She Said I'd Be Fine

There is a specific kind of vulnerability in arriving somewhere alone. Scanning the room, wondering if it shows that you do not quite know where to be. Contributor Jil writes about doing exactly that at Graveller, a gravel event in Brabant, and what she found when she got there. A space that did not need to announce itself as inclusive because it simply was. An honest and warm piece about courage, connection and what good event design actually feels like.

Word: Jil Tomaschko

Photos: Graveller

She said I’d be fine. She was right.

Carola and I met at the TDF Femmes grand départ in Rotterdam through a mutual friend. We stayed in touch, and a few weeks ago she suggested I join her event Graveller, in Brabant (NL). I had just finished building out my Caddy Maxi, a long-time dream of mine, and it was standing there waiting for its first proper trip. Graveller seemed like the perfect reason. The only thing: none of my friends could make it, and I’d be going alone. 

That’s fine, I told myself. I’m a social butterfly. Showing up to a group ride where I don’t know anyone isn’t something that scares me. I’ll find my people on the road. But the whole event felt different. There’s more surface area to it. More moments where you’re standing somewhere without an obvious reason to be standing there. A group ride has a built-in structure while an event has gaps, and in those gaps, you feel more exposed. It’s not that I was afraid of being alone. It’s that the stakes felt higher somehow. More to navigate. More moments where the lost feeling might actually show. And there’s a specific kind of vulnerability in that. The feeling that everyone can tell you’re a little lost. That you’re the only one without a plan, without a group, without somewhere obvious to be. You walk into a space, scan the room and wonder if it shows. It takes courage to show up anyway, and I think that courage deserves more credit than it gets. Arriving somewhere alone isn’t something to be sheepish about. It’s actually a quietly brave thing to do.

I arrived at the sweetest little camping park. A pond, string lights, and the Graveller letters glowing near the entrance. I parked up next to former Canyon colleagues, pulled the bike off the roof rail, unrolled my sleeping bag and set up my little table outside. That adventure feeling settled in immediately.

And then I just.. existed in the space. And the space was easy to be in.

That’s what I keep coming back to when I think about Graveller. Carola has created something that doesn’t brag itself as inclusive - it just is. The bonfires you can drift to whenever you need a quieter moment. Charcuterie & Cards cause playing games while snacking definitely breaks down barriers, connects strangers and brings fun to the tables. A pub quiz in the main area, where you’re sitting with strangers and suddenly you’re all arguing about the same question, someone at your table knows the answer, someone else is completely wrong and very confident about it, and just like that, you’re a team. Karaoke in a small tent causes singing and dancing to these songs we all know the lyrics to, which has its own magic. It’s such a simple mechanism for dissolving the awkwardness of not knowing anyone or simply connecting groups of people. Carola clearly understands that connection sometimes needs a small excuse to start.

The food was genuinely thought through too: vegan, vegetarian, gluten-free. In a way that told you someone had actually considered everyone when planning. Small details. But small details are how you know whether you were an afterthought or not.

The routes worked the same way: generous and unintimidating, even when the distances were respectable. On Saturday, you could choose between 84, 112 and 143 kilometres; on Sunday, between 34, 66 and 97. But what made it clever was that the routes were extensions of each other, so you weren’t locked into a decision at the start line. If you set off on the long route and your legs said otherwise halfway through, you could peel off onto the shorter one. Or you could decide mid-ride that you were feeling good and add distance. That kind of flexibility changes the psychological experience of an event entirely; it removes the pressure of having to get it right before you even begin.

And the riding itself. Brabant surprised me completely. Flow trails through forests, fast hard-packed segments, a national park with wild horses, sandy sections and muddy stretches from the rain that somehow made everything more adventurous. At points, it felt like riding through five different countries in a single day. There’s something about discovering a landscape on a bike, especially one you’ve never ridden before, that feels like a small gift every time.

The evening I arrived, a woman sat down next to me at dinner. We talked, and ended up on the sunset shake-out ride together. There was a little manual ferry crossing mid-ride - one of those unplanned moments that quietly bonds a group of strangers. At the bike wash, I got chatting to a woman whose wheel I’d completely lost on a flow trail earlier, complimented her riding, and somehow ended up at the bonfire with her later that night. Ran into Erwin, someone I’d worked with during my Schwalbe days. Turned out the two of them live in the same neighbourhood. Full circle moments.

At breakfast the next morning, I met Kirsten, the mutual friend who’d introduced me to Carola in Rotterdam, sitting with women from her club Fietsvrouwen. Natascha, one of the women and I decided to ride together. Erwin and the flow trail woman joined. Just like that, we were a group, built entirely from chance and a space that made it easy for that to happen.

About 350 people showed up to Graveller’s 7th edition. The mix was genuinely unlike most events I’ve been to: different ages, backgrounds, paces. Racers, adventurers, people who ride purely for the joy of it. Couples, friend groups or people showing up solo. At a lot of events, you can clock pretty quickly who the crowd is for. Graveller just felt like it was for everyone - not in a vague, marketing-speak way, but in a you-don’t-have-to-prove-anything-to-be-here way. That’s not accidental. It‘s built that way and attracts the right people.

Carola told me I’d be fine. By the time I was packing up the Caddy to head home, I understood what she meant. Not just that I’d survive it, but that I met new people, experienced new routes, left my comfort zone and was gifted with unforgettable memories. She’d built something worth showing up to - no matter if with friends or alone. Something that does the welcoming for you, so you don’t have to do all that work yourself.

That’s rarer than it should be. And when you find it, I think it’s worth talking about.

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Jil is a contributor to Cycling Culture Club. Read her bio here