It seems everyone has an opinion about everything. And everyone knows or wants to be associated with the best. It is just not bikes, it is every aspect in our lives. In the grand scheme that speaks volumes about ourselves as a culture and a world. An example is food. We have to have the best street taco and if you are not having the best street taco, you are wrong. We are evolving into a culture of snobs, or maybe we are already there. And as I write this, maybe I am reliving my past. Glory days no, but at least the past.
Full disclosure, I use to drink the Salsa Cycles Kool-Aid early on. It was not because they were the best, it was because I thought they had well thought out bikes that no one else had. The niche they created in 2013 - 2016 was ideal for how I was riding. Today, they are just another bike company, and their designs and my wants/needs have diverged. This is part of evolution, as I age out of their ideal sales demographic, and my body changes, we will divert. This is part of our lifecycle, which is fine. More importantly, I have found a love in building up bikes from a OTS (Off the Shelf) frames. I think you the reader need to understand where I am coming from before I go into today's post. People evolve, people's needs change, and people will always change with time.
I still think I am newb to gravel. I recall my first "gravel" ride outside my youth. It was a winter ride, around Bremer County, because the single track was covered in snow and we had not packed down the trail yet to rock 2.1" tires on the trail at night on 10 degree temps. We pedaled around a circuit and it was horrible. My shoe choice was awful, my hands were cold, and the wind howled. It was about 5-7pm on a February night. And more importantly those pesky stones bounced my tire all over the place. In March I tried it again, but it was warm temps and I had similar results except, my bike got muddy from the gravel thawing slop. It was 2010 and I thought gravel was dumb based on those experiences.
A few years go by and I meet Mike Johnson the local gravel God. He is preaching the gravel good book to me. I am annoyed by it based upon my previous experiences. He takes me out on a similar loop on a spring day, and he points a lot of my issues and struggles. Tells me to tweak this and that, and try this type of stuff. Boom, it changed my experience and I started to enjoy the ride.
Based upon that positive experience I bought a Foundry Harrow and jammed some wide tires in that cross frame. 35mm tires were wide in those days, and when Surly did a 41mm Knard, my mind popped. We were jamming 41mm Knards into frames. Yes, the clearances were so tight, we would inflate the tire inside the frame. I then transitioned to the Salsa Warbird carbon frame later.
My first gravel race was Colesburg 40 out of Elkport, Iowa in 2013. I finished so late that the podium was happening as I rolled in. I had a horrible/great day. I learned a lot and realized early on, gravel is where old roadies go to podium. The parking lot of the park was filled with cars who hauled bikes valued more than the car. The following year I did a Iowa Gravel races series in the months of Feb to March. Again, it was a road racing lap format but it was old roadies banging it out for their old glory.
As I built my confidence I went after longer races and did the Almanzo 100. I went an tried the Land Run 100, got 9 miles in and my chain jumped off the top cog and got jammed hard. I did a lot of races, with probably a 50/50 success rate. Completing a gravel race in those days was note worthy. As the bikes and tires improved, it lost it's luster.
The failures are important, because it was when you failed you found other riders who were in the same boat. I tend to still talk to most of those folks. The ones that I chatted with and yoyo-ed with in successful races, I could not even tell whom they are. I think the people early on were different. People were still trying to figure out how to complete an event. Now you just get a bike set up for you, and hop on a ERG trainer, select a training program, and it is almost a guaranteed completion if you do the work. I know because I did this almost exactly in 2019 to complete the BC Epic 1000. The big difference is I built the bike I used.
The magic of gravel was figuring it out with others. I would sit at the feet of Mike Johnson and absorbed his information. He may say something like double wrap your bar tape for a cheap way to absorb head shock. People would go to events without massive sponsors. In 2015 I went to Dirty Kanza 100 and decided big races were not for me. I did enjoy the large finish, but the show I did not. I seldom like large crowds, and that is my issue, but that also limits what I do. I also did not enjoy the star atmosphere. I heard stories of a rider pushing their own political agendas upon the locals. When I heard of the event transpiring I asked the person telling me, if they thought the rider was being a good guest in the community. I got no response from them.
Figuring it out with others was what gravel was about. Now the bike industry rightfully so, provides you the consumer with an out of the box solution. You would see things like Scott Sumpter carrying his rubber spatula to clean mud. I would carry popsicle sticks for the same exact reason. I imagine Park Tool or Pedros has a gravel specific tool for that today.
This weekend was UCI CX Worlds in Fayetteville, AR. In the end a big to do was made about Arkansas laws passed prior to the announcement of the race location. Then the hashtag and twitter demands began. UCI waited it out, Arkansas waited it out, and guess what. The same people who were in a tizzy, went to UCI CX Worlds and talked about how great it is. I use that example, because we have already seen this occur in gravel. I have listened to podcasts where people want to confront others in rural communities about their way of life. That is fine and dandy, but remember the turmoil you caused in the community you visited when you are washing your bike in the burbs. You may cause way more damage with your butterfly effect and set crap into motion you have no idea existed. I grew up in small town America. Family rivalries are real, you irking people may result in less gravel races. Communities may not welcome you. Fun fact, RAGBRAI is banned from a few counties in Iowa, because of how riders acted and a few lawsuits filed. The cost became prohibitive both finically and culturally.
I will get a lot of flack and I know I will be mocked behind my back and this blog post will be sent around. You are just reinforcing my points when you do that. Lately the political world has me asking why other people want to control aspects of other peoples lives? I think it all stems from insecurities. All this stacks up into why the magic of gravel in my eyes has been lost. We are now incapable of separating hobbies from politics. And this post does not help, but I am hoping to drive awareness of our issues as a culture. The industry was always going to come along and develop better products, but I wonder if we became worse as humans?
I see you. I hear you. I stand with you Mark. 💯
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