@pete asks:
Q5. What is 'gravel'? 😂
#BikeNiteQ #BikeNite #BikeTooter #Cycling #MastoBikes cc @bikenite
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Discussion
@ascentale @pete @bikenite
A5. Ok gravel has a geological definition based on the size of the clast/grain. So the Wentworth scale is here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Grain_size
As we can see gravel is not listed here but you can make a guess. But rhe Krumbein phi (φ) scale modifies this and is the images below. As ae can see gravel ranges from the granule size to the pebble size and can naturally be well to poorly sorted. What we use is often well sorted into specific sizes.
2 media
![=H |S2= 1.26-2.5 |Very coarse
) Pebble
-6 64mm in gravel
-4to | 16- 0.63-1.26 Coarse
) Pebble
-5 (32mm [in gravel
sols 0.31-0.63 Medium
) Pebble
-4 16mm |in gravel
—PA41(c) ONS 7 )
4-8 mm ] Fine gravel Pebble
= 0.31in
-1to 0.079- Very fine
2-4 mm i Granule
= 0.157in [gravel](https://files.mastodon.social/media_attachments/files/116/116/391/507/831/883/original/670493c6ef70e98f.jpg)
@InkySchwartz @ascentale @pete @bikenite
So what you're saying is, this isn't gravel then? 😃
@eq @ascentale @pete @bikenite Nice boulder field.
@InkySchwartz @ascentale @bikenite 🤯 I just wanna ride my bike …
@FourT4 @pete @ascentale @bikenite And I did promise to answer this way if the question was asked.
@ascentale @pete @bikenite #bikenite A5: Funnily enough, I spend a few hours exploring bits of the Earth, Rivers & Ironbark trail https://nix-tracks.com/earth-rivers-and-ironbark/ last week which comes with the warning:
"The route seeks out earthen roads, dirt tracks and more remote scenic areas as a point of difference. Dirt is the new gravel."
It was pretty fun although because it's very hot here at the moment the dirt is baked so hard that 4WDs are leaving rubber behind. You can see that it's a lot softer at times though ...
@ascentale @pete @bikenite Great question! I love the creative replies. #bikenite
Are we trying to define the bikes, or the surface, or the… "genre"?
Someone I know suggested that if you have to concentrate on picking a line, it's mountain bike territory not gravel.
But perhaps if you can ride a gravel bike on it, it's gravel. And a gravel bike is a bike that you can ride on gravel.
@paul_edwin @ascentale @pete @bikenite
"Are we trying to define the bikes, or the surface, or the… "genre"?"
Yes.
@v_perjorative @paul_edwin @ascentale @pete @bikenite
A5: Gravelbikes = Any bike with broader tires and a little bit more grip for riding between winter and late summer.
Gravel surface = Any bike path after winter before they sweep up the ... gravel (we don't use sand here).
Gravel genre = Biking in the season between winter and late summer, before the gravel is gone from the road surface.
/s
#BikeNite
The Promise versus The Reality
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@ascentale @pete @bikenite
#BikeNite A5a:
What I learned the hard way: Most of the state trails in Wisconsin are crushed limestone, and usually in good condition. I ride my gravel bike on them in case they're not perfect. Once when visiting my sister in Wisconsin, I decided to ride the Buffalo River State Trail with my gravel bike. At the trailhead it was a bit dicey, but 3 miles on it deteriorated to loose sand and dirt and I crashed, broke my phone and lacerated my leg. It was an ATV trail.
@ascentale @pete @bikenite A5. It's what my commuter bike was designed for, and I'd ride on it a lot more if I didn't worry about buggering up my commuter bike! #BikeNite
@ascentale @bikenite Well I'm glad we got that cleared up. Thanks all! 😉
@ascentale @pete @bikenite A5 something between road and mountain?? #bikenite
@ascentale @pete @bikenite A5. I remember the days, when so called 'off-road cars' were seen on our streets, and they were always clean as if they had never seen any dirt.
@ascentale @pete @bikenite A5. Outside of the marketing, pretty sure it's just light off-roading. Nice gravel or dirt path instead of asphalt. Or as I like to call it: Atlanta streets and bike lanes.
A5. Gravel is one of the great inventions of cycling, obviously.
@DurableAce
Reminds me of salt - the by far oldest ingredient in my kitchen and on the table.
@ascentale @pete @bikenite
@datenhalde @ascentale @pete @bikenite And invented purely to sprinkle on chips/frites.
A5. Continued (1 of 2)
Alt text of the article in the above post:
Great Inventions of Cycling 4.5 billion years ago: Gravel
Gravel is, along with "the excuse", the oldest thing in cycling. Gravel forms from the erosion of bedrock, with quartz as the most common mineral. The shards of rock produced are quite sharp, but the edges are normally rounded off as they're washed downstream in a river. It's important that not all the sharp bits are eliminated, because otherwise gravel wouldn't be nearly as useful for creating punctures.
