Ahead of Unbound 2024, Ben Delaney looks back on more than 15 years of gravel tech development

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Published: Thursday, 30 May 2024 at 17:00 PM


It began, as most things do, with the simple idea to try something new – using gear intended for another purpose. 

Fast forward to 2024, and gravel race tech is so specific – and often so expensive – it has more or less become a meme of itself.

As gravel has developed from an ultra-fringe, underground activity to an ultra-trendy pursuit (within the confines of the cycling world), scores of companies have jumped on the bandwagon. 

Some have created legitimately innovative tech based on years of first-hand experience, careful R&D and a sincere interest in building better gear for gravel riders. 

Others have simply slapped the word ‘gravel’ on existing products – socks, bar tape, saddles, you name it – and hoped to cash in on the trend. 

Here, as part of BikeRadar’s Gravel Racing Week, we look back on where gravel riding started, where we are now and how we got here. We’ve enlisted some of the riders who were in at the ground level, and who now work at companies such as ENVE, WTB and CamelBak, driving the design of the best gravel bikes and gear.

Where it all started

When was the very first gravel race? Some would cite Paris-Roubaix, the UCI road race that spans two dozen-plus cobblestone sectors and was founded in 1896. Some would point out that the Tour de France began on unpaved dirt roads, with riders tackling the French Alps on fat tubular tyres, with the first edition in 1903.

But most track modern gravel’s birth to America, with the introduction of events such as Trans Iowa in 2005, Dirty Kanza (now Unbound Gravel) in 2006 and Almanzo in 2007, where riders registered for free with a simple postcard entry.

Ted King won the 2018 edition of Unbound on a Cannondale Super X cyclocross bike. – Josh Patterson / Our Media

The gear often consisted of cyclocross bikes, which had the widest tyre clearance of drop-bar bikes at the time. 

The fields were small, by any standards, and the rules consisted largely of the honour system. 

Ted King's Cannondale Slate with Lefty suspension from the 2016 edition of Unbound
King rode this Cannondale Slate with Lefty suspension for his first Unbound win in 2016. – Our Media

Gravel tech pioneers 

Pro men line-up at the 2012 Crusher in the Tushar gravel race.
Early gravel events saw riders line up on a mix of adapted road bikes, cyclocross bikes and pioneering gravel-specific bikes. This is the pro men’s field from the 2012 edition of the Crusher in the Tushar, described as the ‘toughest 69.9 miles on the planet’ and held in Beaver, Utah. – Cathy Fegan-Kim

Dan Hughes won the first ‘DK’/Unbound Gravel on a custom frame made by Brent Steelman in Redwood City, California, that could take a – then enormous – 40mm tyre.

Dan Hughes' winning bikes from Unbound 2006
Dan Hughes won the first edition of Unbound on this very cool bike, which mashed together a couple of frames produced by Brent Steelman. We’ll be bringing you a full gallery of this bike. – Dan Hughes

Hughes used Campagnolo shifters and a Campag rear derailleur with a Shimano Dura-Ace crank. In subsequent editions – he secured three more victories and finished more than 10 times – he used narrower tyres until stock frames expanded their clearance. 

Hughes was one of the first inductees into the Gravel Hall of Fame in Unbound Gravel’s hometown of Emporia, Kansas, along with Trans Iowa founder Mark ‘Guitar Ted’ Stevenson, Unbound Gravel’s Kristi Mohn, Almanzo founder Chris Skogen, The Mid South founder Bobby Wintle, Rebecca’s Private Idaho founder Rebecca Rusch and Gravel Worlds founder Corey Godfrey.

Yuri Hauswald's Scott Addict from the 2018 Unbound gravel race
Yuri Hauswald won Unbound in 2015. This is his Scott Addict Gravel from the 2018 race. – Josh Patterson / Our Media

Yuri Hauswald was a 2023 Gravel Hall of Fame inductee, in part for his 2015 Unbound Gravel win – a time when purpose-built gravel bikes barely registered.

“My first ‘gravel’ bike was Marin’s 2012 Cortina, a carbon cyclocross bike that I could barely squeeze 38s on,” Hauswald tells BikeRadar. 

Salsa Warbird
The Salsa Warbird was one of the first gravel bikes. – Our Media

“This was the rig I did my first Unbound on in 2013. I was running a cyclocross tyre from WTB, quite possibly their Cross Boss. Tubeless technology was still in its infancy at this time, so getting your bike set up that way always involved some higher alchemy.”

“When I won Unbound in 2015, there really wasn’t much gear that was gravel-specific yet, beyond Salsa’s Warbird,” adds GU community manager Hauswald, agreeing that ‘gravel-specific’ wasn’t even a term yet.

“I still had to squeeze 38s on my bike in 2014, and for 2015 I ran Specialized’s Trigger Pro, which may be the most successful tyre at Unbound, since both Dan Hughes and Rebecca Rusch won many of their titles on that tyre.”

Adventure adaptations

Neil Shirley leads the way up Col d' Crush.
Neil Shirley (blue jersey) was among the early pioneers of gravel racing in the US. – Cathy Fegan-Kim

Neil Shirley, a former pro road and mountain bike racer, who is now ENVE’s marketing director, was an early leader in gravel racing. He won events such as the Belgian Waffle Ride in 2013 and 2014, and Gravel Worlds – the Nebraska-based event born in 2010, not the new-aged UCI World Championships – founded in 2015.

