The Gravelmaster 2000

My old Litespeed Siena has gone through a couple transformations over the years. I raced it for several seasons until I snapped the handlebars at the Race for Alex, and that gave me an excuse to get the Cervelo. After that, I converted the Litespeed to a single speed, and now I put some new heavy duty Continental Contact 28 mm tires on it. My plan for the next couple of months is to ride around on the bad roads in northeast Ohio doing long steady base miles, and then in the spring, I'll take it on Jim's Paris-Roubaix ride.

I took it out today for a test around East Branch Reservoir near Middlefield. (Map with pictures.) I tried pretty hard to get a puncture. First, I rode the gravel utility drive between 322 and the southern end of the park. That's got a pretty good surface with only a few rough patches. I made sure to roll through the loose gravel.

Then, I took the farm road that connects 608 to Hale Road (pictured at left). It has some chunks of new gravel--the big chunks that are almost guaranteed to cause a puncture. I rolled over it with no problem. After that, I was pretty confident in the tires, and looped around Durkee and Princeton Roads.

Since I took four gravel road sections, of course, I started to compare them. I started thinking up some criteria for rating the roads with 0-5 stars (ripped off directly from the ASO's Paris-Roubaix cobble ratings). The number of stars would indicate how hard it is to ride fast. New pavement would be 0, a 5 means you have to constantly be adjusting your line to maintain speed. The road can't be so bad, though, that you can never build momentum or have to stop to keep the wheels intact.

For these roads:

• Durkee/Hale West of 608 ***
• Durkee East *
• Princeton *
• Pioneer *
• East Branch Utility Road *