American football, the country’s top spectator sport, has given one of America’s top cyclocross events a 24-hour punt. Iowa City’s Telenet UCI Cyclocross World Cup, originally scheduled for Saturday, September 16, 2017 and sandwiched between two days of UCI racing, has been moved to Sunday due to a conflict with a NCAA football game.
The world’s best cyclocrossers will be racing a World Cup on Sunday instead of Saturday. photo: Ellen Noble on the rise at Jingle Cross. © A. Yee / Cyclocross Magazine
Iowa plays North Texas at 2:30 p.m. on Saturday, September, 16th, just one hour before the World Cup was set to begin. The overlap is said to overly tax essential city resources, but also could potentially reduce spectator counts, as many of the local cyclocross-curious will be tuning into a must-watch home game.
Although the official UCI announcement lists the game as the “NCAA American Football National Championships,” the Big Ten game (technically 14, of which Iowa is a member) is a regular season matchup.
The NCAA National Championships is scheduled for Monday, January 8, 2017.
We’ve updated our 2017-2018 UCI Cyclocross Race Calendar to reflect this change.
There’s also some news on a new cyclocross relay and time trial being added to the amateur schedule. Start forming your teams, but leave the aerobars at home. Paul Curley’s phone might start ringing with wheel orders, however.
See the full press release below.
The UCI has approved a schedule change for the Telenet UCI Cyclo-Cross World Cup in Iowa City.
Held at the Johnson County Fairgrounds in Iowa City, the Telenet UCI Cyclo-Cross World Cup races originally scheduled for 3:30 p.m. on Saturday, September 16th will now take place on Sunday, September 17th starting at 2 p.m. The change is taking place after the Big Ten Network unexpectedly announced a 2:30 p.m. start of the September 16th Iowa vs. North Texas home football game instead of the previously anticipated 11 a.m. start time.
“With the football game now at 2:30 pm and our World Cup originally planned for 3:30 p.m., infrastructure resources and other city safety services would be hindered by two major events running at the exact same time,” said race director John Meehan. “We’ve been working closely with the UCI to come up with this solution.”
The World Cup races, featuring the best athletes from around the world, are part of a three-day cyclocross festival in Iowa City, with the annual Jingle Cross amateur and professional races taking place over the extended three-day weekend beginning on Friday, Sept. 15. With the World Cup races now taking place on Sunday, amateur races will fill in the newly opened time on Saturday. The UCI C1 race moves from Sunday to Friday and the UCI C2 race moves from Friday to Saturday.
“Although the order of events has shifted, the overall content of the three-day weekend will not change,” Meehan said. “The Jingle Cross Festival will be even bigger and better this year with several new and exciting additions to our traditional lineup, making the weekend even more fun for athletes and spectators.”
One of the new events on the amateur schedule is a cyclocross relay race. Teams of four riders will race one lap of the World Cup course in a relay-style race for men’s, women’s, corporate, and co-ed divisions. A one lap World Cup Course time trial has also been added.
Other new events and activities will be announced in the coming weeks. A detailed race schedule will be announced Monday, June 19th. Registration opens at 8 am CST on June 20th.
