10 Days In: ENVE Gravel Camp
Plus: Altitude, finding a home base, and what's next in the US.
The first ten days of my US trip have surprisingly felt pretty chilled out. It’s not my first rodeo over here, and I’ve learned from many of my mistakes of yesteryear. It’s made a big difference not going straight into race week and instead having some chill-out time before getting cracking.
In this piece, I’ll be giving a quick rundown of what I’ve been up to. Please do subscribe. Now we’re into race season, there’s going to be even more content.
ENVE Gravel Camp
ENVE Gravel Camp is the reason I flew out to the US early. When Neil told me this was happening, I knew it was worth changing my dates. What is ENVE Gravel Camp? A question I was asked seemingly a thousand times by Avery, our videographer. Gravel Camp wasn’t about training, it was about getting to know the people and the products of ENVE - it was also a bloody good time.
It can always feel a little intimidating coming into a new team environment, especially as the only non-American in the room. You’re never quite sure if you’re going to be accepted, whether your sense of humour will match, or how it’s going to go down.
It’s for all those reasons that having what was effectively a bonding camp was all so important.
For three nights in southern Utah, both the business and the athlete side of ENVE were living and working together under one roof. It’s often all too easy for there to be a disconnect between those who race the bikes and those who run the brand’s social media, sort the orders, or manage the day-to-day. Not at ENVE.
The reason Gravel Camp worked so well is because there are no major egos. It’s not like the road where everyone is fighting for a spot on the roster because everyone is already on their roster. I’ve been a part of many ‘collectives’ or ‘teams’ since leaving the road. ENVE are the first that has brought us all together in a way that matters.
At any one point, there’d be five conversations across the room. If you want to get a bunch of people to get to know each other, throw them all in a house together. On night one, it was all niceties, and everyone was in bed at a reasonable o’clock. By the final night, half of us were still awake past midnight, gossiping like school kids and exchanging stories from our very different backgrounds.
Whether it was the ‘Garage Olympics’, riding in the snow, or everyone piling into one van to go to ‘Culvers’ an ice cream joint of some sort - it was a bloody good time. It’s also the first time in all of my years racing that a brand has taken the time to sit all of their athletes down and explain the goal of their sponsorship and talk through each product. That is well worth the time.
It also made me realise how much I learned on the road. There are two first-year U23s on ENVE this year, Alex and Caleb. Both will be racing in the U23 Lifetime Grand Prix. Both of them come from an MTB background. Camps like this are important for them. On the road, you’d learn a lot by being on a team with older guys or girls just through watching and listening. That doesn’t exist in the gravel world.
Home from Home, and bloody altitude
Away from ENVE Gravel Camp, I’ve also been settling into what is going to be one of my home bases in the US this year - Salt Lake City. I’m staying with Cathy and Alex, the former owners of DNA Pro Cycling, who now head Cotton Sox Sports.
Having a home base is making me happy. I’ve unpacked my suitcase, got myself into a very slight routine and slowly started to learn the roads. One of my biggest mistakes in 2024 was always feeling like I was on the go. I’m already feeling like I’m home here.
That being said, I won’t be here much longer on this block as the racing is coming and coming fast.
After my first two races, I’ll be up to Boulder, another one of my favourite places in the world and the perfect place to prep for some upcoming targets. I debated coming back to SLC, but the main driving force is that my (Alexey’s) TT bike is up in Boulder.
Both of my ‘bases’ this trip, Boulder and Salt Lake City, are annoyingly high altitude. I need to get used to altitude and I do love being in the mountains, but it’s also bloody depressing breathing out of my butt every time I try to go hard. I usually find it takes me a couple of weeks to get used to being up high.
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What’s Next?
I fly to Mid South Gravel this Wednesday. It’s one of the early season classics on the US calendar and last year was perhaps my favourite race experience. Dan Hutchinson will also be flying out from the UK and we’ll maybe try out the whole video thing once more.
From Mid South it’s over to Texas to try and hold onto my Rattlesnake Gravel title, and then up to Boulder for some more training time before Redlands.
On the to-do list is build a TT bike. The TT stage is pretty important at Redlands, and not only have I not ridden a TT bike since Redlands last year - I currently don’t have a bike. I’ll be borrowing/ stealing Alexey Vermeulen’s Factor Hanzo which is currently sitting in pieces.
Other Thoughts
Hanging around so many MTBers at ENVE Gravel Camp got me debating finding a mountain bike to take on Leadville in 2026. I know I wouldn’t be fighting for the win or a Top 10, but I relish the challenge.
On the complete other side, both riding a lot of the roads of the Tour of Utah and riding with some of the guys that raced in those days, I’m realising more and more how sad it is that there are few road races over here these days. The roads are spectacular. It’s not the windy, beautiful hairpins of Europe, it’s something quite different but visually stunning. I do miss the road lots some days.
Finally, when does altitude get easier?! I’m at day ten-ish up here and just managed to complete my first session with my zones adjusted for the elevation. If I’m frank, I’m petrified and having a healthy(?) dose of pre first race of the year jitters. Not being able to go bash out some big numbers as I’m up high isn’t helping the situation. I’ve told myself that this year has to be the one where I make it count - and that is frightening - especially considering I’m repeating the same races I did in 2024.
Anyways, thanks for reading. Sorry, this one is a little bit here there and everywhere! By the time this is out, it’ll be race week. The party is starting.
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