Gravel Grinds

A (Mostly) Contrarian View

Unless you’ve spent the last decade under a rock —

No, that’s not the right opening; gravel cycling is too niche-y for the “under a rock” metaphor. Time and again I’m reminded: some of us are immersed in this sport, where Strava and tubeless and, yes, gravel don’t just resonate; they provoke debate. To the vast rest of the world…it’s all mostly meaningless.

So here’s what to know: gravel cycling has soared in popularity over the last decade or so. (Note: “soared” is a relative term; the graph depicting it would indeed climb steeply, but the X-axis would be a tiny, niche-y scale.)

“Gravel” is cycling on…well, gravel, but very broadly defined. Unpaved backroads. Farm roads. Logging roads. Some construction roads. What we used to call “dirt roads.”

But it’s not dirt! Riding “dirt” is riding trails — mountain biking. Not on dirt roads.

Road riding happens on roads. But not dirt roads. Pavement, concrete, asphalt. Oh — and cobbled roads, which are typically a lot rougher than gravel roads, or even some (dirt) trails.

Cars drive on road-riding roads (including the cobbled roads — sometimes.) Trucks and tractors occasionally drive on gravel-riding roads (as do some cars, typically with people who are lost). They don’t go on dirt-riding trails. This will be important later.

To the fully initiated, gravel cycling — really just known as “gravel” — has felt like a movement, with (again, relatively) mushrooming growth, and its own culture. This has all developed largely in America, with several of the most well-attended races and events traveling farm roads in the Heartland; think mustachioed riders in flannel and wool aboard steel bikes with mustache-flared handlebars (not kidding: lots of mustaches). A gravel race is fully democratized: women and men competing together, with one mass start, rather than waves or seeds.

My problem with gravel, though, is that it’s a ‘tweener. It offers neither the speed of road cycling, or the technical challenge of mountain biking. Gravel racing is mostly about who can push hard on the pedals the longest, irrespective of drafting and tactics — or skill in navigating twists, drops, and rocky scrambles. When I’m riding my road bike on streets, I often pass riders on gravel bikes — and same for when I’m riding trails on my mountain bike. Give me the extremes: the pace and surges of a road race, or the Zen flow of a mountain bike ride.

I’m evidently not the only one who feels this way: Gravel racing is being drawn in road cycling’s direction, replete with lycra, drafting, and team tactics. We’re seeing seeded starts, separate for men and women. The recent Gravel World Championships looked and felt mostly like a spring road classic.

Predictably, it was won by one of the world’s strongest road cyclists, Mathieu Van Der Poel. He employed road-style tactics and sported a skinsuit — definitely not wool, let alone flannel. Sure enough, unlike most gravel races I’ve followed, the Worlds race was relatively engaging, with attacks, covers, and counters, until MVDP powered away from his adversaries.

So I’d rather ride on the road or on trails than on gravel, and I’d rather watch a Spring Classic or a Grand Tour than a gravel race. But gravel can boast of something that its extreme counterparts can’t: It’s safe (again, relatively!). Cyclists will tell you: you crash often on a mountain bike, but you crash badly on a road bike. I’ve read that gravel’s popularity, meanwhile, has surged as riders have sought softer surfaces away from cars, the primary cause of so many of the worst accidents, but also avoiding the shoulder-dislocating features of many mountain bike trails.

Given my experience with crashes, then, I often opt for the middle, gravely ground, between the extremes of the road and trail

s. Here in Davis, we have miles of tractor roads and long, straight, levee-topping gravel. These routes aren’t terribly exciting, but I feel entirely safe when I ride them. Which seems worth opting into: Maybe these gravel fans are on to something.