Annual Tradition Time: Let's Complain About the Nationals Course

You know the drill...

We have long established that we are all about traditions at the Bulletin, and perhaps no tradition in American cyclocross is as time-honored as complaining about the Nationals course.

For some backstory I learned about this tradition during my time as editor at Cyclocross Magazine. Someone would send us a GoPro preview video of the Nationals course, we would post it on the website, and people in the Facebook comments would start going nuts (it was always the Facebook comments).

Complaints generally fell into a few categories:

“This course is flat.”

“This course is why Americans suck at cyclocross.”

“USAC sucks.”

Do I miss those days? No, not really.

Nationals kicked off at Joe Creason Park in Louisville on Tuesday, and tradition dictates we have to post something about the course.

This year’s Nationals will be the third race week/weekend at Joe Creason. The first was Pan-Ams back in 2017 and the second was December 2018 Nationals.

The 2018 National Championships were obviously the more memorable of the two races because rain late in the week turned the weekend course into a nearly unrideable slog on a hilly course that was already quite challenging when dry.

I recently took a quick peek at the race replay and it was definitely as bad as I remember. I was only writing race reports back then, and I opted to sit in the media building and watch the livestream instead of trudging through the mud that was literally everywhere.

The 2018 Nationals course was substantially different from the Pan-Ams course, with the start/finish moved to the driveway outside the Louisville Parks and Rec building and much of the course placed in the, for lack of a better term, bowl east of the building.

The 2023 Nationals course, for comparison.

The course we are checking out for the UCI category races is the black course, which features some sections that will only be open for those races.

The course appears to similar-ish to the 2017 Pan-Ams course, but even that one spent more time in the giant bowl section. The course for this year’s races appears to stay higher up on the hillside, although the extra sections will likely add some not-flat parts after the limestone stairs.

My theory on this layout is that the organizers wanted to avoid a repeat of the weekend races in 2018 when most of the course was completely unrideable. The extensive sections on the hillside were pretty cool earlier in that Nationals weekend, but they were completely unrideable once the rain and mud showed up. I haven’t looked at the forecast, but chances are good that it’s going to rain at some point, and we’ve seen the venue turn into an absolute mess when it does.

Anyway, that’s my theory. IDK. Early reports on the course for Masters Nationals are in from the guy who dresses up like Colonel Sanders in the Singlespeed race.

One of the benefits of doing this post during Nationals week is that we got a chance for a do-over on the course preview video that was, uh, needed.

Here’s attempt one, featuring: grass.

Here’s a much better go at it, featuring: the course.

I am willing to keep an open mind about the course, but the Colonel Sanders guy does have a good point. When you travel to a National Championships—and especially this year, pay an ungodly amount of money to race—you want to race on a cool, challenging course. I feel like that’s something organizers and the federation owe to the racers.

As for the UCI categories, the racers make the race, so we will see how those pan out this weekend.