Pain or Pleasure: What Type of Gravel Biker Are You?

Gravel biking is one of the fastest growing segments in cycling, yet ask a rider to describe exactly what gravel riding is and you’ll likely get a wide variety of answers. Gravel includes everyone from bike tourers to racers, and encompasses everything from Type 2 Fun trips along rugged tracks that involve as much hike-a-bike as riding to fast and fun rides on “champagne” dirt. Even within gravel racing, there’s a huge variety in types of riding. The UCI’s inaugural Gravel World Championship was held on a fast and flat course featuring Italy’s “white roads,” cobbles, and asphalt with many riders racing their road bikes—quite a contrast from the long, grueling events like Unbound or the multi-day bikepacking races that are growing increasingly popular. Racing probably isn’t even on the radar of most riders, yet the gravel denomination encompasses it all.

Gravel Riding Defies Definition 

There have been numerous attempts to categorize the different types of gravel riding, but all of them fail to truly capture the essence of the sport: exploration, adventure, taking the road less traveled, and (most importantly) fun. Perhaps it’s so difficult to characterize gravel cycling because it defies categorization and riders don’t fit neatly into simple silos; rather, gravel riders are better represented on a spectrum with those in it for pain on one end, and those for pleasure on the other.

Gravel Biking is Pain

On one end of the spectrum are those who find joy in the challenge—the harsher the conditions, the better. Not all gravel is created equal and these riders seek out unmaintained and infrequently cared-for roads that are commonly super remote and feature challenges including rock gardens, bike-swallowing puddles, fate-tempting ruts and confidence-killing sand traps. Regardless of the condition of the terrain, many of these routes seem engineered to elicit suffering, with lung-searingly steep climbs and puckering descents that will equally take your breath away.