Holy Spirit of Gravel

From the heavens to the corn fields…this episode is sometimes casual, sometimes erratic Lauf Gravel Worlds riffing. All yall were either there or watching the livestream anyway so we don’t need to get too serious. Or maybe you commenting "cross is coming" on a stray piece of mud-coded media. Or maybe you were doing something sane with your time.

topics include:

• the upcoming Gravel Race Calendar
• the Adam Roberge protocol
• we love Gravel Angels
• the neurotic Elite Field rider meeting
• Gravel Worlds rules are just "normie tactics"
• worldly representation at Gravel Worlds
• Holy Spirit probably going to Girona next year
• Joe Goettl programming
• five HYDRATION BLADDERS - stomach bloat confusion
• Hitter-coded life style clothes
• “XTREME GRAVEL” as a naming concept for mountain bike races that aren’t ‘real’ MTB races
• Chequamegon preview?
• respecting indigenous culture
• taping your bladder to your bike (we are Diesel Decker truthers)
• which Privateer would loan me 40 bucks of their big Gravel Worlds check if I asked

-presented by MGrills or MLGrills, we arent too sure

Holy Spirit has her first in-race media gig from core4 in Iowa.  She recaps the vibes of the race, the course conditions, and what it takes to elevate a race into the gravel discourse for a weekend.  Maybe every race doesn't need a 6 hour livestream to capture the hearts of gravel fans? All-in-all a great weekend for gravel and core4.

Topics include:

• the social politics of Flight Attendant
• which privateer got Holy sick?
• Gravel Worlds DNS for Holy Spirit: "Are you going to Nebraska?"
• how did the Core4 gig come about?
• Groadio Amanda - a great mentor
• EXCLUSIVE HSOG vibes-based videos
• gassing up Holy Spirit's contribution
• instagram stories "vs" livestreams
• Holy Spirit uses the term "liminal space"
• does Holy Spirit actually ride?
• Holy Spirit privateer interview style
• making Packet Pickup cool
• Lachlan Morton had a mechanical on a Greenbelt
• Local Gravel Dads are the Best Drivers
• Normie Greenbelts in the Race
• How Coverage of these Races activates normies at home
• Holy Spirit's autism-coded knowledge of privateer bike sponsors
• witnessing Man drafting Woman
• LOGISTICS humor
• The Poutine Mafia one-two
• We are now the number two Quebecois gravel podcast
• Gerard's long camera stick
• Cellphones capturing THE moments
• tagging Privateers
• fans of this pod asking for "the other guy"
• Rosa Maria Kloser beat Gee
• Paul Sandmann index is rising
• Daxton Mock was there
• Mt Washington Hill Climb
• Iowa City cycling culture is so ACTIVATED
• local gravel dads are the best media drivers
• Normie Selfies with the Holy Spirit
• Call ups and Podiums
• Dutch woman finds me funny
• 2022 Gravel Dad Culture
• The Great Cecily Diesel Decker Podium Heist
• shoutout With Pace
• Midwest/Montana Bike Culture
• Phil Gaimon cringe
• Core4 on ProCyclingStats
• Betsy Welch and Christopher Blevins Leadville Video
• Media Privateers
• Blevins as Chad soulcycle instructor
• dialed media team plan (we didnt crash out anyone)
• Split Timings culture
• Summer Heights High
• Race Meetings live stream Easter Egg
• DFL culture
• DFL guy was Keegan at Sea Otter-coded
• Mountains in New Hampshire
• weather check: It Was Hot
• The Bicycle Station Video on Kate Courtney Leadville setup
• who's going to Gravel Worlds?
• Axelle Dubau Prevot MVP
• witnessing real life MEMES

We weren't there and don't know a whole lot about Mountain Bikes but that doesn't stop us from talking about the most gravel-coded MTB race in the world. Or maybe its just X-Treme Gravel?

Holy Spirit and the Gravel Dad cohost ate at a really activated pizza spot featured on Barstool Sports and then just decided to pod before she went back home because even tho the vibes were off, the pizza was really good! Also Holy Spirit briefly mixed up Heathland Gravel and Latvia's Gravel Weekend, she should resign from the Core4 media team. Also Holy Spirit wants to commit fraud and use the funds to start a team of privateers. Also thanks for listening, please rate/review and tell your friends.

