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Mud, Mayhem, and Memories

Gravel Worlds 2025

Gravel Worlds doesn’t do clean storylines. It does mud. It does chaos. It does the kind of racing where you’re unclogging your bike one minute and launching full-gas attacks the next.This year’s race was Nebraska at its grittiest — bikes caked, groups shattered, and riders forced to choose between fighting the mud or letting it win. KAV athletes Ted King, Marc Spratt, and Nathan Spratt each walked away with a story that proves what this race is all about: grit, guts, and going all-in.

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TED KING

Just as the sun peaked onto the horizon, we approached the first MMR. I found myself in great position, riding in the top half dozen places. At the very end of that section, a rider slipped and fell in front of me, so I veered 90 degrees left to avoid him. I came to a standstill, then was immediately back on the gas in hot pursuit. The front group now was probably ten riders and moving like a freight train. I latched onto the next group and we chased at a cross-eyed pace through the next MMR and then onto the third. The front group was still close and I literally laughed out loud seeing that entire group either running through the grass or stopped to de-clog their frame/drivetrain/wheels/shoes.

The smart choice for me here was to immediately take to the grass rather than following the rider in front of me. Like a lemming, I was glued to his wheel so that the mud was soon glued to my… well, everything.

When a bike race becomes a “who can clean their bike the fastest” race, it’s a real head scratching moment. Not literally, because that would be filthy. I quickly reached the point where the mud had overflowed with calamitous volume that my chain refused to stay on the chainrings.

Commence: wipe chain with hand, reinstall chain, pedal half revolution, drop chain, repeat. 🙃🤪

Fast-forward 5 minutes and I’m still at this particular junction. Fast-forward 15 minutes and I’m at an intersection where I consciously take a left while my GPS pinged right.

I’ve been looked for silver linings for the past 24 hours and exchanging condolences with other DNFers has helped. Props to @tlideen

for some hard pulls and kind words. My premature arrival to the finish allowed me an earlier flight home. Today was a bonus: riding with my kids marking an end to a solid weekend.

It’s a safe bet that the strongest two riders duked it out for a well deserved win. It’s not like they had a magic carpet ride to avoid the mess so I take my hat off to them and anyone else who found the finish line.And despite it all, it was still a helluva good time!

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Marc Spratt

Gravel Worlds delivered a banger this weekend 👌. They built a stage for the pros and the joes. Great work ya'll 👏.

I had the best performance I've had at this race. I did well to position myself at the front of the race, but some bad luck with a lodged, muddy rock took me out of the front group through the first MMR section. I stayed in it and fought all day with some fellow strong dudes. 18th in the end and honestly still pretty pleased with that.

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Nathan Spratt

Gravel Worlds 2025 - Nice n' sticky

Pretty happy with this result. After a hectic start in the dark, the first MMR section had everyone scrambling through the ditches trying to shed pounds of mud off the bike. I chased hard post mud section to make the front split, and after an hour of frustrating group dynamics at the front I started trying a couple moves. The group was pretty motivated to keep anyone from going up the road, but I finally made one finally stick to go off the front with @mctubbbin.

We were only given a gap of ~1min before @camjonesnz decided nothing was going up the road and we were reeled back in. I had burned quite a few matches, so when @mattbeers55 cranked the throttle around mile 80 I was spat out the back. It ultimately didn't work out, but sometimes ya just gotta send it! I worked well for the rest of the race with @raddaddizzle and @chasethebiker before they tag teamed me at end for the last two money spots. Still pretty damn happy to come home 11th in a STACKED field.

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