For its first few billion years gravel was essentially useless, since no one had invented the bicycle. Even when that finally happened, for the following 150 years if it was used at all it was for making surfaced roads, which was as misguided a use for it as you could possibly think of.
Worse than that, in races it was common to get marshals to go and look for gravel on the inside of sharp corners and then actually, unbelievably, use brooms to remove it.
Happily, in recent years, all this has changed. Gravel has taken up its rightful place at the centre of every major bike manufacturer's marketing strategy.
@DurableAce @ascentale @pete @bikenite Couldn't they have two classes of gravel racing, gravel the size of your fist and gravel about 2-3 cm? That instantly doubles everyone's racing calendar.
@CharlesSites @ascentale @pete @bikenite And would almost certainly require a second bike for the different conditions 😉
A5. Continued (2 of 2)
It has become a valuable resource for stage race directors striving to randomly torpedo the hopes of GC contenders. And it's become a means by which the UCI can drum up more sponsor revenue by inventing a whole new World Championships.
It's important not to confuse the rock fragments that make up gravel with the smaller particles that make up mud. Mud is only any use for cyclo-cross.
@ascentale @pete @bikenite A5 - Anything that isn’t a road!
@AsphaltandEarth @ascentale @pete @bikenite
Come to North Yorkshire, some of the roads can be classed as gravel...
@yorkie @AsphaltandEarth @ascentale @pete @bikenite You mean this 'bike lane'? (Seen in Germany. The blue traffic sign indicates that the path is mandatory to be used by bicycle or on foot.)
@realSiegfried @yorkie @ascentale @pete @bikenite well that’s curtaining a gravel bike lane!
A5. Why, it's 90s mountain biking of course!
@Pionir @ascentale @pete @bikenite anyone would think nostalgia played a part in the purchase of this £50 bike I'm restoring for my son's girlfriend.
@ascentale @pete @bikenite A5.
Gravel is a transcendental multifaceted paradigm representing a bicycling state of mind.
It's also the stuff from the quarry up the road coating our driveway.
I use the term "mild off road" instead of gravel.
I was not successful in my marketing career.
The advertising stuff around gravel bikes & riding is hilariously out of control. But...
I think it is useful as a term for differentiating mild off road (bridleways, forest tracks etc) from more technical mountain biking - where there'll be trail features (drops, jumps, berms, rock gardens) and you'll need skillz to keep your teeth.
The problem is some things that look exactly like 'gravel' on a GoPro really aren't. Example: I arrived at the bottom of this about 24 hours slower than Meggie. It just looks harmless on YouTube. https://youtu.be/fnejusVbpWA
@ascentale @pete@masto.hypertelia.com @bikenite #BikeNite A5 Our immediate reaction took me to childhood! When we were born, our family farmed and lived off a gravel road. At approximately age 10, we were driving on a blacktop when I said, “Look! They poured gravel along the edge of the road!” I’d just received eyeglasses, and Dad felt terrible that I’d never seen it—that gravel had always been there!
BICYCLING-related gravel? It brings to mind a recent road mess
It also brings to mind “kick rocks” - https://sfba.social/@bikemonterey/115914206212707468
And #SeaOtterClassic in Monterey County April 2026 gravel racing: https://www.seaotterclassic.com/gravel/
@ascentale @pete @bikenite A5. #BikeNite
I think the popularity of gravel rose because gravel means no cars. Gravel is where you need to worry about traction, not about drivers on their phones. Gravel is when you hear your tires but also birds and creeks, not honking and revving. Gravel is often exploring beyond what's common.
#BikeNite A5: Crushed Gravel is that fantastic stuff on the trails, spread out every few years by the trail maintenance volunteers to make my recreational cycling wonderful!
Gravel is also the miserable stuff on the shoulder of the road, spread out every few years by the Regional Works crews to make my commuter cycling awful!
#BikeNite A5+ Of course, there was the time the trail maintenance volunteers spread a 5cm layer of sand on the trail, making it completely unrideable for the rest of the season.
The irony is that a sand-strewn trail will become ridable much more quickly if cyclists actually ride on it to compact it. But who wants to ride on it before it's compacted?
@ascentale @pete @bikenite #BikeNite A5. "Gravel" is a designation of crushed rock size. It is frequently used as a term to designate "unpaved roadway" in the US, because many unpaved roads are strewn with gravel to deter erosion and enhance traction. When it comes to "gravel" as a designation for bicycles, it is virtually indistinguishable from what we used to call "cyclocross" bikes. Generally speaking, this is a hybrid of road racing bicycle and mountain bike.
@ascentale @pete @bikenite My mother has a gravel driveway at her rural New Jersey home. It is the most awful thing in the world when it snows, because you cannot use a snowblower on it, and it's too damned big to shovel by hand.
