There will be no roar from Into the Lion's Den Powered by SRAM this fall. That's because event founder Justin Williams (L39UNION, Los Angeles) has announced that the popular criterium, which boasts one of the largest prize pools in the country, will be postponed until next year.

Justin Williams wrote on his Instagram a week ago, "After much deliberation, I have decided to postpone Into the Lions Den until 2023, prioritizing L39ION's event resources to create additional junior day camps, community rides, outreach programs to be produced.

SRAM had indicated that it would return for a second year as the top sponsor of Into the Lion's Den, scheduled for Saturday, September 10 in Sacramento. Last year, the invitation-only event was held on October 30 with a one-kilometer lap around the California State Capitol, with the start/finish line at 11th and N Streets.

The inaugural event paid $100,000 for the 140-minute race, with the prize money split evenly between the top 10 finishers and primes in each of the women's and men's races. Olivia Ray (then with Rally Cycling) won the women's race overall, with Kendall Ryan (L39LION of Los Angeles) in second and Amy Peters (Team SD Works) in third. Justin Williams won the Pro Men's race, with Luke Lamperti (Trinity Racing) in second and Corey Williams of L39ION in third.

In addition to community outreach and overseeing the second Pro Race, Justin Williams has been a part of L39LION of Los Angeles for a full season. He is currently in the UK at the Commonwealth Games with his brother Cory Williams, representing Belize in the cycling competition. The brothers will compete in the Warwick Road Race on Sunday, while Corey Williams will compete in the individual time trial on Thursday.

The Intelligencia Cup concluded Sunday with the 10th anniversary criterium series in the Chicago, Illinois area, July 22-31, with nine of the 10 races (excluding the road race on July 27) being part of the omnium competition.

In the women's Pro 1/2 division, Marlies Mejias Garcia (Blue Ridge TWENTY24, Virginia) swept the podium seven times, including four wins. Paola Muñoz (CWA Racing p/b Goldman Sachs ETFs) was second overall and U23 U.S. Pro Time Trial Champion Zoe Tapeles (LUX/CTS plb Specialized) was third.

Clever Martinez (Blazers) won the Men's Pro 1/2 division on the final day after a points battle with Brandon Fiheri (Project Echelon Racing). Martinez competed in every event, finishing no worse than sixth and winning two of his six podium finishes. Fihaly did not finish in the points standings on the final day, but did enough to finish second overall, with teammate Ethan Crain in third place overall.

The Northwestern Medicine Lake Bluff Criterium, the final day of the Intelligencia Cup, was also the seventh race of the American Criterium Cup.

Maggie Coles-Leister (DNA Pro Cycling) leads both women's individual categories with a 142 point advantage over Andrea Sill (Butcher Box Cycling p/b LOOK) in the overall standings and 45 points in the sprint standings. DNA Pro Cycling leads Colavita Factor Pro Cycling by a narrow margin with only one point separating the top two women's teams.

In a similar scenario in the men's category, Brandon Fiheri (Project Echelon Racing) leads the individual standings. He leads Alfredo Rodriguez (Best Buddies Racing) by 169 points overall, but the leader has not scored any points in the last three races as he recovers from a broken collarbone suffered in Boise on July 10. Fihaly is 80 points ahead of Michael Hernandez (Best Buddies Racing) and 85 points ahead of Thomas Gibbons (Automatic-ABUS).

With the American Criterium Cup taking place on the final weekend of the Intelligencia Cup, some teams called up additional male riders, including Butcher Box, Best Buddies, and L39LION. [Eric Hill, director of Project Echelon Racing, told Cycling News. 'There's fatigue, there's the unwritten rules of the group, and we're going to spend the next 10 days getting to know our competitors.'

"When the team raced the American Criterium Cup, it was a different story than the one-day ACC event. Still, racing on a really technical and fast course was a really hard investment."

The Lake Bluff Criterium was held after Michael Hernandez (Best Buddies Racing) got into a post-race fistfight with Justin Williams at the Salt Lake Criterium on July 16; the two were disqualified and given a 72-hour suspension and a $500 fine.

Hernandez then agreed to serve a three-month suspension for USA Cycling Rule 8A3(a) ("violent conduct" between competitors) for a physical altercation with Justin Williams. A similar ruling against Justin Williams has not been confirmed, but Cycling News expects a similar penalty extension to be confirmed in the next few days.

The National Series, the eighth of ten races, will be held on August 6 in Littleton Twilight, Colorado.

However, organizers of the Jingle Cross GX gravel race in Amanda, Iowa, canceled the event in early July, a month before the inaugural event.

In a July 6 statement, the organizers said that the short preparation time for the event as a UCI World Championships qualifier and the fact that it is a non-profit organization were factors in the cancellation, citing weeks of uncertainty as the UCI was seeking a location and date for the championship event. Registration for the Jingle Cross GX opened in late March, but the UCI waited until mid-June to announce the final championship location and date (October 8-9 in Veneto, Italy).

"Unfortunately, this date and location had only been set three and a half weeks earlier, as it was unclear when the UCI World Championships would take place, and thus it was not possible to promote the event as a qualifier for the UCI World Championships. Therefore, after considering all possibilities, we regret to inform you that this year's event has been cancelled," organizers posted on the Jingle Cross website; it is unclear if there are plans to bring the event back in 2023.

The Jingle GX Gravel Race was launched by the same group that organized the Jingle Cross Cyclocross scheduled for October 14-16; in May, event founder and race director John Meehan announced that the World Cup event would be held the same weekend in Fayetteville, Arkansas, and cancelled the cyclocross event that had been running for 18 years, citing scheduling conflicts between the UCI and the Flanders Classics.

The Gravel World Series has now completed five rounds, the last of which was the Highland Gravel Classic held in Fayetteville on June 25. At each event, the top 25% in each age category qualify for the UCI Gravel World Championships, which the UCI has announced will be held in Italy in 2022 and 2023.

The next qualifier will be the Gravel Grit n Grind in Halmstad, Sweden, on August 20; no other events will be held in North America in 2022.