# Who here rides your road bike on gravel?



## mm9

Thought I'd try to discuss the road bike on gravel issue another way. 

If you ride your road bike on gravel (not a gravel specific bike or CX bike) - How often? how much mileage? Rough or smooth gravel? Did you go with different tires or wheels? Did you change your air pressure? Or do you just leave it alone and ride it as is? Any other changes that you've made to your road bike for gravel riding?

How often do you flat on gravel?

Personally I love gravel roads as part of overal routes in the mountains here. When I travel to the mountains. most routes there are something like 60 - 80% pavement and 20 - 40% gravel. But, I don't want to optimize for gravel. I want my bike to be optimized for road riding and "acceptable" in the gravel, if that's possible.


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## dir-t

There are a few rides that I do, one in particular, that include sections of dirt road. Depending on maintenance and weather they can range from blissfully hard packed clay to loose gravel up to 1" deep. The sections are a few miles long.

My road bike is set up for road riding and 95% of that is pavement so I don't do anything special when my rides are going to take me on dirt other than try to ride more carefully. I've never had to walk or fallen or flatted but if the gravel is really deep and loose it's no fun. Otherwise, I don't give it a second thought.

If I planned to do ride where dirt roads were the main objective I would take a different bike.


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## jfaas

I've been surprised a time or two by less than a mile of gravel. I clinch my cheeks and pick a line that looks like hardpack. I haven't flatted on gravel and obviously I'm not optimising anything for gravel. As dir-t says, if I was riding gravel as a planned part of my route, I would use a different bike.


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## farnsworth

mm9 said:


> I want my bike to be optimized for road riding and "acceptable" in the gravel, if that's possible.


Seems pretty easy. Just run some wide tires with file tread. A bike with disk brakes will work better when trying to fill multiple categories. You also might want to switch tires occasionally but really there is no reason a good road bike and a good gravel bike should be much different.

Provided you make reasonable choices a single bike can perform across various categories. For what you describe a disc brake equipped bike with 28 or 32mm tubeless style tires that have a file tread pattern would do pretty well.

I don't really see any advantage in a bike that has limited tire clearance and/or fragile parts. I understand why they exist but don't see why so many people who own just one bike choose models that have limited operating range. To me, the optimal road bike pretty much is gravel and cross friendly. 

My personal "road" bike is also my gravel bike, occasional single speed, and does fine for cyclocross. I don't really see any limitation in it. So far I have used it for fast group rides, road racing, criteriums, cyclocross, and gravel. 

For road and gravel, I run 28mm tubeless tires. For cyclocross, I am now running 32mm knobbies. If I were doing a lot of gravel I might consider mountain 35mm file tread tires. For "road" race season, the bike was setup geared with nine speed shifting and bar ends. I also used it as single speed with 54/18 for part of the late summer on fast group rides. For cyclocross season I am running it as a single speed with 44/20. I like that I can shift the personality of the bike simply by swapping parts.


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## Nubster

28mm Gatorskins work wonderfully for gravel grinding. That's what I run all the time on my Synapse.


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## Roland44

Nubster said:


> 28mm Gatorskins work wonderfully for gravel grinding. That's what I run all the time on my Synapse.


+1 for the 28mm Gatorskins.


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## bikerector

Similar to nubster, I ride 28mm training slicks. My tire of choice is maxxis refuse, amazing flat protection.

I don't change anything unless I plan a gravel specific ride where I'll spend at least 1/3 of my time on the gravel roads. I'll then take out 5-10psi, but that's it. If I know the roads are looser, I'll just ride the cx bike. 32-35mm slicks are pretty sweet for most gravel. CX tires are nice but they wear so fast on the paved roads and gravel that they end up flat down the center pretty quick anyway, at least that's been my experience. Worn CX race tires, where you really want the tread, work well for gravel.


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## xxl

I used to ride quite a bit on gravel, with no special considerations. I was running somewhat wider tires, 28mm IIRC.

Not me:


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## fishboy316

Never! That's why I have a cross bike also. If I know there is any chance of hitting gravel I take my Trek.


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## PMC

The smallest tires I run on my road bike are labeled 25mm but measure 27.5mm on the rims I run. I'd go bigger (29-30mm) but I'm limited by the fork. For short stretches of non-paved hard pack I don't change anything. I have a few routes that have some non-paved roads but most road riding is on the road. Never flatted on my road bike on non-paved roads.

I wouldn't ride it on epic gravel rides mainly because it's not well suited for that type of ride and our country gravel roads are not all hard pack or fast rolling. If they were I'd have no issue with smaller tires.

