It was a big week for Lauren De Crescenzo (Cinci Elite). Her wedding to Jim Snitzer in Colorado and her "honeymoon" in Emporia were expected, but her triumphant ride in the 200-mile gravel race and her solo finish as queen of gravel was unexpected.

"This is my honeymoon. It's hard to go anywhere because of Covid, so I think this is a good place to be right now," de Crescenzo said after the race.

"I broke my collarbone last time I raced here, so this is much better. I'm having a lot of fun. I like the hardness of the gravel. I like that it's genuinely very difficult for everyone around me, and it's a test of my strength, not my stamina."

At the 2019 Unbound Gravel, de Crescenzo crashed on a technical section of the course when someone crashed in front of her just 35 miles into the race. She continued on to the first checkpoint, where doctors from her team at the time, DNA Cycling, told her to retire due to a broken collarbone.

The next morning, she and Snitzer spent time in an emergency room in Emporia, not for de Crescenzo's shoulder, but for Snitzer's, to treat hyponatremia. He was not properly hydrated and only made it to the second checkpoint.

"My preparation was very inadequate at that time. The amount of preparation for this event is more like staying in a mansion than a dorm," she said.

This year, the newlyweds will drive home to their home in Atlanta, Georgia, after the race with a new branding iron, the prize for winning Unbound Gravel. De Crescenzo is an epidemiologist at the Centers for Disease Control, where she works as a researcher on traffic safety. Snitzer has just graduated from medical school at Emory University, which is also her alma mater, and is starting her residency in Atlanta.

"It's a lot of fun. I love the hardness of the gravel. I just genuinely like that it's very difficult for everybody around me. It's not a test of how strong you are, but how good you are. That's why I ran the Hoppen 24 and a half times. I like those races too."

During the summer months when the COVID-19 coronavirus closed and races were cancelled, de Crescenzo found time to climb the Hogpen Gap in the North Georgia Mountains a total of 24 times in 9 hours 57 minutes, setting a women's record for climbing Everest.

This year, she returned to road racing with gravel, but as a sideline to her CDC job. She is part of the new Cinch Elite Racing team, founded and coached by former World Tour pro Tom Danielson. The team has 14 men and women competing in 10 major races, half of them gravel.

"We had a training camp and did some races in Colorado," said de Crescenzo, who won three of the four races, "which was pretty cool. I didn't win the crit. I could have won the other races. I don't like crit."

"In two weeks there are road races in Knoxville, including Nationals, Tour of the Gila, and Jo Martin. Crusher in Tushar, GRL in SBT, and a few others. So there are 5 big road races and 5 big gravel races. I'll be doing the All-Japan TT and the road race, so I won't be at the crit. I'll take that day off."

De Crescenzo has her reasons for not doing criteriums or circuit races: until her big crash in the last 100 meters of the San Dimas stage race circuit race in the spring of 2016, she had a full schedule with the Visit Dallas DNA Pro Cycling women's team of road races. She was airlifted to USC Medical Center, where she suffered severe injuries, including a fractured T1 vertebra, a broken hand, and facial trauma, and was placed in a medically induced coma; three weeks later, she awoke in another hospital, where she spent another five weeks with no memory of the accident or change of medical care.

But her love of cycling found her racing again at the Old Man Winter Bike Rally in her home state of Colorado in February 2018, which she won. She also raced and won the Tushar in Utah that year. Then she returned to try her luck at Unbound Gravel and won gold.

"It was very difficult. The finish line is at 11,000 feet elevation, which is right up my alley. So I really liked it. The harder the better."