Originally Posted by JayNYC

We have cobblestones here in NYC (both new ones and old ones). I love riding gravel, but hate riding cobblestones. They're no fun w/ 40mm tires, I can't imagine trying to do them at speed on 25mm tires. I can totally see where "brutal" and "vicious" would be apt terms…

Originally Posted by Spoonrobot

I don't think I've ridden a gravel course yet that comes close to these descriptions from the Strava article. Sections of singletrack within a gravel course? Yes a couple times, but gravel road? I really can't think of anything that I would describe as that intense. Even if they were riding at pro race speeds the roads I'm familiar with just aren't rough enough to mimic the high speed oscillations that comes from the cobbles. 50km+ of cobbles and 200km of road seems to me to be harder than 200km of regular gravel roads.

Strada Bianche has quite a bit of gravel and a much lower overall winning speed historically, it seems to lack the reputation of Paris-Roubaix. Regardless, interesting to think about. Makes me want to look up the alley cross routes and see how many cobbles are left in Atlanta.