Lots of opinions on riding a bike that can only run small tires when you don't need a race bike and I tend to agree with Mark in this thread and even Grant from Rivbike. Why have a bike that limits where you can comfortably ride if it's your only bike. Why limit yourself to 23mm or 25mm tires if you really want to ride places better suited to 32mm tires. Does a set of 32s slow you down? Maybe a little but who cares. If you're out enjoying back roads that get little bike traffic due to the road surface a 1 mph penalty is a small price to pay.

Spend some time reading Grant Peterson and Jan Heine's sites and you may realize what you're missing trying to optimize your bike with small tires.


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## looigi

Yep. I sometimes meander off paved roads on my road bike with 23mm tires on carbon clinchers. I exercise due caution in not hitting rocks or roots and managing speed in rough terrain. Sinking into soft surfaces like small gravel, sand, mud, loam... is a limitation.


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## mm9

PMC said:


> Lots of opinions on riding a bike that can only run small tires when you don't need a race bike and I tend to agree with Mark in this thread and even Grant from Rivbike. Why have a bike that limits where you can comfortably ride if it's your only bike. Why limit yourself to 23mm or 25mm tires if you really want to ride places better suited to 32mm tires. Does a set of 32s slow you down? Maybe a little but who cares. If you're out enjoying back roads that get little bike traffic due to the road surface a 1 mph penalty is a small price to pay.
> 
> Spend some time reading Grant Peterson and Jan Heine's sites and you may realize what you're missing trying to optimize your bike with small tires.


Thanks, good input - I'm familiar with the philosophies about cycling from Grant Peterson and others. They speak to me most of the time. My question is kind of in the reverse. When I purchased my road bike, if I knew then what I know now, I would have bought a bike with the ability to put larger tires on it. For my current bike, I'm limited to 25 mm, and possibly 28 mm depending on the tire, but not positive - there is debate among the mechanics at my shop about the 28. I don't want to buy a new bike right now, so I'm trying to see if there are others that made a road bike work on gravel - "Run what you brung" philosophy. I treat my street bike motorcycle like a dirt bike sometimes - crossing rivers etc, so I realize these street oriented vehicles have more capability than we give them credit for. Just wanted to see what others have done or are doing with their pure street bikes.

Plus, I just thought it would be interested to hear from other riders who do these combination rides of pavement with some gravel roads mixed in. In cool places, some of the best loops have both.


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## n2deep

Roland44 said:


> +1 for the 28mm Gatorskins.


+2 on the 28mm Gatorskins with a old school Columbus "Dean Cross" frame, triple front and nine back,, a little slice of heaven on those steep inclines. The Ti bike pretty much stays on the road or hard pack.


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## farnsworth

mm9 said:


> For my current bike, I'm limited to 25 mm, and possibly 28 mm depending on the tire, but not positive - there is debate among the mechanics at my shop about the 28.


25mm will be fine but it is best to use tires that have a strong casing and pump them up to a higher pressure (say 110psi).

The issue with 25mm is that you don't have a lot of volume so if you try with low pressure you will bottom out the tire and may pinch flat but if you have adequate pressure they will be fine although it is a somewhat harsh ride.

Early this year we had a gravel grinding race (Love Valley Roubaix). Huge number of flat tires because people were not running strong tires but the winner ran 25mm gatorskins pumped up to something like 110psi. He *might* have also been tubeless. Most other guys were on 28mm, CX, or in my case mountain bike tires. Honestly I think the winner had a bad tire choice but he had enough power and toughness to make it work.

I saw a lot of guys go out with flats because they were hitting holes at speed and pinching their tires. The key is to make sure you have enough pressure in your tire to prevent the pinch and a strong enough casing to prevent cuts. With narrow tires you need higher pressure and get a ride that is harsh and the bike will roll slightly slower but provided you avoid flats it will function just fine.


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## robt57

farnsworth said:


> the winner ran 25mm gatorskins pumped up to something like 110psi. He *might* have also been tubeless.


 Did you see him putting his dentures back in at the end? Because folks with teeth should be aware of trying that float like a butterfly , sting like a bee approach. Or would that Bee bounce like a butterfly?


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## Local Hero

If the plan is to spend the day off road on gravel I will take my cross bike. If it's a mixed day -- mostly road and a few gravel sections -- my road bike is just fine. I just ride through it without changing tire pressure or anything.


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## mm9

xxl said:


> Not me:


Great pic!


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## wgscott

> Who here rides your road bike on gravel?


Only me. Nobody else ever touches my bike.


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## Shegens

My hybrid has slick type 32mm tires and it does hard packed small gravel just fine. It does not like large loose gravel or mud at all. That's what I bought the MTB for. I like to ride old cemeteries with gravel drives and the hybrid does fine because most of them are small gravel.


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