Topics include:

• ​John Gaston - Leadville specialist
• ​What is Skimo?
• ​This is now a Skimo specific pod
• ​WNBA and Gravel
• ​HSOG meme coin when?
• ​Lauren Stephens DQ'd
• ​existential ramblings on where Leadville exists in the non grassroots, non UCI, prestige gravel paradigm of races
• ​fixing feed zones
• ​Cecily Decker and Skimo
• ​how were there seemingly 50 feedzones?
• ​becoming QOM on a MTB/Gravel livestream chat
• ​what makes a livestream worth watching
• ​how we would run a GRAVEL RACE live stream
• ​activating the Life Time app
• ​Holy Spirit's best friend and drinking buddy Piotr Havik won Gravel Weekend in Latvia
• ​FNLD Gravel and RADL Gravel
• ​Kate Courtney: She Sends
• ​Heathland Gravel in Belgium being Americana-coded
• ​Life Time GP Midpack Standings
• ​there are two guys named Mat/t Stephens
• ​rules are a thing in sports even silly ones like Gravel Racing
• ​telling random Kiwis about Cam Jones
• ​Remco to Jukebox racing
• ​Dylan Groenewegen to some meme team
• ​Holy Spirit x Anna Delvey con artistry
• ​Holy Spirit cheating in the feed zone
• ​insane pop culture references
• ​Sarah Gigante and Safa Brian collab
• ​False Flag operations

Alternate title for the podcast episode is: Did Axelle Dubau Prevot’s INSANE Leadville Block inspire her sister to win TdFF??

Your favorite unhinged Gravel podcast breaks down the paved race called Tour de France Femmes avec Whoop Cycling and DESTROYS the critiques of “women don’t know how to ride bikes”. Also Megre Gravel was happening during the queen’s stage and apparently pro cycling stats has a hidden tab for gravel races.

Topics include:

• ​celebrities in the gravel paddock (aka grassy parking lot)
• ​this Sarah Gigante video is lowkey amazing
• ​Sarah Gigante did nothing wrong
• ​we love Sarah Gigante
• ​Sarah Gigante should come to Core4
• ​Sarah Gigante should do the State Bikes fixed gear climb video
• ​why I didn’t post a Kristen Faulkner meme I made
• ​leave Sarah Gigante alone!!
• ​Taylor Phinney also painted the Pan Normal Tostado logo on the road (in our imagination)
• ​Phil Liggett humor (he didn’t realize PFP got a phone call from Presdent Macron and thought it was her dad)
• ​imagine winning Unbound and getting a phone call from your city council representative
• ​Femmes do it better
• ​what’s harder? Riding up Col de la Madeline or descending down Powerline
• ​demonic billionaire Peter Thiel to fund GRAVEL
• ​this Josh Reid video on the Tour Divide was awesome
• ​Avery in Alexey and Avery videos is a good thing
• ​Sad indoor trainer set ups
• ​what bike should be the neutral service bike in Gravel Racing?
• ​Holy Spirit’s best friend and drinking buddy Piotr Havik got 2nd place at Megre Gravel
• ​Holy Spirit wants to do Megre Gravel
• ​what is Enough Cycling?

The Holy Spirit of Gravel digs in on two weeks of gravel and whatever the Leadville stage race is because we were getting sick of the Tour (hommes) (we love it but).

Gravel Earth Series seems to be winning the aesthetics war currently with their women’s Rift coverage… I think the men’s was in there somewhere. Foco Fondo had a dialed, grassroots-coded livestream where we could see some normie style aid station usage. Leadville stage race was stacked but does Holy Spirit even care about MTB?

Will Daxton Mock/Lance Haidet’s family break the Gravel Database Project servers because they checked their profiles too many times? (We are too cheap to have a good server).

Are vibes-based race calendars the new high carb movement? Why does Holy Spirit wear the same shirt in every video she’s soft doxxed herself in? What actually happened in the Lithuanian forests all those years ago? Do Lithuanian gravel races have 10k prize purses or is that just middle of nowhere North Dakota?

These questions and many more get answered on today’s pod.

Oh yeah, should we continue to do political pundit impressions?

