Five years can convey a world of change, particularly in sports activities. In ladies’s biking alone, the interval between 2019-2024 has seen the beginning of the Tour de France Femmes, which is now the largest race on the calendar, improve in professionalism and salaries rising in direction of the €1 million mark, and an entire new era of riders emerge.
But for one rider, Rosa Klöser, the previous 5 years have seen her take an unlikely path from using the Copenhagen commute throughout her PhD in Green Shipping by means of to victory at gravel racing’s largest occasion – Unbound Gravel 200, and now into UCI Women’s WorldTour.
While you could know her due to her battle again from a puncture and shock dash triumph in Emporia, Kansas final June, in case you watched the current three Challenge Mallorca Femenina races that kicked off the 2025 ladies’s street racing season in Europe, you could seen Klöser’s identify on the beginning listing.
However, whereas using for her new group Canyon-SRAM zondacrypto, the German is competing in a number of the first street races of her life, definitely on the skilled stage, after a exceptional rise into biking’s high division.
Klöser describes becoming a member of her native Germany’s high ladies’s group as “a dream”, however one which wasn’t even potential for her to dream of 5 years in the past, having come to the aggressive aspect of the game late through the COVID-19 pandemic after her metropolis bike was stolen.
“I type of began within the midst of the coronavirus disaster. In Copenhagen and Denmark, everybody is de facto sporty, so lots of people use a motorcycle for commuting,” Klöser informed Cyclingnews at her first group coaching camp in December. “I believed at one level, why should not I try this? And then I actually fell in love with biking shortly.
“It should have been late 2020 that I used to be on a street bike for the primary time in my life. Then initially of 2021, I purchased a pleasant street bike and went out on the primary longer rides. But nonetheless, the primary native race I’ve ever achieved on the street was in 2022.”
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Klöser beams as she recounts her early moments within the sport, paying huge credit score to her time in Copenhagen’s native racing scene three years in the past when it was “actually extra like a interest” than a job possibility. But she additionally highlights a visit to “biking’s Mecca”, Girona the place she first tried gravel and met professional Piotr Havik, who was impressed together with her stage as a newcomer and inspired her to pursue racing the off-road self-discipline.
“I took his recommendation, then quick ahead to 2023 and I did my first gravel races, virtually on my own, very unprofessionally, with simply me and my boyfriend going to the races. But it went actually, rather well,” stated Klöser.
“I went on to attain a number of podiums within the UCI Gravel Series. From there on in, my skilled biking profession began, as a result of that was the primary time I obtained in contact with sponsors who have been eager to assist me within the sport.”
Klöser confirmed heaps of potential in these preliminary UCI races in 2023, incomes podiums behind Marianne Vos at Gravel Grit ‘n Grind and Carolin Schiff at Millau Grands Causses in addition to a top-five end behind Gravel One Fifty winner Pauliena Rooijakkers. After netting twenty eighth on the UCI Gravel World Championships in Italy, received by her now-teammate Kasia Niewiadoma, the 28-year-old German confirmed this was simply the beginning. It solely obtained higher in her second season.
“In 2024 I had a far more skilled setup for races, however nonetheless very a lot targeted on gravel,” she remembers. “Then I managed to win arguably the largest gravel race on the earth, Unbound Gravel, as just a little little bit of a darkish horse to some.”
Klöser nonetheless could not fairly consider the place she’d ended up when talking in December, with that unlikely rise all coming in such a condensed interval.
“It’s been enormous progress and to be trustworthy with you, I by no means anticipated it. My predominant focus was my PhD once I began biking, so in case you had requested me if we’d be having this interview in 2022, I might for certain not have believed you.
“If you had informed me that I’m sitting right here immediately with you as a Canyon-SRAM WorldTour rider, I might not have believed you. So yeah, it is mind-blowing and actually, a dream come true for me – however perhaps a dream that I did not even know that I had in 2022.”
Combining street and gravel racing going ahead
With an exhilarating dash win after 327km of gravel-induced Flint Hills ache within the financial institution, Klöser’s deal to hitch Canyon-SRAM zondacrypto solely absolutely got here to be after her pure intuition to be inquisitive once more took over. Three weeks precisely after Unbound, she put away the gravel bike, entered German street nationals on a whim and completed ninth, primarily behind WorldTour riders.
“It’s honest to say that I used to be positively elevated by means of the victory at Unbound. Canyon as a biking model, they’re actually huge in gravel and are investing closely in it. They do have already got the GRVL CLLCTV, their particular person gravel squad,” stated Klöser.
“But with me, I used to be at all times curious from the beginning of my brief biking profession about street racing as properly, with it being way more strategic, extra about groups and typically having objectives for some riders not at all times to win, however to contribute.
“When I talked to Canyon about changing into a part of their gravel group, on the identical time, I used to be really simply signing up for the German street nationals, to do some street racing simply out of curiosity. I went there, and it really went rather well. I used to be within the closing choice within the race and naturally, Canyon-SRAM was current due to the group’s German riders.
“That was type of my first contact level with the street racing aspect of the group. I believe the concept emerged that truly, there are numerous synergies that we might perhaps use and that it could possibly be a very nice, dare I say, experiment to make use of me in each capacities.”
For a group with a historical past of supporting multi-discipline objectives, be that Zoe Bäckstedt within the cyclocross discipline or Chloé Dygert on the monitor, Klöser was assured Canyon-SRAM zondacrypto have been the proper match.
“It’s a group that at all times, from once I began racing in 2022, actually stood out to me due to their very distinctive strategy of working with cyclists,” Klöser stated. “They’re very open-minded and so they’ve at all times had new approaches like Zwift Academy to pick out new expertise, but additionally with riders previously who’ve mixed totally different disciplines.
“They are giving me the chance to mix gravel racing with street racing and I believe if we take a look at each disciplines, the gravel and the street, we will really see that there is numerous synergies and gravel is changing into far more skilled.”
Klöser did not know a lot of her calendar on the finish of the 12 months when chatting with Cyclingnews, nonetheless, a defence of her title at Unbound is certainly on the schedule and he or she’s obtained the largest one-day races on her eye for the long-term future.
“For me, positively, it is not a secret that one can find me initially line of Unbound once more hoping to defend my title. The group has additionally been tremendous supportive in permitting me to arrange properly for that and have this objective in thoughts,” Klöser stated.
“I’m hoping long-term to do a number of the extra technical, gravel-style street races like Strade [Bianche], or [Paris-]Roubaix would after all be a dream to take part in.
“I believe I can study a lot from the women, from their street racing smartness. But I hope that I can convey my huge gravel engine to the street races as properly and assist them in addition to potential.”
She might not have taken the traditional path, nonetheless, Klöser did not take lengthy in any respect to develop into one of many stars of gravel racing, so do not be stunned if she’s quickly making a fast stand up the street ranks.
Klöser can be again on the gravel quickly, although, after kicking off her street season in January, together with her first race coming at X Santa Vall as a part of the Gravel Earth Series this coming weekend.