Matthew Busche (Trek) and Ted King (Cannondale) are the only two WorldTour riders racing the US Mens Road Race without teammates. BMC have three riders and Garmin bring six men to Tennessee. Both King and Busche have alluded to potentially working together but they have said that in a national championship, its every man for themselves.

"I mean you look out for each other just knowing that other teams have very, very full support, and we're going in swinging solo," King said. "But only one person gets a national champion's jersey. Every person wants their national champion's jersey, and I'd much rather get it than Busche. And he probably thinks the same."

Busche agreed saying that having no teammates is not necessarily a disadvantage.

"Of course we'll try and help each other, at least in the race support," he said. "But a championship race, even when you have teammates, it's negative racing; everybody wants to win a jersey. So maybe for me it's better if I don't have any teammates, then I only have to worry about myself."

Busche won the title in 2011 and King was third that same year but both men are gunning for victory this time around. Both men finished in the leading group on exactly the same circuit last year with King 7th in the sprint behind Jelly Belly’s Freddie Rodriguez and Busche was ninth after riding an attacking final.

Organisers have made one change to the circuit, adding in an extra climb that is reported to be very steep. Busche says that while the course will be hard enough to remove the sprinters, it will not get rid of fast finishers on the final ascent of Lookout Mountain either.

"It's better than a pure sprinters' course,” he said. “But I think it's a long way from the top of the hill to the finish. Just as we saw last year, I was alone at the top and then a big group came back. They added that little bump in the circuits now, so hopefully that helps me out a little bit."

The extra difficulty caused by the circuit will benefit the WorldTour riders.

"On top of that, it' s a really, really narrow road," King said of the new section. "So it's another day of bike racing."