Here’s that awesome Kate Courtney video I was talking about: https://youtu.be/xFJsR8bG6es?si=fg2nWUOq0BpkCm19

Holy Spirit of Gravel DESTROYS NBC Sports' coverage of the Tour De France. As much as we enjoy this time of year, why does the Peacock coverage in America feel disconnected from the things that we love about cycling in America? Are we too gravel-pilled, or is the broadcast disengaged from the best parts of cycling in America?

-guys in suits

-Bradley Wiggins and George Hincapie working out

-track cycling to UCI British Olympic pipeline

-ketones and veteran owned podcast products

-the fallacy of having an American be the best

-improperly using Sepp Kuss, Quinn Simmons, Matteo Jorgenson,

-Quinn Simmons to Miami Blazers pipeline

-Broke Knights

-Has Lance Armstrong been memory-holed with Zoomers and Gen Alpha?

-we do NOT talk about Tadej vs Jonas

Presented by The Feed presented by Nathan’s hot dogs presented by San Luis Potosí tourism board presented by Campaign for Nick Blouin for Utah Presented by Crusher in the Tusher presented by

Today marks our first ever interview on the Holy Sprit of Gravel podcast. We are calling this series the Beyond Privateer Chronicles (until I think of something better).

We're joined by German pro elite hitter Paul Sandmann. You might know him for his 38th place result in Unbound 2025. He pulls back the curtain on life as a lesser-known gravel hitter, if the privateer model is worth it, and the differences between Euro gravel and American prestige gravel. Oh and he's Rosa Kloser's boyfriend.

We here at HSOG productions make an effort to highlight the lesser known hitters whose stories deserve to be told.

We get to hear unfiltered views from inside the men’s elite field, such as:

-Tim DeClerq policing the Unbound breakaway

-The future of steel/metal/magnesium bikes

-The best tire to rollover a water bottle in a rut

-What can sponsors truly add to a privateer

-Who gets to debrief first: Paul or Rosa?

-politics of Unbound Drafting

-is Chase Wark shadow banned in Europe?

-are Hambini and Peak Torque accurate from an engineer-privateer point of view?

-what it’s like being a member of Team RK (team Rosa Kloser)

-how to travel with your bike like a pro

And much more…

We hope you enjoy the first in what will be a continuing series in highlighting the best of our deranged sport.

The Holy Spirit talks about SBT GRVL for way too long. It ends up being a podcast about lap races in gravel, neutral feed zones and MAURTEN's nutrition. (Not to be confused with Morton's Steak House or Morton's salt). The Cooldown with Alexey Vermuelen and Keegan Swenson provided insight into a race weekend of narrow tires and champagne gravel from the perspective of the gravel elite.

Eventually, there is a vibe check on Oregon Trail Gravel Grind. We talk about the camping vs Airbnb wars among privateers and the future of the spirit of gravel. Does the Lifetime Grand Prix need a stage race? BWR Montana also happened and Chase Wark won a grassroots race. An overbooked weekend in Gravel means the privateers don't all get to hang out and post videos on Instagram together!

Overall, there's a normie vibe shift towards adventure biking so gravel dads can ride overnight/camp in a Lachlan Morton style windbreaker tent for a night. There's also a vibe shift towards SCOTT bikes in 2025. Holy Spirit continues to push the narrative that the women are more interesting than the men. And that there should be more nutrition-specific gravel races when races design their course + race experience narratives.

We talk about the biggest cycling brands like Pas Normal, MAAP, Colnago, Scott, and the ongoing vibe wars in gravel.

Riffs of today:

-Endurance Bro says the podcast is terrible

-The move from aero to adventure coding

-Is the aero movement ending?

-Gravel is ruining every cycling discipline theory

-The spirit of Randonneuring

-SBT GRVL's cultural significance on the gravel calendar

-The new format of SBT GRV

-Loop formats and Dozinky Doozie's triple loop format

-Brennan Wurtz and his stars and stripes x SCOTT bike

-Is SCOTT bikes winning the vibes war in gravel this year?

-The Cam Jones UNBOUND video drop

-Are Cam Jones and Brennan Wurtz the REAL Keegan and Matt Beers?

-Matt Beers is tall

-BWR Montana and Finsty

-Privateers who don't live in the Four Corners states have to go home eventually -- you can't just live in a van for months?

-Chase Wark won a race --new documentary dropping soon?

-Should more privateers go dominate grass roots races?

