Race Report: 2025 USAC Pro Nats - Men’s RR
Race: 2025 USAC Pro Nats - Men’s RR
Date: 5/26/25
AVRT Racers: Nathan Martin
Top Result: 24th - Nathan
Course: 10 laps of a 13.1 mile loop with 1,100 ft of elevation gain. Two climbs, one about 1.6 mi long, starting flat and gradually going up to about 12% gradient, another about 1.7 miles long with a steep 10% starter section for 0.6 miles, then some stair steppy stuff the rest of the way. Some turns through downtown as well as we did part of the crit course. First two laps only included the first 1.6 mile climb.
Nutrition: Lots of bottles of mix and plain water
Strava: https://www.strava.com/activities/14604430408
Race Recep (written by Nathan):
This was going to be a super tough race. The WorldTour lineup wasn’t the same as previous years, but we had 2 Ineos riders in Artem Schmidt and AJ August and Quinn Simmons riding for Trek. EF-Aevolo had a good squad, and a couple other U23 devo teams had riders as well. In addition, pretty much every strong rider in America was here, so it was going to be tough.
I did not start out well. I was nervous, and was hanging around the back the first two circuits of the junior course, and I got caught behind 2 crashes at the top of the climb each time, having to chase on the descent and burn some matches early. Obviously not what you want for a 130 mile race.
Once we did our first ascent of the 1.7 mile long climb on Bridge Road, I knew it would be a long day. Those first two efforts had definitely sapped my legs, and hanging around at the back of the group through the corners of the crit course didn’t help either. The descent after each climb was super fun though. Very flowy, didn’t ever feel unsafe in the group, had a lot of fun which is rare for me, usually I hate descents.
I tried to move up where I could, following good wheels like Tyler Stites or Artem Schmidt, who was going back and forth from the Ineos team car for AJ, but just didn’t feel comfortable fighting for wheels with some of these guys. There were a couple other crashes in dumb spots which didn’t inspire confidence for me, either.
This would carry on until Lap 7, as guys slowly started dropping off, when there was not so much an attack but an acceleration on Bridge Road, and me and some others couldn’t follow it.
We rode together as a small group for Lap 8 before we were pulled with 2 to go.
Overall disappointed to not finish the race. I know I had good legs, but was held back by some poor positioning and decision-making. It was a super cool experience to be able to ride with some WorldTour and Pro-Conti riders, though, so I enjoyed that. And a big thanks to my dad, Roger, for flying out to do feed for me, and happy to get some screentime on the video feed for AV!
I also got a pretty silly fine for feeding the second lap. The tech guide said we could, but apparently that was before 30km into the race, which is the rule, no feeding until the first 30 km pass. Unfortunately USAC decided to keep the fine, so I am happy to say I got my first UCI fine (and it must be paid in Swiss Francs!)