Scotland did not disappoint.
The Gralloch — 111 kilometres through Galloway Forest Park, 1,750 metres of climbing, 80% off-road — is one of those races that sounds demanding on paper and delivers on that promise in person. The conditions on Saturday were, if I’m honest, better than I expected. Cool — around 9°C — with a westerly wind and cloud cover, but dry throughout. For gravel racing, that’s close to ideal: grip on the forest tracks, no puddles to read wrong, no mud to slow you down on the climbs. The terrain did the work. It didn’t need the weather to make it harder.
How the Race Split
Gravel races have a habit of revealing themselves gradually, and the Gralloch was no exception. The opening kilometres through the forest were aggressive — the usual positioning scrum, riders testing each other, a few early moves that went nowhere. I stayed patient, stayed in the top twenty, and let the race come to me.
By the midpoint, the field had fractured into three distinct groups. At the front, Geerike Schreurs and Karolina Migon had gone clear with Wendy Oosterwoud and Danielle Shrosbree, the four of them locked in a lead group that finished within 82 seconds of each other after three and a half hours of racing. That group was gone — and chasing it alone was never the plan.
Behind them, a second group formed around positions five and six: Jana Gigele and Alison Jackson, riding clear of the rest. Jackson — who I’d identified before the race as the strongest finisher in the field — rode intelligently, conserving early and moving through the field in the second half. That’s exactly what I’d expected her to do. She finished sixth.
Then there was our group: four riders racing for positions seven through ten, arriving at the line within three seconds of each other. Sophie Wright, Tessa Neefjes, Grace Inglis, and me. I finished tenth. Two seconds separated me from ninth. Three seconds from seventh. After 110 kilometres through Scottish forest, that’s as close as it gets.
Three Seconds
I want to be honest about tenth place: it is the target I set, it is the result I got, and I’m satisfied with it. A top-ten finish in the Elite Women’s field at a UCI Gravel World Series event against a field that included some of the strongest gravel riders in Europe is a result I can build on.
But three seconds — that stays with me. Not in a negative way. In the way that races do when they’re close enough to feel the detail. There was a section in the final 15 kilometres where I made a choice to sit on wheels rather than push and I think, in retrospect, that was the right call for the energy I had. The gap didn’t come from a bad decision; it came from a fast race against fast riders in a tight finish. That’s racing.
What the Conditions Required
The cool, dry conditions defined the day — unlike a wet, muddy spring race, the tracks were grippy and fast. On technical gravel in those temperatures, tyre pressure matters. Body temperature matters. Fuelling matters — the calorie burn in 9°C is meaningfully higher than in warm conditions, and you don’t feel it the way you do in heat. You just quietly run out of energy if you’re not paying attention.
I started fuelling in the first twenty minutes. I ate to a schedule rather than to hunger. By the back half of the race, when the conditions were getting harder and other riders were visibly struggling, I was still moving cleanly. The nutrition work paid off in exactly the way it was supposed to.
The Coros data from the day will be interesting to go through with Jacob. My power on the key climbs held up well — I had QOM on the first gravel climb and was second on several others. The engine was there. It’s the racing craft I’m still sharpening, and the Gralloch gave me a lot of material to work with.
Galloway
A note on the venue, because it deserves one. Galloway Forest Park is remarkable. Long forest roads that go on long enough to feel endless, open moorland sections where the wind comes from wherever it wants, a landscape that makes you feel genuinely remote even when you know there are marshals every few kilometres. The Gravel Earth Series has good taste in locations, and this is one of the best.
The crowds at the finish in Gatehouse of Fleet were genuinely warm for a cold May afternoon. Scottish spectators understand endurance events in a way that still surprises me — quiet, knowledgeable, properly enthusiastic without being performative about it.
Next: Kansas
Unbound Gravel is in thirteen days. 200 miles across the Kansas Flint Hills — a completely different kind of challenge. Flat, hot, long, brutal in its own specific way. The Gralloch was about technical precision and patience. Unbound is about sustained output over ten-plus hours and making good decisions when everything hurts.
I’ll be on a flight by Wednesday. There’s work to do.
Supported by Merlin Cycles, Ventum Racing, OGT, Spatz, Coros, and Kenetik. Coached by Jacob Tipper at JT Performance Coaching.