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| Image courtesy of Life Time Events |
NOTE: All information and images provided by Life Time Events. Comments are Guitar Ted's and may not reflect the opinions of Life Time Events and their affiliates.
Thursday sees a big announcement with Life Time Events revealing its plans for the 2026 Grand Prix. This series of six events evenly split between gravel and MTB has become the premier series for professional cyclists in the USA.
There is a lot to dig into here, so let's begin with the dates for the events in 2026.
Thursday, April 16: Life Time Sea Otter Classic Gravel
Saturday, May 30: Life Time UNBOUND Gravel 200 presented by Shimano
Saturday, August 15: Life Time Leadville Trail 100 MTB presented by Kenetik
Saturday, September 19: Life Time Chequamegon Mountain Bike Festival
Sunday, October 11: Life Time Little Sugar MTB
Saturday, October 17: Life Time Big Sugar Gravel presented by Kenetik
The Money:
The Grand Prix for 2026 - according to the press release - " ...will see record investment in athletes, including $590,000 in prize money across the series, with $350,000 dedicated to the overall Life Time Grand Prix podium, increased prize purses to $60,000 at UNBOUND Gravel and the Leadville Trail 100 MTB, and $30,000 prize purses at the remaining events."
The overall series compensation pays out from first to tenth place equally between Male and Female riders. First in Male or Female categories gets $50,000.00 and tenth will receive $7,000.00. Additionally, every Pro racer who finishes at least three of the series events, and ends up in 11th place overall in the series or beyond, will be compensated at an amount of $2,500.00.
Additional benefits to series riders are all entry fees being covered. Under 23 athletes selected for the program after the Unbound Gravel event will also have their entry fees covered. All series athletes have free entry to Life Time events nationwide, coverage in media promoted by Life Time Fitness, and complimentary access to all of Life Time's fitness centers nationwide.
The Selection Process:
According to the press release, there will be some tweaks to the selection process. Here are some bullet points from the release:
Each 2026 roster will include:
- The top five overall finishers from the 2025 Grand Prix
- The top overall U23 athlete from the 2025 series
- A minimum of 16 selected athletes (additional slots may open if one or more top-five athletes do not return)
- Three Wild Card athletes, chosen following Life Time UNBOUND Gravel 200
"Applications will be evaluated based on performances over the past 12 months at Life Time-owned and select national and international off-road events, including the Sea Otter Classic, UNBOUND Gravel, Leadville Trail 100 MTB, Chequamegon MTB Festival, The Rad Dirt Fest, Crusher in the Tushar, Lutsen 99er, and global events such as Cape Epic, BC Bike Race, and the UCI Gravel World Championships."
The Wild Card Life Time introduced for the 2025 season will again be enacted for the 2026 season with three male and three female riders being added to the Grand Prix after Unbound Gravel, as long as those six athletes meet certain criteria.
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| Image courtesy of Life Time Events |
This is an amazing development as it makes Unbound Gravel and Leadville some of the most lucrative Pro cycling events in North America. The ability to win one of these two events, or even place top-ten, will be "season makers" for those who can achieve the results.
The Effects Of Enriching The Prize Purses: The season conclusion for the Grand Prix last weekend was marred by weather and the resulting chaos from changing course at the last minute caused some amount of fear and anxiety for the participants in the finale of the series. Making things more lucrative for the 2026 events will only enhance these emotions, even without the weather factor.
Amping up the series by way of monetary reward will induce demands from the participants. These might range from petty desires to make things "easier" to concerns over race protocols. We've already seen the results of the monetizing of Unbound, and even before that event was monetized it was indirectly affecting athlete's abilities to score sponsorships and support. Athlete's demands which have resulted in changes to how Unbound is run include separation of Pro's from amateurs, separation of women's Pro fields from the Men's, and separated finish lines for Pro racers.
Money on offer for performance results has dramatically changed Unbound in particular to an event where the focus has been shifted to only what the Pro riders are doing. The resulting media coverage has affected the experience for amateurs, wrecked what was once a serene, soul-stretching challenge, and affected local residents negatively. While a thriving undercurrent of amateur experiences and competition still exits at Unbound, there is also still a small amount of friction between Pro and everyone else when it comes to how things play out on the gravel.
Every year we see and hear about how Pro riders desires for "freedom from obstruction" are hindered by roads being open to traffic, riders from the amateur ranks being on a similar course at times, and by an "unfair" support structure for Pros who are "privateers versus those who are affiliated with teams with big budgets and larger, better supplied crews.
With more on the line than ever before, induced demands will also be on the rise from the Pros. What will the resulting changes be to Unbound, and perhaps other events influenced by Unbound, be in the future?
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