing the 200. It’s pretty quiet. Logan and I have both done enough Unbounds now that ignorance is no longer bliss. We know just how tough of a day the Flint Hills can be, we know how many things can go wrong.

We get changed, pump up the tyres, and start to roll out. It’s 5:15am.

The roll to the start of Unbound is one of my favourite rides all year. It’s still dark and there are no cars on the road. There are just tens of cyclists that are riding to the centre of Emporia like moths to a flame. It reminds me of going to watch football as a kid, the closer you get to the stadium, the more people you see. The anticipation is in the air.

I go in search of a toilet. The first one I find, I’m kicked out of as apparently it was reserved for LifeTime Grand Prix athletes, darn. I find another and then roll to the start line. By this point in my gravel career, there are a lot of friendly faces on the start line. Daylight just begins to break over Kansas. There are almost 200 elite riders on this start line.

The Star-Spangled Banner plays, and the countdown begins. It’s go time.

Go Time

Click-clack-skreech-shout.

Neutral is not neutral. We’re racing, chopping, and cutting each other up. It’s only 5:52am, but the race has very much begun. I’ve told myself that I want to be in a good position from the start. Last year I chilled at the back as we were going easy - that’s a fine strategy, but I wanted to be in the race from the start this year.

I sit in the top quarter of the pack, aware of what’s going on, but with the goal of staying safe. Every now and then, I drift back in the washing machine but as soon as I realise, I move up.

We’re ripping through the gravel roads. There’s a slight tailwind, and everytime I look down we’re going north of 40kph. We’re racing as if there’s 20 miles to go, not 200. Over the gravel hills it’s in one long line. I look down again and I’m in my biggest gear doing over 60kph. Damn, this is fast.

My average power is some 285w, normalised nearing 320w by the two hour mark.

A group goes. No stress, I think to myself. I want to get through the first ‘Minimum Maintenance Section’ safely. That’s where I flatted out last year, and essentially ended my race. I go into it, and come out of it in a good position, sitting next to the favourites. There’s a break up the road, but that’s suicide, surely.

We reach Eskridge, the town before the next minimum maintenance section. This is where shit begins to go down. There’s slick mud which has essentially turned to ice. We’re racing through here with guys trying to split it. Every patch of slick mud we hit somebody goes flying. It’s not bad bike handling, just bad luck. I go off the road to avoid a crash, questioning how I kept it up.

I find myself in a chase group, trying to make our way back to the front. There’s no thoughts in my brain, just pedal. We’re all feeling the effort.

We hit Alma, the first pit stop. We’re here in record time - so fast I still have water and gels remaining in my pocket. I swing into the pit zone, shout to do a fast change and I’m on my way within twenty seconds or so.

I rejoin the group with cafe legs of sorts. Matt Beers is also in the group, he goes to the front and drills it, I get distanced.

The next minimum maintenance section. My group splits further. Matt Beers punctures again. The main peloton of 40 appear out of nowhere. Beers comes past me like a train, I sprint onto his wheel. It’s been a very long time since somebody has come that close to dropping me off their wheel on the flat. Matt Beers has some of the stupidest power I’ve ever seen.

Oh Shit.

Back in the main peloton of forty, I’m a happy man. I know my days are numbered and the win is far from possible, but if I can hang here for an hour or two then I’m on for a good result. An attack goes five minutes later, my legs blow. Shit.

I’m in no-man’s land. The group of favourites has dropped me, the next group is miles behind. I’m struggling to get power out. Some hour later, a group including Terpstra and my old Ribble teammate Metheven come past. I hop on for all of two minutes and blow. Oh, I’m in deep do do.

This happens a few more times before the next aid station. Group comes past me, I hop on, and go out the back. I’m overheating, struggling to put food in and get power out. It’s 150km between aid stations.

I hobble into the aid station light headed and mentally fried. I need water, ice, and to cool down. This is the most fucked I’ve been in a long time. Engine warning lights are flashing red. But, it’s Unbound. One must always finish Unbound. Hutch later tells me he was worried about how I looked at Aid 2 and questions if I’d make it to the finish.

With ice down my back, and a bottle of water over my head, I felt somewhat a new man. I could eat again, but I was still dead. 90km home. This was a commute now. I was still on for a pretty fast time but any result was long gone.

I pick up stray groups, stray groups pick up me. This deep into an effort like Unbound everyone has a story and everyone is fucked. I have to swing in by the lake to use the toilet. I come back out and bump into last year’s second place, Chad Haga. He’s in a deeper hole than me. I offer him food or water. His stomach can handle neither, so I offer him my wheel and he takes it.

A group catches us and we hop on. This is the train home and we’re all fucked but pulling equal turns. The faster we pedal, the faster we get home.

It’s Over.

I cross the line dejected, or maybe a better word is fucked. I see Dan, I see Andrew, and I see Bert. I smile. I might’ve had a shit day out there in the Flint Hills from a sporting perspective, but the boys were all there to put an arm around me.

"Who won?”, I ask Bert.

“Cam ... .I think, some Kiwi…”

All of a sudden, my dejection turns to the biggest smile. Cam Jones, you ripper. Cam is the same age as me, a Kiwi MTBer who I met last year at Oregon Stage Race. He’s not just one of the good guys, he’s one of the best guys. Always smiling, always happy.

I said at the start of this article that Unbound can change a rider’s life. There are plenty of big name favourites who, if they’d have won, would have received bigger bonuses, or ticked Unbound off their career bucket list. But, it wouldn’t have changed their life.

Cam Jones’ life changed at some point in the Kansas early afternoon. He’ll forever look back on that day, he’ll forever talk about that day, and I hope he gets the contracts he deserves going into 2026.

I look back at the results later on. I start playing the if game. Well, if, I hadn’t blown up I was in the group that was racing for Top 10. If I hadn’t blown up then it was a salvageable result. But, I did blow up. What happened? I don’t know. It’s both relieving and killing that it could have been a good day.

In hindsight, I probably shouldn’t have followed Matt Beers to get back on. But, I’m always going to go full to get back to the front of the race. I race to be at the front, not to ride tempo all day and finish 50th. I’d rather have done that than not. I don’t know.

What’s Next?

This was my first ‘clean’ Unbound. No bad luck with mud, no punctures. A straight shot chance. My equipment was perfect. Yes, I was caught behind a crash, but that’s hardly worth writing about. I think that’s why I walked away from Unbound with my tail between my legs, the opportunity was there.

Yes, my job these days is about much more than results, but I’m an athlete. My brain works in results. It’s basic pro-cyclist psychology: good performance, happy athlete. Bad performance, sad athlete.

What’s next? That’s a good question. I need a break, that’s for sure. I’ll have a few days chilling out here in Boulder, hitting some local breweries, doing some hikes, and then get back on the bike towards the end of the week. I need to talk to my doctor, get my chest sorted as that’s still giving me grief and then try to figure out what the rest of my year looks like.

For now, thanks for reading, thanks for commenting. Putting this on paper is a good way of me thinking through it all. Selfishly, writing this helps me think straight as much as I need to put an article out. It was longer than my normal article, but Unbound is longer than my normal race.

I’ll be back to Unbound. Maybe, I’m just a glutton for punishment. Maybe, I’m a dreamer. Maybe, it’s because I want to complete five Unbounds and get my 1,000 mile chalice.

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