<\/p>\n \u201cThere\u2019s this notion of feeding the rat,\u201d Stetina says. \u201cYou have to keep feeding it, and it almost becomes an addiction at one point.\u201d<\/p>\n You may like<\/p>\n For a rider who has spent his career challenging conventional paths, from the WorldTour peloton to the self-built world of gravel privateering<\/a>, Stetina is determined to step away on his own terms as well. For him, retirement does not mean disappearing; it means reshaping his relationship with the sport that has shaped his life.<\/p>\n A full year in the making, Stetina announces his retirement today alongside the release of Feeding the Rat<\/a>, a short documentary centred on his last full commitment to speed: one final, all-in effort up the slopes of Mount Washington.<\/p>\n A life shaped by the bike <\/p>\n \n A young Pete Stetina racing the U23 road race at the UCI World Championships. (Image credit: Getty Images)<\/p>\n Stetina grew up inside the sport. He is the son of former U.S. national champion and two-time Coors Classic winner Dale Stetina<\/a>, and the nephew of Wayne Stetina, another national champion and Olympian. Brothers whom Stetina describes as the \u201cdynamic duo\u201d of American racing in the 1970s and 1980s. And by the time U.S. road cycling surged in popularity during the Lance Armstrong years, Stetina was already firmly on a path of his own.<\/p>\n He rose quickly through the American development system, earning national-team selections and spending his formative years racing in Europe. As an under-23, he got a taste of the yellow leader\u2019s jersey at the Tour de l\u2019Avenir, an early signal of his promise as a climber and stage racer. By his early twenties, Stetina had reached the WorldTour, carving out a long career with Garmin-Sharp, BMC Racing Team and Trek-Segafredo, valued for his ability to survive deep into the mountains on cycling\u2019s biggest stages.<\/p>\n His WorldTour years were defined less by headline wins than by trust and durability. He raced all the Grand Tours and was a key mountain lieutenant in Ryder Hesjedal\u2019s 2012 Giro d\u2019Italia victory<\/a>. And when opportunities did arise, he showed his own depth with podiums and top-tens at the Tour of California, Tour of Utah and Tour of Colorado.<\/p>\n Some less-glorious moments reshaped him just as deeply, he says, pointing to a horrific crash in the Basque Country, which left him with a broken leg and a long road back.<\/p>\n \n Stetina was a key mountain lieutenant in Ryder Hesjedal\u2019s 2012 Giro d\u2019Italia victory. (Image credit: Getty Images)<\/p>\n All told, Stetina enjoyed a solid, respected WorldTour career, one that ended not through necessity but opportunity. Rather than step away quietly or chase marginal contracts, he built a future in the then-little-known world of gravel racing<\/a>, helping to define what the discipline could become.<\/p>\n You may like<\/p>\n “When I left the WorldTour, I didn’t retire<\/a>. I said, This is a discipline in its own right, and I\u2019m going to come race it. It deserves to have its own professionals,” Stetina recalls.<\/p>\n In 2019, gravel racing was still a loosely defined space. There were must-do events and some personalities, but little structure and no clear professional pathway. Stetina built his own, coining the term \u201cprivateering\u201d to describe a one-man operation that combined racing, sponsorship, logistics and promotion.<\/p>\n \u201cI based my career on gravel,\u201d he says. \u201cI was going to sink or swim with this ship.\u201d<\/p>\n And the leap was rewarded on the results sheet. Stetina emerged as one of gravel racing\u2019s early standard-bearers, winning Traka in Europe<\/a> and the Crusher in the Tushar in the U.S., while consistently featuring at the front of events like Unbound Gravel<\/a>, Belgian Waffle Ride California and Leadville. In a discipline still defining itself, he proved that a full-time gravel career was not only possible, but sustainable and fulfilling.<\/p>\n Six years on, the landscape is barely recognisable. Gravel racing<\/a> is global, hyper-competitive and increasingly professionalised. For Stetina, that evolution has been both a gift and a mirror.<\/p>\n \u201cI came to gravel to have a more fulfilling and fun experience,\u201d he says. \u201cAnd I almost feel like I\u2019m back in the WorldTour that I left. That\u2019s not a negative thing, but it\u2019s so high-performance now. It extended my career even more than I ever thought possible.\u201d<\/p>\n It also delayed the reckoning. \u201cI never really did retire,\u201d he says. \u201cI just transitioned disciplines. Now it’s time.”<\/p>\n Why now?<\/p>\n \n (Image credit: Canyon Bikes)<\/p>\n Asked what made this the moment, Stetina pauses. \u201cIt\u2019s a lot of things,\u201d he says. \u201cIt\u2019s complicated.\u201d<\/p>\n Age plays its part, as does motivation. The hunger that once defined him no longer burns in quite the same way. \u201cThe endless pursuit of another race, another performance; it\u2019s starting to get tiresome and not fulfilling,\u201d he says. \u201cWinning doesn\u2019t mean the same anymore.\u201d<\/p>\n Family plays a factor, too. \u201cA big part of it is not having the bike dictate every angle of family life,\u201d Stetina explains. \u201cThe bike would have to come on every family vacation. That\u2019s not fair to my wife, to my kids growing up. I want to be more present at home.\u201d<\/p>\n And then there is the sport itself. Gravel, the space that once gave him freedom, has evolved into something far sharper-edged. \u201cI love it,\u201d he says. \u201cBut it\u2019s changed from what it was in 2019.