The Road To Gravel
What made pro road cyclist Jess Cerra go all-in with gravel?
Jess Cerra: determined since day one on the bike. Photo: Jussi Oksanen @jussioksanen
By Jess Cerra
My mom hired a teenage neighbor to teach me how to ride my first bike—a bulky, blue Diamondback mountain bike. About 30 seconds after our first lesson began, the neighbor burst through our front door yelling, “She just took off!”
I still laugh at this story, not only because it’s kind of badass, but also because it describes my personality in a nutshell: recklessly stubborn and determined to muscle my way through any challenge. (This is still possibly both my prevailing strength and weakness.) This story is also a window into the future of what bikes would ultimately bring to my life, a concept that wouldn’t come full circle until my mid-20s.
My reconnection to bikes came in grad school, when I was testing elite cyclists in an exercise physiology lab. When I did the VO2-max test myself, the results showed that I too had a lot of athletic promise. That childhood drive to show that I was a natural at riding a bike came roaring back. This single test was the catalyst to a major pivot in my life—I decided to choose my own bike adventure instead of pursuing a PhD.
After seeing glimmers of success in the disciplines of XTERRA off-road triathlon and mountain biking, I stumbled into the world of road racing. Now, I don’t want this to seem like I’m dogging on road racing, but you have to be in the right place in your life and in the right mental space to deal with the realities. It demands a lot of sacrifices, a lot of missed birthdays, baby showers, and girls trips—really missing out on a lot of life experiences that provide a healthy balance. In road racing, there is no balance. And I say this after fondly looking back on five years spent on two amazing UCI Continental women’s teams, with other riders who also worked other full-time jobs, trying to strike a so-called balance.
When you are accustomed to all the travel and the back-to-back racing lifestyle, honestly it is hard to imagine how other people live a “normal” life—or why they would even want to. You convince yourself that it’s not that bad racing 28mm slick tires in the pouring rain at 30mph around a crit course. You assure yourself that crashing and tearing half your kit off is NOT an acceptable reason to quit a bike race. You tell yourself that sleeping on a pad in the living room at a host house with seven other women is actually comfortable.
Catch her if you can. Photo Jussi Oksanen @jussioksanen
And then, you sneak away to Richmond, Vermont for a weekend to try out a gravel race called Rooted Vermont, during the peak of your road season, and the world comes to a screeching halt. What is this I see? Competitive cyclists drinking beer and eating creemees the night before a race? Total anarchy!
Truth is, I am massively grateful for my road cycling career. The amount of generosity (and, quite frankly, charity) that came from teams, sponsors, mentors, friends, family, etc is a hard concept to unpack. But it’s also easy to get burnt out by the demands of this discipline. Also, running my company JoJé Bar from my various hosts’ living rooms was also increasingly challenging. With my heart pulling me into the gravel scene, and my craving to ride in more remote places on the rise, I decided to make a transition and go all-in with gravel. My thinking was that pursuing gravel racing would allow me to manage my own schedule and lower the demands of training for the top-level fitness needed for road racing.
What I found: Gravel cycling brings together the best of both worlds of road cycling and mountain biking, but with less of the exclusive factor. For starters, you spend more time in remote areas and see landscape and wildlife that doesn’t come as often on the tarmac. Simply put, you get a chance to feel more connected with nature and the outdoors, which is something that I recognize I need in my life. Looking back, I think I knew this the second I first hopped on a bike and “rode away.”
No matter your background, you will also find that the gravel scene is welcoming. Since it is an unsanctioned discipline, you don’t need a race license or to work your way up through the categories to fit in. It’s a naturally inclusive format for trying something new and meeting bike friends. This is a refreshing concept. Even for me, as a professional in the sport, I sometimes felt out of place in the road scene, like I was trying to prove that I belonged. In gravel, the focus shifts away from palmares and results and onto community, stewardship, social impact, friendship, development, exploration and personal challenge. Unlike results, these elements are attainable for any participant, as everyone can contribute in a meaningful way, regardless of their finish place. This connection resonates so hard with me because, to me, riding bikes centers around these human relationships and the impact that I can have on my peers and community.
I cannot recommend highly enough signing up for a gravel event if you haven’t already. In my experience, many gravel organizers take painstaking effort to develop and present courses of varying distances that not only suit a variety of skill and fitness levels, but also offer all participants exciting and beautiful features. As I have come to learn, these kinds of events are incredible avenues through which you can connect with others as well as yourself. You learn where your limits are, how to push past them, and how to take that newfound confidence and transfer it to the person next to you (not to mention to your life off the bike!).
On this site you’ll find a list of cool womxn friendly events that we think you’ll like. You can also contact a local bike shop in your area and ask for suggestions on preparing for an event in the area, or seek out local clubs or clinics that offer resources. Alternatively, seek out mentorship via resources such as Girls Gone Gravel or Amity Rockwell’s Discord Channel, Fast Friends. If financially viable, consider hiring a female coach via Source Endurance.
Lastly, I hope to see you at an event in the near future; please make sure to come introduce yourself because I love meeting new friends!
Jess is a professional gravel cyclist with the Pinarello Scuderia team. She is the Founder/CEO of JoJé Bar, a real-food energy bar company located in Encinitas, California, and is a Chef Instructor of Culinary Medicine at VEBA Resource Center. In 2021, Jess adds “race director” to her resume, as she will launch (with her partner, Sam Boardman) The Last Best Ride, a gravel event in her beautiful hometown of Whitefish, Montana.
