Bradyn Lange and Lauren Stephens powered to solo victories to claim the U.S. gravel national titles in La Crescent, Minnesota, at the 2025 championships on Saturday.
Lauren Stephens secured her third gravel national title, maintaining a perfect record at the championships. It was a masterclass in control: she set the pace from the front, whittled down the field on the punchy climbs, and leaned on her road racing savvy to extend her streak of dominance.
Sarah Lange was the last rider to stick to Lauren’s wheel, and the New Hampshire rider was rewarded for her efforts with the silver medal. Lauren De Crescenzo rounded out the podium.
In the men’s race, Bradyn Lange surged to a late solo victory, earning his first major gravel title after starting his career as a mountain biker. A 2022 Life Time Grand Prix participant and winner of the Chequamegon event, Lange has steadily risen to prominence as one of the leading gravel racers in the U.S., while also cementing his reputation as one of North America’s top bike handlers
How the racing unfolded
(Image credit: Avery Stumm)
Bradyn Lange wins one for the mountain bikers with a last-ditch solo
The men’s race rolled out from La Crescent at 7:00 am Saturday with a mixed field of gravel and road races, looking to put a cherry on top of their season in the case of road racers, or build into the final few events of the year for the off-road specialists.
The big name missing from the start list this year was Keegan Swenson, the discipline’s first national champion and recently crowned marathon mountain bike world champion. In his absence, all eyes were on Alexey Vermeulen, who just won the LIfe Time Grand Prix’s Chequamegon event, defending champion Brennan Wertz, and other gravel stalwarts like Payson McElveen, Russell Finsterwald and Peter Stetina.
Without live coverage or many updates from the course, the exact ins and outs of the racing are hard to come by at the moment – more will trickle from the social media of riders as the days go by – but what we do know is that a large breakaway of seven riders got away early, with key riders like Chase Wark, the local favourite for the race, and Michael Garrison driving the pace. Those two riders would play a role deep into the race as some of the favourites would later bridge up to the leaders.
Lange was one of these riders who jumped across the gap to the breakaway as he moved just after the midpoint of the race, with Wertz and Daxton Mock making quick work of the gap towards the leaders. Behind them, Stetina was still recovering from an early crash, and the likes of Vermeulen and Davis were scrambling to rejoin the front of the action. Lange had the leg up as the early mover and was aided by the fact that the lead group had a crash, leaving just Wark, Garrison, and Zach Nehr out front to catch.
Ultimately, Lange made it to the front with under ten minutes left in the race, joining the fight for the win alongside Davis, Vermeulen, Garrison and Wark. Lange used the final technical section in the run towards La Crescent to make his move, and reached the finish line with enough breathing room to celebrate.
“It was an interesting race,” said Lange post-race. “It didn’t start out too hard, a break had about four minutes, and then it just kind of turned into survival on the final climbs.
“I bridged to the final group with about ten miles to go, and there were five of us heading into the final section, which suited me well as a mountain biker. I hit it on the first kicker, got away, and held it to the finish.”
(Image credit: Avery Stumm)
Lauren Stephens makes it a nationals hat-trick with a dominating performance
The women’s race closely followed the men’s event in terms of time and course, but it played out very differently.
Heading into the championship weekend, the women’s elite field featured only a handful of realistic contenders. And with Stephens’ dominance in road-style gravel races, it was arguably her race to lose. Melisa Rollins, Emma Langley, Lauren De Crescenzo, Cecily Decker, and Emily Newsome all had potential paths to victory, but none matched the two-time defending champion’s knack for riding rivals off her wheel when the miles stack up.
Once again, there isn’t a ton of information to go from, but what we can deduce is that Stephens’ victory path followed that general narrative, with the lead women’s group dwindling from the whole peloton to just Stephens, De Crescenzo, Langley, Rollins, Newsome, Leah van den Ham and Sarah Lange.
That group split after a crash in the middle third of the course in a muddy section, where it was reduced further to just a trio of Stephens, Lange and Newsome. That lead group turned into just Lange and Stephens before the defending champion made her move on the same final technical climb that Bradyn Lange had his winning move.
“The race was the hardest one we’ve had so far,” Stephens said after the race. “Every climb, the group would splinter and kind of have a selection. Finally, at the southern end of the course, we were a selection of six or seven riders.
“What made the race was quite a muddy, slick section where a few riders went down, and that was the point that made the race. The following climb, Sarah Lange and I pulled away from Emily Newsome, and from then on we worked together all the way to the final steep cyclocross kicker, and I was able to pull off the win out of that section.”