\u201d<\/p>\n This year was always meant to be the end. And for his last hoorah, Stetina had planned his 2025 season around one final target: the Mount Washington Auto Road Bicycle Hillclimb.<\/a><\/p>\n The Mount Washington climb is short, brutal<\/a> and steeped in American bike racing history. Contested and won by Tour de France veterans, Olympians and national champions such as Tyler Hamilton, Tom Danielson, Ned Overend and Jeannie Longo, the event covers just 7.4 miles (11.9 km) but climbs 4,678 feet (1,425 m) at an average 12.6% gradient, with ramps that pitch up to 22%.<\/p>\n His father, Dale, held the record on the climb for 17 years. When organisers reset the record books in 2022 after paving the final gravel section, Stetina saw an opportunity to reconnect with that family legacy<\/a>.<\/p>\n \u201cMy overriding desire was to do it all right, one last time,\u201d he says. \u201cSo that I could put myself to pasture at peace.\u201d<\/p>\n He committed fully. \u201cI went all in this year,\u201d Stetina says, from dieting and altitude camps to bike modifications. \u201cI wanted no regrets.\u201d<\/p>\n There was also the hope that Mount Washington might provide a “beautiful moment” to close this competitive chapter: a victory, a final high point, a place to announce his retirement.<\/p>\n But the beautiful moment never came. Illness struck at the wrong time, and on race day Stetina could only watch as his close friend Ian Boswell rode away<\/a> and claimed the win.<\/p>\n \u201cThis was one of the poorest seasons of my career,\u201d he admits. \u201cSomething went wrong every race. And Mount Washington was the epitome of that. I put so much into that record and that family legacy. Looking back, I was trying to control and write my own destiny, and no one gets to do that.\u201d<\/p>\n That tension is what Feeding the Rat, the documentary that accompanies Stetina\u2019s retirement announcement, is really about. The short film captures the reckoning that comes at the end of an athletic career: knowing when to let go and how much purpose to attach to performance.<\/p>\n For Stetina, the bike has been his career, his community, his second life partner, and he admits he is nervous about what comes next.<\/p>\n One Last Lap<\/p>\n \n Stetina on the attack for Garmin-Sharp (Image credit: Supplied by Peter Stetina)<\/p>\n \u201cI\u2019m nervous,\u201d Stetina says plainly. \u201cWhen you retire as an athlete, it can be a midlife crisis.\u201d<\/p>\n After more than two decades of measuring life in training blocks, race calendars and marginal gains, he is acutely aware of what can happen when that structure disappears overnight. \u201cWhen this is all you\u2019ve done since you were 16, you need to put that intensity somewhere else,\u201d he says. \u201cAnd if you don\u2019t, you can spiral.\u201d<\/p>\n That awareness has shaped the way he is choosing to step away. Rather than draw a hard line under his racing career, Stetina is opting for a long, deliberate exit. One that allows space to adjust, reflect and redirect. \u201cI like the long tail,\u201d he explains. \u201cI think when riders just stop, you see people get in trouble. They don\u2019t know what\u2019s next.\u201d<\/p>\n Part of that process is a farewell tour: a limited series of races that matter to him personally. \u201cThere\u2019s no pinnacle,\u201d he says. \u201cIt\u2019s just a collection.\u201d Levi\u2019s GranFondo in his hometown of Santa Rosa, Belgian Waffle Ride California, Mid South<\/a>, Oregon Trail and Steamboat. All places that shaped his gravel career and still hold meaning beyond results.<\/p>\n \u201cI\u2019m really grateful that I get to do it on my terms,\u201d Stetina says. \u201cIt\u2019s so rare in this sport. Usually, the sport decides when you\u2019re done.\u201d<\/p>\n Alongside that gradual goodbye, he is stepping into a new role that keeps him close to the sport without being consumed by it. Stetina will extend his relationship with Canyon<\/a> and several long-time partners, attending races not as a podium hunter but as a Spielertrainer, a player-coach helping guide the next generation of gravel professionals.<\/p>\n \u201cI\u2019m truly just retiring from the pursuit of pro podiums and being a professional athlete and what that entails,\u201d he says. “I want to keep going to these events and explore them in different ways. Maybe sometimes I\u2019ll be quick, but that\u2019s not the objective.\u201d<\/p>\n The motivation now lies in helping others navigate a world he helped build. \u201cWhen I started in gravel, there wasn\u2019t a formula,\u201d he says. \u201cNow it\u2019s a thing, which is awesome, but there\u2019s this whole subset of younger pros who don\u2019t know how to do it yet.\u201d<\/p>\n Drawing on his WorldTour background and years of privateering, Stetina hopes to help younger riders learn not just how to race, but how to build a sustainable career.<\/p>\n “At this point, I feel like I’ve had a Master’s in sports marketing just from having to privateer…so I’m going to help these young talents truly excel, especially Canyon’s current and soon-to-be-announced new signings,” he shares.<\/p>\n Still, the habits of a lifetime do not disappear overnight. \u201cIt\u2019s weird,\u201d he admits. \u201cEven today, I went out and did a really hard ride, because it\u2019s fun, but it\u2019s also a habit. But I\u2019m done living for speed on the bike, you know?”<\/p>\n Can Peter Stetina Break the Mt. Washington Hillclimb Record? – YouTube![\"Peter](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/12\/TeJDhxDxmARvFuQ7TzZ3PY.jpg\")
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