- We've all done plenty of climbing on our road bikes,
many of you have probably done quite a bit of climbing
on your mountain bikes, but today, I'm going to be
going through some tips and tricks to be able to
ride uphill on gravel like a boss.
(short intro SFX)
Riding uphill on gravel isn't all that different from
road riding, but anytime you got the ground moving
underneath your tires, there are some nuances to it.
And today I'm going to hook you up with some tips that
I have picked up along the way.
(hip-hop music)
So on this rig, I'm running a forty-two up front and a
thirty-two eleven on the rear.
Now, with Sram and Shimano both coming out with
gravel-specific group sets, the options are endless
for what you could use for gravel riding now.
Having a clutch in your rear wheel is a really valuable
tool to have at your disposal.
While a clutch isn't essential, it does keep the tension
on the chain which will keep it from coming off the
front rig over bumps and breaks in the road and
are going to keep you riding without having to stop and
put your chain back on.
(hip-hop music)
So keeping with the theme of equipment and how to
climb gravel, the biggest thing is that you got to be
prepared for what you're coming into.
As you can tell, I am in a massive gear right now,
so I need to put out a ton of power and then let
way off, shift up through the cassette, because
during gravel, it can be mud, grit, sand, all types
of terrible conditions and there's nothing that
spells recipe for disaster than shifting under pressure,
but even on your road bike, it is a sure-fire way
to have a mechanical.
(hip-hop music)
So now we're going to talk about the technique,
or the finesse of being able to ride gravel uphill.
Riding with your weight back when you're riding up gravel
sounds like a no-brainer, especially when you consider
all the loose rocks and stuff that are underneath your
tires, so you really have to make sure that you've got
your weight back. And then, well, if you think of the
alternative, and you're climbing some big torn stage,
and you're throwing your bike all over the place,
and the tire is wheeling out, that is not very efficient.
You need to be in saddle, in a good gear,
nice and smooth, putting out a consistent amount of
power to the pedals which is going right to the
rear wheel, and has a nice consistent contact
path with the ground.
Okay. So I know you guys are thinking,
"Oh, yeah, JP, that's great, you riding on all those
nice and manicured dirt roads but what if you get into
some really technical stuff like this?"
Well, all the same stuff applies.
You've got to keep your weight back.
You've got to make sure you pick your head up and
you've got to anticipate because momentum is the
key to being able to ride really steep off road stuff,
keeping your head up.
(hip-hop music)
So one thing you might not think a lot about when you're
climbing gravel is overheating and I'll can't tell
you the amount of times I've actually burned up
when I've been out riding gravel on a super long,
20 minute climb because while there's no airflow out here,
and sometimes the sun is just beating on your back,
the combination of those two makes me say,
"I've got to get my jersey open, flapping in the breeze,"
And if there's any rivers or lakes that I can
jump in and bring my core body temp way down,
I'm doing that. And I guess if you have enough water,
spraying water just kind of all over your back, and bringing
that core temp down is good advice.
(hip-hop music)
All right, so I'm not being totally serious,
you don't have to be meditative and zen, and doing
crazy stuff on the side of the trail,
but you should be really positive because sometimes
these climbs can be really long, hot, arduous,
and these rides are adventures, you're out in the middle of
nowhere often for hours, sometimes by yourself,
so you know, I try to kind of channel my inner
mentality to be really positive, think forward,
think about something that you're looking forward to,
whether that's a good meal after the end of the ride
or hanging out with friends when you're finished,
but if you map everything back towards,
"I'm having fun, and I'm out here to enjoy myself,"
This is going to make your day-riding gravel and
climbing gravel a heck of a lot better.
(hip-hop music)
A lot of times when riding gravel, we come into what
we call stutter bumps, or breaking bumps, which can be
quite undulating.
Now, these gravel bikes are able to hold up to 50
C tires so high volume tires that can really absorb
a lot of what I'm
Riding over right now, these huge bumps and everything, so,
my advice here is, get some really big tires,
run them at decently low pressure,
and I guess you have the two options where you
either go slowly and then you just kind of use
your rhythm and glide through them while you're
climbing with your weight back.
If you're going to hit them, full speed, better be
really confident because if you get it wrong, it will
definitely throw you.
(hip-hop music)
Tying this all together, we need to make sure that we get
our weight back, we don't want to be climbing like we're
some big quarter France star, out of saddle, like,
no, this is gravel, we need to be planted, and we
need to be firm.
Make sure that you got your gears right.
You want to make sure that you got high volume tires,
especially if you're hitting the stutter bumps.
Stay positive, zen, we can't let our body temperature
rise and get too hot, blow off on the climb,
or you'll be out in the middle of nowhere.
I think that's just about everything that I went over
to be a gravel rock star.
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