2023 Pan-American Championships Preview and Start Lists

Big races up in Big Sky Country, or something like that

One-third of the domestic championship season is upon us with the 2023 Pan-American Championships taking place on Sunday in Missoula, Montana.

Since the pandemic, UCI racing west of the Mississippi has disappeared from the calendar, leaving folks from Colorado, the Pacific Northwest, and other western cyclocross locales feeling left out. This year’s event forces the East Coasters to put in big miles to head out to the Big Sky state to chase the 2023 Pan-Ams jerseys. It only seems fair.

While I personally thought the three-race mega weekend in Falmouth worked really well for a sport where travel budgets aren’t exactly flush, it is cool to see folks such as those organizing Pan-Ams put in the work to organize races like this.

Missoula might be new to the UCI cyclocross scene, but it is definitely not new to the sport. The western Montana city hosted a pretty well-known race called Rolling Thunder in the 2000s and 2010s. A review of available photos verifies my memory of the event being a night-racing party that was pretty well-known in the region.

Rolling Thunder returned as a race last weekend—during the day, however—and Missoula hosts a seven-week weekday series of races on Wednesdays. The city is also the adopted home of the Swartzi, and long-time ‘cross racer Emma is serving as assistant race director.

Photos from Saturday’s course inspection suggest the venue is pretty much as expected, with plenty of mountains providing a backdrop for the race. Bill is on-site, and he put together a course preview video that gives the lay of the cyclocross land.

When the season started, we definitely had questions about who would be racing in Missoula since it is outside the New England/Mid-Atlantic/Midwest nexus the domestic UCI calendar has settled into. Our friends at Cyclocross24 pointed out that the distance from Falmouth to Missoula is a cool 2,114 miles, which is not too different from, say, the 3,400 miles from Falmouth to Koksijde.

Fortunately, a good number of the top athletes are scheduled to be in Missoula this weekend. Maghalie Rochette is getting ready to make the long trip to Europe and won’t be there, and Andrew Strohmeyer has already made the trans-Atlantic flight, but the rest of the season’s stars thus far are on the start list.

U23 Women

For better or worse, the lack of U23 races on the domestic calendar presents young riders with huge opportunities to show out on the big stage. As in most years, a number of riders have made the most of these opportunities.

The midseason favorite for breakout rider of the year is Canada’s Jenaya Francis. Francis is rolling a streak of three straight 4th-place finishes in the Elite category, with another 5th on Day 1 of Kings CX.

While Francis’ name pops out due to recency bias, Ava Holmgren and Lauren Zoerner should also be in that conversation based on results thus far this season. I decided to look at the 2023 head-to-head numbers (ignoring Saturday’s race) and the conclusion for the favorite is:¯\_ (ツ)_/¯

• Francis [2] - Holmgren [2]

• Francis [3] - Zoerner [1]

• Zoerner [2] - Homgren [0]

One could say anything can happen in this cyclocross race, IDK.

Elite Women

The term Statement Race gets tossed around in these parts relatively frequently, and one could strongly argue that Isabella Holmgren’s Day 2 win at Kings CX was decidedly a Statement Race. She absolutely crushed an Elite Women’s field that included three-time U.S. Champ Clara Honsinger in that race.

As of a week ago, Holmgren was registered for the U23 Women’s race, but she decided to level up to the Elites in a move that makes complete sense. Her position as the favorite is, admittedly, the ultimate test of recency bias.

Honsinger still holds a 3-1 head-to-head advantage on Holmgren this season (at Kings CX and Trek) and an even more impressive 14-1 all-time advantage after Honsinger’s Saturday win. But Holmgren had that Statement Race.

It’s the ultimate test of the unstoppable Statement Race force against the immovable 93% winning percentage object.

Pre-supposing a double H podium (and you know what happens when you pre-suppose), the favorite for the third podium spot is Sidney McGill. McGill has finished on seven UCI podiums so far this season, and her worst finish in a non-World-Cup race is 4th. It seems likely McGill will find common cause with fellow fast-starter Holmgren in dictating the shape of the race from the opening whistle.

