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Sarah Sturm (Specialized/SRAM/Rapha) and Hans Becking (Buff Megamo) won the overall titles at the Migration Gravel Race in Kenya on Friday. The four-day off-road stage race totalled 650km with 8,000 metres of elevation gain, which runs in a clockwise direction south of the start in Massai Mara close to the Tanzania border near Mount Kilimanjaro and back.
Migration Gravel Race is one of five events on the Gravel Earth Series calendar at the Global level, which provides the highest points for top riders.
Stage 1 opened from base camp at Massai Mara with a muddy 140km route. Xaverine Nirere (Team Amani) of Rwanda and Lawrence Naesen of Belgium won the first installments for elite women and men.
Naesen posted a time of 5:53:01 to take the first leader’s jersey. Dutch rider Becking would sprint ahead of Mattia De Marchi (Enough Cycling) for second, three minutes behind Naesen. Team Amani teammates Seth Hakizimana and Jordan Schleck would finish in fourth and fifth, respectively, and two more of their teammates, Ndung’u Wa Kieya and Kennt Karaya, finished in the top 10.
In the women’s race, Nirere posted a time of 5:53:01. US rider Sturm stayed at the front of the race with Nirere for much of the contest but fell off the pace to cross the line in second, 2:12 back. Maddie Nutt (Ribble Collective) finished third, seven minutes off the pace, and last year’s Migration Gravel winner Amith Rockwell (PAS Racing) had issues with a dropped chain and a mud section to put her 15 minutes back.
“It was a really hard day, which is ‘funny’ since it is typically one of the easier days in the stage race. This area has gotten a lot of rain lately so in the beginning we hit some really, really, really crazy mud. A lot of people were on the side of the road cleaning it out, myself included. That set everyone back quite a bit. I just spent the whole day chasing,” Amity Rockwell (PAS Racing) recalled, who finished fourth.
Stage 2 was the longest of the stage race at 170km. Denmark’s Luise Valentie Rygaard won the stage in 8:27:07, with the rest of the field strung out on the dry, sunny day of the queen stage. With another second place, 7:29 back, Sturm took over as the women’s overall leader. Lukas Baum (Speed Commpany Racing) won the men’s division in 6:41:52. De Marchi sprinted ahead of Tsgabu Grmayu (Team Amani) for second place, 8:19 back, and used a second podium to move into the GC lead for men.
Sturm added her first stage victory on the third day of racing, winning a sprint against Rygaard by two seconds at the finish in Nibosho, the Dane not able to carve away at the 20-minute margin in the GC standing. The two riders were part of a trio that stayed together for most of the 140km route from Loita, the leaders fininshin in 6:36:54. Nutt dropped off the pace near the end and finished in third, 36 seconds back.
For the men on stage 3, Baum and Becking battled across the high-elevation, dry gravel, with Baum taking the sprint at the end in 4:57:05. De Marchi rode solo in third place and held the GC lead, a little over eight minutes ahead of Becking.
While giraffes, zebras and wildebeests added to the scenery on the fourth day of racing, Becking and Sturm were the stars on final stage. Rockwell claimed the stage victory for women after the 165km hilly route in a time of 5:52:40. Rygaard and Sturm marked each other all day and finished with the same time to complete the podium, giving Sturm the GC win.
With a fast ride of 4:32:56, Becking crossed the finish solo for the win. Chad Haga (PAS Racing) outsprinted De Marchi for second, 8:22 back. The victory for the Dutchman pushed him ahead of De Marchi for the GC title.
The overall victory by Sturm put her in the series lead with a 106-point advantage over Carolin Schiff (Canyon CLLCTV). Another 70 points back, Luise Valentin Rygaard of Denmark moved ahead of Geerike Schreurs (Specialized-SD Worx) into third place, and Karolina Migon (PAS Racing) rounded out the top five.
For the men, Hans Becking (Buff Megamo) moved into first place in the standings by just 10 points over Petr Vakoc (Canyon Isadore) and Peter Stetina of USA, who each had a pair of series victories and were tied with 1,750 points.
The next Global event will be held next week at Oregon Trail Gravel in the US.