“My first gravel bike was custom-made for me in 2012 by Calfee to take on Crusher in the Tushar (an event created in Utah by former road pro Burke Swindlehurst, that is now part of the Life Time Grand Prix series),” says Shirley.

“They started with a bright orange custom Dragonfly with ‘adventure’ geometry built at Calfee’s La Selva Beach, California, workshop. The final product would go on to help influence the market long before most brands even realised gravel was a thing.”

The final selection of the Pro Men before the climb up Col d' Crush, at the 2012 Crusher in the Tushar gravel race.
Narrow tyres – by today’s standards – were the only option in early gravel races, due to restricted frame clearance. – Cathy Fegan-Kim

Shirley says the Dragonfly used geometry modified from traditional road to ‘adventure’ for more stability, slightly relaxed handling and clearance for up to a 35c tyre.

“It’s laughable to think about the high tyre pressures and narrow widths accepted at the time,” he adds. 

The build used ENVE’s 29-inch XC tubular rims laced to Chris King hubs, along with Schwalbe 33c tyres. “Because cyclocross tyres were limited to a max width of 33c due to UCI rules, finding a high-quality 35c was next to impossible,” says Shirley.

“Shimano Ultegra Di2 had just released in 2012, but unfortunately, it would be another year before a Shimano hydraulic road disc was an option. Cable-actuated, Avid disc brakes were matched to 10-speed levers with a compact 50/34 front chainring combo and an 11-32t cassette.”

Shimano GRX 12-speed gravel groupset rear derailleur
Shimano, SRAM and Campagnolo all now offer gravel-specific gearing. – Ben Delaney / Our Media

Since then, gravel groupsets have come to the fore, with gravel-specific gearing to combine road speed with off-road climbing capability.

However, if you’re looking for a single piece of gear that changed the gravel game, then look no further than disc brakes. Not so much for their stopping power, but for how they freed frame makers up for more tyre clearance. 

Add in tubeless technology, and we’ve come a long way from the good old/bad old days (depending on your viewpoint) of riding thick cyclocross tyres that maxed out at 35mm with inner tubes and perhaps a tyre liner or Mr Tuffy Strips in the hope of warding off pinch flats… 

Gravel-specific everything

Alison Tetrick's Unbound Specialized Diverge
Gravel tech has come a long way since the first edition of Unbound in 2006. This is Alison Tetrick’s Specialized Diverge from 2021. – Specialized

Fast forward to today, and many of the world’s best gravel riders will take to the Unbound start line on 45 if not 50mm tubeless tyres, 1x drivetrains, aero wheels and frames, skinsuits, aero helmets and hydration packs. 

Gone are the days of gas-station stops and rummaging for food; this is the era of specialised nutrition, F1-style pit stops and gravel-specific flourishes on nearly every piece of equipment.

Pack shot of the Surly Grappler gravel bike
Gravel bikes cover a broad spectrum, from adventure-focused bikes such as the Surly Grappler… – Russell Burton / Our Media

Gravel bikes themselves, for instance, have blossomed into such a large segment that there are two distinct types of gravel bikes: adventure gravel and fast gravel, with plenty of variance in between

Ivar Slik's Wilier Rave SLR for the 2022 Gravel World Championships
…to aero race bikes such as Ivar Slik’s Wilier Rave SLR. – Wilier

Adventure gravel bikes feature taller geometry, and mounts galore for racks and storage, while fast gravel race bikes boast aerodynamic shaping and minimal weight.

Suspension has also evolved, with short-travel, gravel-specific suspension forks arriving alongside proprietary ride-softening tech such as Specialized’s FutureShock headset, found on the brand’s Diverge gravel adventure bike.

Fox 32 Taper-Cast fork suspension fork on the Niner RLT 9 RDO gravel bike
More recently, we’ve seen gravel-specific forks arrive from the likes of Fox, RockShox and Cane Creek. – Josh Patterson

“From 2013 to 2018, there was a significant shift in equipment, with the industry as a whole getting behind gravel,” Shirely says. 

“The biggest improvement to product has come from tyre-width increases and tubeless compatibility, in addition to clearance on frames ever-increasing. Brands slowly began purpose-building the equipment.”

Shirley cites ENVE’s releas of the G23 wheels in 2018, designed to add compliance to the rims for ride quality, with the leading edge of the rim also profiled to prevent pinch-flats.

ENVE G23 gravel wheel rim from 2018
ENVE introduced the G23 as a gravel-specific rim in 2018. – Our Media

It’s all about the tyres

WTB Nano 40 gravel tyre, pictured in 2016.
WTB was one of the first brands to jump on board with gravel tyres. The Nano 40 was launched in 2014. – Josh Patterson / Our Media

Elsewhere, WTB had rolled out its first gravel tyre, the Nano 40, in 2014, followed the next year by a variety of all-road and gravel tyres

Salsa, Kona, Cannondale, Rocky Mountain and Breezer were early adopters of WTB’s gravel tyres, according to Johs Huseby, WTB’s OEM sales director, who works with bike brands around the world, as well as being a gravel racer himself.