Originally Posted by grolby

That's bizarre; there isn't any rule that mandates an upgrade based on cross-disciplinary categories. Like @shovelhd already said, you can request a cyclocross upgrade based on your road category, i.e. if I were just starting out in cyclocross, I could say, I'm a 3 on the road and start at CX 4, skipping cat 5. But I couldn't use my Cat 2 in CX to skip Cat 5 on road or track. Seems like someone just didn't fully understand the rules, if this woman you know was upgraded to a road 3 based on her CX category. There's a local cross racer here, very strong, who earned his Cat 1 in cyclocross midway through last season. He still started the road season as a Cat 3 and had to earn the upgrade to Cat 2. Now he has to do the same thing if he wants to be a 1, which I assume he does. Road is pretty much top of the USAC upgrade hierarchy, not necessarily because it's regarded as more important (though some do regard it that way, I'm sure) but because rider skill contributes much more to the safety of everyone else in the race than it does in MTB or CX.