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| The reasons we rode gravel are now ghosts of the past. |
I was in line at the Post Office the other day waiting to drop off a package to be shipped. A couple of people were ahead of me. One man. a tall, thin, athletic looking older gentleman, had on a t-shirt with a small logo on the back. I recognized it as the Life Time logo and just underneath it was the Unbound logo.
I smiled, thinking about how I was a part of what made the Unbound event what it is today. Then I started thinking about how that seminal, top-tier gravel event no longer represents what it did 20 years ago.
Of course, I know why this is, and I just enjoyed the memories I have of what it was which motivated us back then.. Things this man ahead of me at the Post Office that morning likely does not know about, or care to know about. And why should he? Gravel is big business now in cycling. It is a UCI recognized sport, and there is a UCI "World Champion" in gravel racing now with events spread across the entire globe. The gentleman probably thinks this is normal. It is how it is. Right? Why should he, or anyone who attends a UCI gravel event, or who reads the cycling internet sites, or attends Unbound, think otherwise.
It is dangerous for me to write about things concerning gravel riding and racing in 2025 because most folks coming across these thoughts probably have a completely different viewpoint than I do. And my viewpoint is unique in that I am looking at gravel events and modern day gravel cycling from "
the beginning', so to speak. In other words, I have two decades of perspective on this sport. If you've been riding gravel for five years, or ten, your perspective is going to be quite a bit different. I understand this: Many people reading my perspectives may think I'm crazy.
I've recounted this story a few times here before, but I will risk one more retelling, since it has relevance to this subject. Many years ago, Joel Dyke, one of the co-founders of the event which became Unbound and a Gravel Cycling Hall of Fame member, emailed me after he had stepped away from the event. He was encouraging me to stick to my way of doing Trans Iowa, the gravel event I used to promote and produce. Trans Iowa was free to enter, self-supported, and ultra-distance with hard time cut-offs. We had no "podium" awards ceremonies, no prize money to 'winners', and no finish line furnishings or hoopla. The entire reason Trans Iowa existed was to be an alternative to what racing had become. An alternative to just focusing on "the Winner" and disregarding all other competitors. At Trans Iowa, if you even lined up to start, you won.
Joel knew this, and his event he started with Jim Cummings, (again - why isn't Jim in the Gravel Cycling Hall of Fame?), was like Trans Iowa in the beginning, but it "grew" and changed, and well, Joel finally had had enough of that. Joel messaged me, as I said, and stated that "...when the money comes into it, it will ruin gravel."
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| UCI Gravel Worlds (Image courtesy of the UCI) |
Ruin? Well......
c'mon! I mean, look what we have now. Gravel tires, bicycles, gear, and even gravel specific bibs, for cryin' out loud! How would we have any of this without gravel cycling becoming a money-making machine? Who would invest their time doing anything for gravel cycling
unless they could make a living out of it?
Well, I don't know.......ask me. I can tell you how that works. But I'm not like most people, so I understand.
But was Joel correct in his prophecy? Can we look around and see how "gravel is ruined", or is it at the pinnacle of cycling in terms of popularity? I would say it is a pretty big deal now, and thanks to gravel being big business for this. So, "ruin" in terms of the overall impacts of gravel, yeah.... This sport has put a LOT of people on bicycles, so just from this standpoint, I think the prophecy is not correct. But this is not the only way to look at what gravel has become.
There has always been something about what Joel emailed me which stuck with me though. In the context of what gravel cycling once was, and where it is now? Maybe there is something to this "prophecy" which is true.
I always felt what he meant, and in my heart, I knew something was right about what Joel, and to be honest, many others, were saying back then. Gravel cycling was done for many reasons, but there was an element of gravel cycling which was unique, had nothing to do with who crossed a line first, and was something which any person could experience, whether they were blessed with a top-tier athletic ability or not at all.
Recently, a press release and an old public television episode helped me make sense of these feelings.
The press release came from a European cycling brand. They sent out a press release about their athlete's experiences at the 2025 Unbound event. I got eight seconds in before I stopped and sat aghast at what I had heard. I assumed this was from their male athlete in the event. His quote was this: "I don't think there is any reason to come here (Unbound) unless you have a chance to win the race".
Spoiler alert, this athlete did not win. (At least his name did not pop up in results for winners of Unbound) So......I guess he shouldn't come back again and this year was a waste? Admittedly, there could be something worthwhile about this person's experiences which came out through the video, but I couldn't get past those first eight seconds. I had heard enough. And this is why it is dangerous for me to write about this sort of thing.
Here is another quote. This time from a person who had ultra-distance cycling experience and knew competitive cycling norms from before 2010. His name, Jeff Frings. He filmed and produced the award winning documentary, "300 Miles of Gravel", which Iowa Public Television picked up on when they ran a portion of this film and interviewed Jeff about it.
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| Image courtesy of Mondraker Bicycles. |
Jeff was struck by Gravel Cycling Hall of Famer, Cory, "Cornbread" Godfrey's efforts in Trans Iowa v7, the version of Trans Iowa Jeff filmed. In describing this effort, Jeff asked some questions which summed up the very reasons all of us engaged in gravel cycling events in the early days of gravel. He said, "
Can I finish this? Can I push myself beyond what I thought I could do?"
Looking at gravel cycling in this way, if you simply engaged in the activity, you were "winning". It did not matter who crossed a line, as long as it was a line you didn't think was possible for you to cross. This made gravel events inclusive of everyone. All bodies, all levels of fitness and talents. It did not matter a whit what bicycle you had as long as it was what made you happy and successful in reaching goals for yourself, or going beyond those to reach points you never dreamed of before.
So, was Joel right in this view of things? I think we have lost something here in 2025. We've exchanged a personal growth aspect to attain a business growth aspect. We've left the focus on "everyone" and focused on the riders so talented we could never hope to be like them. Where does this leave us who cannot attain to such heights?
Well, maybe you have no reason to come "here" (grave cycling) anymore. This wasn't how things used to be though.
pfft! I probably should watch the end of that video.....but I probably won't.