Even if you hire a plow, they can't plow all the way down to the gravel, for fear of displacing it, so the whole thing turns into solid ice very quickly.
@gcvsa @ascentale @pete @bikenite Same with my MiL house in rural VT. Though they also grit it.
@InkySchwartz @ascentale @pete @bikenite My driveway in downtown not-so-rural Vermont is dirt, so when the plow comes, they can plow right down to the dirt without hurting anything.
But, I got rid of my car 4.5 years ago, so I don't have to worry about getting out of bed and moving the car when the landlord sends the plow.
@ascentale @pete @bikenite long; not paved in a way that’s possible but very unpleasant on a road bike but a mountian bike is overkill
@ascentale @pete @bikenite A5. I defer to OpenStreetMap for questions like this 🤣🚴♀️❤️
@ascentale @pete @bikenite
#BikeNite A5:
Usually crushed rock, or any surface that isn't paved but isn't mud, loose dirt or sand.
But gravel varies heavily, and even the same material varies based on season, weather and amount of traffic. Some midsummer heavily traveled gravel roads here can be almost as hard and smooth as pavement. Then there are surprises, like getting on a road with freshly deposited crushed granite. That can eat any tire! I once had to dismount and walk the bike.
@ascentale @pete @bikenite a5 #biketooter #bikenite what is gravel?
I have to remind myself that it does not pick up my bike and throw it to the ground. So, JUST KEEP ON PEDALING.
And I remember doing a winter4 ride and being *thankful* for occasional gravel and therefore TRACTION.
@ascentale @pete @bikenite OH.
And ... it makes me actually a bit anxious so I remind myself that's what anxiety feels like, but slippery surfaces or riding in a small shoulder make me more irrationally anxious.
@ascentale @pete @bikenite
A5.
It sounds awful to ride in! The trails we ride are very well mannered; paved or groomed with fine rock dust. The loosest is the shoulders when we cross roads.
Does gravel vary regionally? Around here, it's limestone pieces, about 1-1.5cm. Everything here is limestone, though, so I don't know if that's universal or more of a Limestone City thing.
@ascentale @pete @bikenite A5: Some cyclists love gravel riding, but I find the surface can vary widely from hard-packed earth with just a few loose stones, to coarse, sharp stones 2-3” deep.
I’m not a fan.
And I still don’t understand the difference between a gravel bike and a mountain bike.
@grammasaurus @ascentale @pete @bikenite
IMHO, only thing worse than gravel is sand. I hate riding through sand. Mud is even better.
@the5thColumnist @ascentale @pete @bikenite have you tried riding in snow? (only half kidding….it reminded me of sand)
@grammasaurus @ascentale @pete @bikenite
That's when you want it hard packed and not fluffy, though an inch or so is not a problem with Scwalbe winter Marathons.
@ascentale @pete @bikenite Gravel is a state of mind!
@ascentale @pete @bikenite Also, if we're talking grammar: 'gravel' is a verb as well as a noun.
@ascentale @pete @bikenite A5: I don't get it? I feel like I'm missing an in-joke.
But if you want to talk actual gravel:
There are some trails here that use small-rock hardpack gravel as a surface (parts of North Creek, large areas of Eastrail), and they're perfectly fine. It's similar enough to pavement as to make no difference and I think most importantly handles tree roots better than asphalt.
But loose gravel is a nightmare, at least on my thin-tyre bike :(
@moira @ascentale @pete @bikenite #BikeNite A5 follow-up: Yep, wasn't sure if that's meant as some in-joke about the scene not being able to agree on some common definition of a gravel bike (but not gravel itself) or so.
A5. Chrisjen Avasarala's voice and character in the tv show "The Expanse".
For roads, small pieces of rock that help with traction over dirt and clay.
@ascentale @pete @bikenite #BikeNite A5: A loose type of road surfacing. 😇🤓
A5. I took a hard fall in a newly lain gravel path (temporary detour for a cycling course that was being repaved), going roughly 0kph, by turning the front wheel and having all the gravel suddenly become ball bearings. Gouge in the helmet from that one, in addition to a full complement of road rash.
I can enjoy a bit of smoother gravel and trail as part of a ride -- done well it can be better than broken pavement. I've got a bike that's suitable for gravel (although not really marketed as such), and the tires for it. But in the end I'll take smooth pavement when given the choice.
@oheso @ascentale @pete @bikenite
What is worse than natural gravel is crushed rock with rough and sharp edges. A number oi years ago I rode a long section of abandoned rail line on the crushed rock that was under the rails,. After about 20 km I took a road route home, Fortunately since then the old right of way was converted to a rail trail with proper stone dust surface,
@ascentale @pete @bikenite A5. Pain waiting to happen.