Funny how things turn out...
After a few years' hiatus I'd been looking once again at gravel bikes, specifically with the Ekar groupset as I'm a bit of a Campy nut, and happened upon an article here on sportive.com featuring the editor's own massively upgraded Bianchi Impulso Comp.
Encouraged, I Googled some more and found a matching example for sale online (complete with pink EF sticker on the front mech mounting point) which I immediately fell in love with!
> Bianchi Impulso Comp 2024 Review >
As it turned out, it was more than a matching model, it WAS Oisin's bike! Before I knew it, I'd bought it and Oisin had delivered it on his way to holiday.
Oh, and he also threw in the chance to go and ride the inaugural Gravel Rocks 2024 in Yorkshire too... result!
Fast forward a couple of weeks and after a long drive from Shropshire, I rocked up early evening on the Friday at the amazing Duncombe Hall in Helmsley, which was the home of Gravel Rocks for the weekend.
I arrived to a fantastic site, with wonderful vistas on a lovely clear evening and the event village was banging.
I met Bryan and Neil from organisers Focal Events at registration, had a chat and got my number and timing chip then took a wander around the site. Having managed to forget my clear glasses, I acquired some lovely ones from the guys at Tifosi, at event-pricing which is always nice!
After chatting to a few people I headed back to the van to set up 'base' for the weekend. I dragged the Impulso out and went out for a couple of miles shake down following the event arrows, noticing immediately the descent signs and thought "Uh oh"!
Back at the van, I had some food and FaceTimed home. At this stage, there was a little bit of drizzle starting to hang in the air, but nothing too bad. Around 9pm we had a race briefing, with Neil explaining everything about the Prologue and also a bit about tomorrow's main stage.
The evening prologue - a 10km loop through the estate grounds in the dark - started on the dot at 9:30, everyone heading out over the start ramp and down the main grassy slope.
We immediately were onto broken concrete slabs and gravel tracks mix for about a mile, before the descent started... and it seemed to go forever, bone-rattling and wheel jarring, not daring to change hand position on the bars for one second!.
Finally we bottomed out, round a bend over a bridge and a to a nice fast flowing section with a couple of sharp rises. Added into the mix were a number of "special" segments which were timed and would count towards whether you got a the podium place or not.
The only issue I had was that my front light kept slipping, so I stopped at the Exposure pit stop. Sam from Exposure helped to fix it as best he could, but he recommended I get some "proper lights" and to pop by and see them in the morning!
Eventually, a final glance at the bike computer showed I was at about 9km, so not far to go. Suddenly, I could hear the music and see the lights of the event base. A final bend in the track on to concrete slabs and a final sprint past the lad in front (and why not?) and over the finish line... Such good fun... weather sort of held off with just a light (very light) drizzle, finishing was such a buzz!
I spoke to a few people about the race, then made my way to the Spooktons Brewery refreshments tent and had a delicious "energy drink" from them!
And.... woke up to the sound of rain pattering on the van roof... which continued... okay, maybe NOT like stage 9 then!
A quick look at the weather app (all of them!) wasn't promising, but hey ho, looked like the new clear Tifosi shades were going to get a second outing!
After a standard brekkie of oats, yoghurt and nuts I made my way up to the event HQ, got a coffee and chatted to a few more racers, then made my way to the Exposure tent again and chatted to Sam about the Exposure light again. He said to call in after the race and we'd sort something out.
Back to the van and got ready, there was no going back now! There I went through the usual faff about what would be the most appropriate kit to wear for the day... we all know it's impossible to get that right!
9am was the riders briefing, and everyone huddled in the main marquee out of the rain whilst Neil kept our spirits up and gave us lots of last minute info, mainly about being wet! Kick off was 9:15 with everyone expected out over the start ramp by 9:30.
And that was it, we were off: a cautious start over sodden grass, then tracing the initial few kilometres of the prologue, including the initial steep descent - not sure if it was scarier in the dark or in daylight!
The course was spectacular, obviously low cloud prevented the anticipated views, but where it did clear, on top of the moors, it was wonderful: Yorkshire truly is God's own county!
And it was challenging, a wonderful mixture of hard packed bridleway, super-fast forest tracks, scary winding singletrack, short sections of country lane, puddle-filled (some deeper than others) bog tracks and a lot of grassy right of way, steep up and down... oh and many, MANY mud bath sections!
I don't know when but at some point the weather became totally irrelevant as I just seemed to blend into it, and all was fine.
The only personal issue I had was the overriding knowledge that I had a pre-arranged knee-op (torn cartilage) the following Tuesday, so I was very aware about staying upright... which of course meant about three "offs", but happily not landing on the 'soon to be fixed' knee side!
Even so, I made an executive decision at the feed station that I'd head back on the short route to minimise the likelihood of crashing. To be honest, I didn't regret this at all - although I did regret not paying attention and not knowing that the short route wasn't half of the full 80km long route, but about 68km instead!
Still, in for a penny and all that! There were again a number of timed "special sections" on today's course, and with marshals explaining the length, elevation and surface type, all we had to do was blast along them grinning like loons!
After a final super-speedy downhill blast through Carlton into Helmsley (and a couple of wrong tunings in the village... the only place I did get it wrong!), the final climb took us through the grounds of Dunscombe estate to the finish where Neil was there to greet us with a smile. Nearly 70km with about 1200m climbing, absolutely brilliant.
Gravel Rocks was an absolutely stellar experience. I think the only thing I didn't quite enjoy were the ridiculously "rain-enhanced" muddy sections, but that's mainly down to my tyre choice, and also the fact that at core, I'm mainly a bit of a soft roadie!!
This was my first gravel experience for a good few years, and I will definitely be back... I don't think there's any two-wheeled experience that captures that child-like wonder of cycling like pounding down a gravel descent does...
All being well I'll get a place at Dirty Reiver next April (already planning a weekend in Kielder next month!), and will be back with new lights, new tyres and hopefully a bionic knee!
Photos by Stuart Proctor and Stephen Smith (stephensmithphotography).
Gravel Rocks will return on 11-13 July 2025. Find out more and enter at gravelrocks.cc.
0 Comments