diff --git a/azure-pipelines/variables/InsertTargetBranch.ps1 b/azure-pipelines/variables/InsertTargetBranch.ps1
index bd65511b8..cdcc91943 100644
--- a/azure-pipelines/variables/InsertTargetBranch.ps1
+++ b/azure-pipelines/variables/InsertTargetBranch.ps1
@@ -1,2 +1,2 @@
 # This is the default branch of the VS repo that we will use to insert into VS.
-'rel/d17.8'
+'main'
diff --git a/version.json b/version.json
index acf636d1e..4c605c5cd 100644
--- a/version.json
+++ b/version.json
@@ -1,6 +1,6 @@
 {
   "$schema": "https://raw.githubusercontent.com/dotnet/Nerdbank.GitVersioning/main/src/NerdBank.GitVersioning/version.schema.json",
-  "version": "17.8",
+  "version": "17.9-alpha",
   "publicReleaseRefSpec": [
     "^refs/heads/main$",
     "^refs/heads/v\\d+(?:\\.\\d+)?$"