-We need more Deep South Gravel representation

-The Cooldown with Alexey and Keegan breakdown--Do we love Keegan Swenson hot takes?

-Nathan Haas rode road tires at SBT and wrote narrow-tire-core instagram captions

-Pas Normal Studios x Colnago road bike collab talk

-Is Pas Normal a roadie brand?

-The Pas Normal to Team UAE sponsorship Theory

-Neutralized feed zones--great for normies, bad for sponsored athletes

-Sarah Lange is bursting on to the scene

-The Cooldown Femmes with Lauren Stephens and Paige Onweiller -- Cecily Decker or -Lauren DeCrezenco? Sofia Gomez-Villafane?

-Are looped races just adventure dirt crits?

-BWR Montana results review - Stella Hobbs to podcast guest? Daxton Mock, Lance Haidet, Joe Goettel.

-Oregon Trail Gravel Grinder - Are stage races the next big vibe in gravel?

-Glamp style stage races

-Sophia Gomez-Villafane stayed at an AirBNB

-Cecile Lejune, Sarah Sturm, Morgan Aguirre, Dani Shrosbree

-Can Sarah Sturm digest Maurten's products?

-Cam Jones and his parents are gravel's top story of 2025?

-Iz King and her fourth trimester adventure experience

-Bike shop customers in Pas Normal and MAAP are the worst patrons

-Inside the Maurten's marketing team's reaction to post SBT buzz

-Going Narrow with 45s

-Facebook marketplace gravel dads looking to exploit cycling quitters

-A theory on Nike joining the gravel boom

-H&M bibs - is fast fashion aero?

-Los Angeles cycling bros - Mitch Boyer, Shreddy Pendergrass, Safa Brian and NOT Phil Gaimon

-That feeling when a fat tire bike passes you

-How to get NIKE into gravel - a roadMAAP

-Holy Spirit prepares to go to Gravel Mexico and get into the Gravel Earth longtail scrub standings (and connect with her heritage)

-The Paul Sandmann Documentary?

-Maurten's is SOYLENT coded

-How to get a bike shop to hate you

We had to reupload this episode due to the audio being horribly corrupted on the previous one (it made it seem like we were high on uppers interrupting each other constantly but in reality the audio was desynced). We are sorry and we strive to DO BETTER. We are not perfect but we will learn from this experience. Sorry again to everyone, now on to the show. If you were late and this is your first time listening just disregard the last few sentences.

The A24 coded / Criterion Collection era of gravel videos is in full swing this gravel season with Lachlan Morton's Unbound XL video. Will the world's most artistic directors begin making spon con for gravel brands? Will EF put MUCK OFF in their TDF team's tires.

This is basically a pod about Cinéma vérité, not gravel. But only in that gravel is real life, and real life is every thing, and thereby gravel is everything. American directors mentioned include Gus Van Sandt, Ben Affleck, Wes Anderson, Paul Thomas Anderson, Greta Gerwig, the Coen brothers and Ben Affleck.

Don't you want to see spon con directed by Greta Gerwig about Paige Onweiller's former career as a physician's Assistant?

Elsewhere, the Holy Spirit does her worldwide grassroots recap on Migration Gravel and Big Horn Gravel. Let's just say PAS RACING (Cecily Decker, Karo Migon, and Emily Newsom] dominated the podium and picked up some physically HUGE checks.

-Introducing an a.i. generated farmer

-Local bike shops not knowing you are cool contemporary gravel coded

-Brady Corbet from child actor to director to gravel spon con collaborator

-The farmers are winning the War on Gravel

-Is Lachlan the most popular privateer amongst gravel dads?

-Pas Normal x JJJJound tastemaker collab

-Paul Sandmann to HSOG pod?

-GCN cringe core

-Rural Murals

-Will Keegan and Sofia launch a couples reality show?

-The Ben Delaney Ventum embargo

-Joe Goettl, a BWR Utah Specialist

-Dylan Johnson's heat training video

-Valterri Bottas's cringe gravel-coded IG privateer social media presence

-Matt Stephens is trying to Great British Bakeoff-code cycling

-Building out the Emporia State University Gravel Studies Program

-Natural Wine x gravel x Girona

-Can you do drugs and eat caffeine gels?

-SBT Gravel preview (not actually a preview)

-What happens if a bike shop hates you for thinking you are a cool gravel guy? (You probably deserve it)