Written and reported by Logan Jones-Wilkins.
The American Crit Cup will take its final bow this Sunday at the Bommarito Audi West County Gateway Cup in St. Louis. For the fourth straight season, the end-of-year omnium in the “Show Me State” will bring the ACC to a close over the 1-mile four-corner course of the Giro Della Montagna.
The race, which is also known more simply as “the Hill” as a nod to the neighborhood’s name, is an institution in the American cycling scene, with the race’s first edition coming way back in 1986. The race was originally formulated by lifetime Hill resident Joe Torrisi. The Giro, as it was called, slowly gained steam as it was held over the Fourth of July weekend to draw additional racers who were in town for the VP Fair cycling races held in St. Louis on the same weekend. In 1998, the Giro became the cornerstone of the Gateway Cup and was moved to its Labor Day slot as a part of the final stop on the American professional cycling calendar.
On paper, the course is a classic American criterium, featuring four corners over one-mile laps. Nevertheless, as the name suggests, the race is defined by the rise, which takes riders to the top of the course around turn three, before they plunge back down to the long finish straight. The Gateway Cup’s Giro Della Montagna is a great example of how not all four-corner criteriums are created the same and should provide a fascinating cap to a great summer season of racing in the American Criterium Cup.
What’s more, the race takes place in one of the most vibrant Italian-American communities in the country. Complete with a piazza, Italian restaurants, gelato options, an Italian grocer, and a massive sense of community that comes from age-old Italian heritage in the bones of the neighborhood that produced Italian American legends like Yogi Berra and Joe Garagiola. Here are all the details of the weekend before things get underway on Sunday:
Facts and figures
Where does the Gateway Cup take place? The Gateway Cup takes place in St. Louis, while the Giro Della Montagna is located in the Italian neighborhood called “The Hill.”
Where does the Gateway Cup take place? The Gateway Cup runs from Friday, August 29, through Monday, September 1st. The Giro della Montagna is on Sunday, August 31st, with the women’s race starting at 4:10 pm and the men taking off at 5:40 pm.
What are the course attributes? The Giro Della Montagna is a one-mile, four-corner, rectangular course with a hill between turns two and three. In total, there is just shy of 40 feet of climbing per lap.
How many editions of the Giro Della Montagna have taken place? The Giro della Montagna began in 1986 and has run every year since, except for 2020 when the race was cancelled due to the COVID-19 pandemic.
Who won the Giro della Montagna in 2024? Juan Arango and Marlies Mejias won their respective races last year in 2024.
The course
The Giro della Montagna is a four-corner crit with some pazazz. The course has a rising climb on the backstretch of the course heading into the race-defining third corner – not for its race-breaking difficulty, but for how it plays in a sprint.
The position of the hill sets up a very early sprint, as whoever manages to lead into turn 3 is in the box seat to have a smooth final two turns to set up the rapid downhill run to the finish. It is rare for anyone to come back from behind the first few wheels to win the final sprint with two turns to go. By the last turn, a rider needs to be either in first or second position.
A breakaway is always possible in criterium racing, and this year has seen breakaways in a few scenarios where it was unexpected, however with lots of room to chase and strong sprint teams looking to end their seasons on a high note, it seems likely that after 70 minutes of racing it will be all together for a sprint in the end.
The contenders
Chicago Grit – Fulton Market Grand Prix
With the Giro della Montagna bringing the ACC season to a close, the overall battles that are yet to be decided are sure to take center stage. We dove into all of those different subplots last week, which you can read here. However, with only six individual races to win on the ACC this summer, there is plenty to gain from winning at the Hill. Time is running out for riders who haven’t gotten on top of the podium yet this year to claim one of criterium racing’s big prizes.
Read more: Table setting –– where the ACC standings sit heading into the finale in St. Louis
That being said, the men’s race is likely to be a battle between those in the overall ACC hunt. The top four men – Maurice Ballerstedt, Danny Summerhill, Brody McDonald, and Lucas Bourgoyne – have been filling up the podium all season long. Interestingly enough, only Bourgoyne has won an ACC race, but that is, in part, due to his team’s depth. Two of the five races have been won by his teammates, with Luke Fetzer winning in Boise and Richard Holec winning in Chicago.
Bourgoyne will certainly want to make it three in a row for Cadence Cyclery at the Hill, but standing in his way is the trio of Ballerstedt, Summerhill, and McDonald. Those three are ahead of Bourgoyne in the ACC standings, they are well-suited for the hilly course, and, in the case of Summerhill, are former winners on the Hill.
It is hard to imagine one of the top four in the ACC standings, or one of Bourgoyne’s teammates, winning in St. Louis beyond a few interesting challengers. Team Medellin EPM is the big variable, as the Colombian team is in the United States for the Maryland Cycling Classic and has decided to jump into the racing a week earlier in St. Louis. Jordan Parra and his Bikers Cycling Team will be back in ACC racing as well, hoping to match Parra’s podium finish at Tulsa to start the ACC season.
On the women’s side, Aline Seitz, the ACC leader, and Marlies Mejias, the two-time defending champion, will be the big favorites. Seitz took a win in Milwaukee and has yet to relinquish the red overall leader’s jersey. Mejias has yet to win on the ACC this summer, but has shown plenty of speed whenever she has turned up to the start line. Mejias will also have the backing of a strong Virginia’s Blue Ridge Twenty28 team that is going blow-for-blow with Seitz’s UTC Butcherbox team. That team competition is the main ACC sideplot left to be decided on the women’s side, with 12 points separating UTC Butcherbox and Virginia’s Blue Ridge Twenty28 in the team standings.
Outside of those two contenders, there will be the challenge from Fount Cycling Guild, where Andrea Cyr will try to consolidate her second place on the individual ACC standings and perhaps sneak away for a breakaway win that she has been chasing all summer. She is backed by a strong team as well, with Fount sitting in third on the points table heading into the finale. LA Sweat is the other contending team with a deep roster and some outside contenders, including Jospheine Peloquin, who won the Chicago Grit overall omnium last month.
