The Brit lined up in Maastricht with narrow tyres, a maxed-out chainring, and a dazzling custom paint scheme.
Alex Hunt
Before the race even began, much of the talk around the UCI Gravel World Championships centred on Tom Pidcock. Making his debut at the event less than 24 hours after finishing sixth at Il Lombardia, the Brit arrived in Belgium with more uncertainty than preparation. He was open about it, too. While I was photographing his bike, he admitted he hadn’t yet ridden it, or spent much time on Pinarello’s Dogma GR platform at all.
For someone as meticulous as Pidcock, that kind of winging it is rare. The 24-year-old was obsessing over setup details in the pits, adjusting the angle of his computer mount and making minute changes to his saddle angle. But when it came to the gravel-specific details, his approach was more pragmatic than polished. “I don’t really know what pressure to ride,” he said with a shrug. Tyre pressure and width choice are arguably the biggest variables in gravel racing, and most riders spend hours testing them. For Pidcock, the plan seemed to be: turn up, line up, and trust the estimations.
His choice of bike was also the subject of pre-race speculation. Although Pidcock races on Scott bikes as part of the Q36.5 ProTeam setup, his contract only binds him to the brand on the road, leaving him free to ride Pinarellos for mountain bike and gravel events. His selection of the Dogma F GR, rather than the endurance-oriented Dogma X or the standard Dogma F road race bike, gave a glimpse into his thinking.
The Dogma GR sits firmly in the race-oriented end of the gravel spectrum. It borrows aerodynamic cues and much of its tube shaping from the Dogma F, while adding a touch more compliance and clearance. Pidcock’s setup featured 35 mm tyres front and rear, narrow by modern gravel standards, suggesting he expected the course to ride fast and firm. Technically, both the Dogma X and the Dogma F can clear tyres of that width, but the GR’s dedicated geometry should make it the sharper tool for the job, built to handle the endless corners littered across the course.
Despite his lack of time on the bike, Pidcock was relaxed about the challenge ahead. A former Strade Bianche winner, he was quick to play down comparisons between the Italian semi-classic and this course when asked if there was some crossover. “I guess so, but I think it’s different. There are a lot of Belgians in the race,” he joked. With just over 1,600 metres of climbing packed into the 180 km route, less than half the elevation of Strade, the race designers had angled the race around raw speed rather than attrition.
For Pidcock, the weekend was a study in contrasts: one day climbing more than 4,000 metres around Lombardy, the next, rolling out on gravel tyres barely wider than his thumb in the Netherlands.
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