Two-time defending Pan-Ams Champ Raylyn Nuss is going to face a tough battle for the win and potentially even for the podium. Her new teammate Katie Clouse will be racing her second weekend since returning looking to follow up her 3rd-place finish at Really Rad Day 2 with a bronze or better in Missoula.

U23 Men

The U23 Men also been making a big contribution to the Elite fields this season, especially the last two weekends at Kings CX and Really Rad. Luke Valenti, Jules van Kempen, Marcis Shelton, and Dylan Zakrajsek are all names that have been ringing out during those weekends, some of them more easily pronounced than others.

The question of the top U23 racer in America is pretty straightforward—Andrew Strohmeyer—but Strohmeyer is in Europe, so the rest of the young riders have a golden opportunity to show out in Missoula.

In an effort to make sense of the U23 field for the race, I used the old approach of pulling the U23 podiums for the four USCX weekends and Kings CX and assigning points on a 3-2-1 basis for 1st-2nd-3rd. Here is how the numbers add up, although it is worth noting that in the last two weekends, Valenti has an average of 2.25 points per race and Van Kempen has 2.00 points per race.

So basically similar to the U23 Women, the favorite is: ¯\_ (ツ)_/¯

Elite Men

Last season’s Elite Men’s Pan-Ams preview where we went to the tale of the tape between Eric Brunner and Curtis White was one of our most popular posts of the season. Honestly, that post could probably be rebooted for 2023 with another Pan-Ams title in Brunner’s tally and a National Championship for White.

I mean, I still haven’t seen where Brunner has a logo yet.

If this preview were written 3.5 weeks ago, Brunner would have been the overwhelming favorite for this race.

Brunner had a weekend at Major Taylor where he went toe-to-toe with Joris Nieuwenhuis and then a follow-up where he finished 3rd at the Trek CX Cup. White, meanwhile, had a disappointing start to the season where he only had a couple 3rds at Charm City in the relatively positive column.

Since this theoretical moment where we would have been doing a Pan-Ams preview almost a month before the race, Brunner finished with a meh 16th at World Cup Waterloo only the Slow Ride Podcast would celebrate and a 23rd at the Big Sugar gravel race.

White, meanwhile, rolled the Kings CX and Really Rad weekends against the kids and Moose Lodge director Michael van den Ham and is currently sitting on the second-longest active winning streak in cyclocross (h/t Boedi).

So what does it mean? Even though White won the tale of the tape last year, the Bulletin is going to argue that since Brunner has won two Pan-Ams in a row in convincing fashion, the crown is Brunner’s until White takes it away.

Looking past the top two, there is a lot of darkhorse potential in the Elite Men’s field

Lance Haidet absolutely balled out on Day 2 of Rochester and nearly got on the podium. Caleb Swartz hasn’t necessarily had the season he has wanted, but the weekend is his de facto home race and he’s looking to peak for this part of the season. The Happy Fun Ball Scott Funston is in the same boat, minus the de facto home race part.

Then there’s everyone’s second favorite Canadian Michael van den Ham. Van den Ham is firmly in his swan song as a cyclocross racer, but he had a solid weekend in Falmouth directing the Moose Lodge on Saturday to guide him into Sunday’s race.

The biggest what-if of Van den Ham’s career is probably the sprint finish against White at the 2018 Pan-American Championships in Midland, Ontario, so it would the poeticness of justices for him to shock the cyclocross world and go out on top with the Pan-American Championship that has eluded him during his career.

Arguably the most exciting news of the weekend is the return of the Shred the S*** bois Brannan Fix and Gage Hecht. Fix stepped away from racing this season, while Hecht made a few incognito appearances at races in Spain. He’s now back in the U.S. and on the start list in Missoula. Hecht won U23 Pan-Ams in Midland in 2018 and 2019, so a win on Sunday would be new at the Elite level but not necessarily new.

Start lists are below. I had to type these in and I have to get this posted, so excuse the lo-fi quality.