Super talent skips road racing for a bit to deliver a top Unbound performance

The Giro d’Italia has just finished, and the race calendar is filling up with events such as the Tour de Wallonie, the Giro d'Italia Women, and the upcoming Tour Auvergne-Rhône-Alpes. But while his colleagues are slogging away on the road, Emil Herzog chose a different path last weekend. The young German from Red Bull-BORA-hansgrohe flew to the United States to line up at Unbound Gravel.

Herzog has long been regarded as a true top talent. The now 21-year-old German became junior world champion in 2022 after beating António Morgado. Two years later he joined Red Bull-BORA-hansgrohe, where he immediately turned professional in the WorldTour. He has not yet quite had a full breakthrough in his 2.5 years as a pro, but his talent is beyond doubt.

We have not seen all that much of the prodigy this year, but anyone following Unbound Gravel would have seen Herzog’s name pop up. There, he showed some excellent things. He finished eighth. “It was my first gravel race, and a very cool experience with the Specialized Off-Road team,” he says on his team’s website. “I am very grateful for this opportunity, and for a first attempt it went pretty well.”

In the 200-mile gravel race, the German stayed with the best riders for quite a long time, but after a while his inexperience showed. “I made a beginner’s mistake. I missed my second feed, so I started to run a bit low on energy. Then I got dropped from the group.” The eventual winner Mads Würtz Schmidt came from that group.

Fortunately for Herzog, he was able to recover. “At the third feed I was finally able to get food back into the system, and got my legs back. I could keep going, and a bit faster than before. In the end I finished eighth.” He crossed the line together with Piotr Havik in ninth, almost 25 minutes behind the Danish winner.

Red Bull and Specialized also made a strong impression in the United States. “My team-mates finished first, second and fifth, so we had four riders in the top places.” Herzog will return to road cycling, but this will not be the last time we see him on unpaved roads. “It was a really cool day, and it was very fun. I am sure I want to do this again.”

Author: David Bavin-Hobbs - [email protected]