Dmitry Bogatyrenko: winter without a trainer, tips for Tsar Grader, and gravel trends

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• Issue #53 · December 24, 2025 · 55 minDmitry Bogatyrenko: the psychology of a racer, bike fit and why Ilya does racing

Useful from the issue

1. Take your food and water to the long gravel

   A quick group can arrive at the food point before it is opened. At 180 km, Dmitry advises you to count on your stock, and you can give one flask to an escort car.

2. Train your stomach in advance

   Six hours on liquid carbohydrates is hard for an unprepared digestive tract. Accustom him to racing nutrition during long training sessions.

3. Rubber — as wide as possible

   Between 44 and 50 mm, the difference in the roll is minimal, but the wide tire dampens the shaking. At a long distance, this means less fatigue and more confident control.

4. Don't train with friends

   Friendship prevents a coach from relying only on numbers, and an athlete from communicating normally with a coach. Dmitry decided to separate these roles, and the third interlocutor advises to keep his distance.

5. Coach lifts the burden of responsibility

   If you're lazy to delve into theory and don't want to waste time on mistakes, a plan from a coach eliminates doubts, and getting on a trainer becomes easier.

6. Running won't keep you in shape

   To maintain functionality with running, the same volume is needed as on the trainer — from 5–6 hours per week, and the legs will still work differently. Skis, according to the interlocutors, help more.

7. Come to the race without high expectations

   The mindset of 'I must be in the top three' led Dmitry to a series of failures. Realistic goals help you finish and enjoy the experience.

8. Second wheels instead of a second bike is not always the way out

   If you ride both road and gravel every week, changing wheels, brakes, and derailleurs gets tiresome quickly. A separate road bike saves evenings.

9. A bicycle for a girl is, first of all, light

   For a novice cyclist, the small weight of a bicycle is more important than, for example, hydraulic brakes: it is more convenient to handle a light bike and you want to ride more.

Winter in the forest: running, gym and river

Dmitry is 27 years old, he is from Novgorod and runs a YouTube channel about a bicycle. In the autumn he moved to live in the forest, where there is almost nowhere to ride: there is only one road there and back. Therefore, in winter he goes to the gym three times a week and runs twice — although he disliked running all his life. He runs mostly to the river to swim: he started in October and never stopped, and in December he still dips into the Mstu. There is no goal to become a walrus or a runner, this is pure curiosity.

Last winter was hard for him. It was the channel’s first year and expectations were high: he thought the videos would change his life. By autumn he was disappointed, seriously considered giving up cycling, and did almost nothing until March apart from a couple of trainer sessions. His main goal for this winter is simple: fall in love with cycling again.

Why does a lazy racer need a coach

Ilya has been training with a coach since July 1, right after Tsar Grader. Workouts are usually an hour, three to four times a week, and the load, in his words, is quite manageable. He's too lazy to understand the theory, and he would be too soft a coach for himself: when the plan is written by someone else, a sense of obligation appears, and it's easier to get on the trainer. Tests for one and two minutes after the first months showed progress.

The third interlocutor asks how one can want results and not be interested in what exactly they are training. Ilya explains that he enjoys the process first of all — just like doing races. Another argument is that he doesn't want to waste energy and time on experimenting on himself and then realize after six months that he was training the wrong thing. Long rides in the second zone on a trainer are mentally tough, while an hour-long workout with intervals is easy; wintering in Turkey is certainly more pleasant than a trainer, but it's tolerable at home too.

Dmitry trained with a friend last season and believes that friendship interfered with work: the coach built a plan not only by numbers, but also by his own idea of him. Next season, he wants to make friends and practice. The third interlocutor goes further and advises to keep a distance with the coach, up to the point of referring to "you".

How to drive 180 km Tsar Grader

The main race of the next season for Dmitry is the Tsar Grader: this year he missed it, and last time he drove into the top three on the same route that will be offered for 180 km, and now he is thinking of trying 250. His main advice is to take maximum food and water with you. The leaders drove so fast that they arrived at the food outlets before they had time to open. The group ran out of water, had to stop in the village, and one of the riders had a severe cramp in his legs. In addition, the stomach needs to be accustomed to liquid carbohydrates in advance: six hours on gels and drinks without preparation are hard.

According to Dmitry, you can put a lounger (aerobars) on a gravel bed if you know how to use it: it almost does not spoil aerodynamics, and there will be areas where you can lie down. He advises to put the rubber as wide as the frame allows. Between 44 and 50 mm, roll losses are minimal, but a large volume dampens the shaking, and over a long distance, vibration fatigue hits the control technique. He himself is limited by the Cannondale SuperX frame, which is much wider than 44 mm does not fit.

On Fury Road, Dmitry rode an old MTB for the sake of interest after a month without riding due to injury. The conclusion is unequivocal: 26-inch wheels catch every hole, and everyone left him. He will go to the Tsar on a gravel road.

High-speed gravel or mesilovo

The third speaker describes two poles: the American Unbound with monstercrosses and tough off-road terrain, and Belgian gravel races similar to criteriums on paved tracks. Ilya votes for speed: no messing around in the mud, so the dust flies nicely, asphalt is acceptable — that's exactly the kind of races he organizes. He considers Fury Road after the rains to be a cool race, but not a gravel one. Dmitry likes both formats, but in his opinion, a tough race should be shorter: five hours in the puddles on an old MTB is too much, three would be enough.

Dmitry finds asphalt on long distances even beneficial: you can catch your breath and eat without stopping at a feed station. Conversations agree that more road cyclists come to gravel than mountain bikers, and over time, asphalt sections may develop their own tactics. They also comment on MTB: short XCO is similar to cyclocross, and Dmitry doesn't understand root marathons — off-road, he'd rather ride a gravel bike.

A separate story is the tandem on the last Tsar Grader, on which Ilya and the third interlocutor rode. Aluminum frame, 40-millimeter rubber, pumped up to the stop, dismounting in the sand, slides that were taken only from acceleration, and the collision of one of the riders with a dog right in front of them. The result is about the twentieth place and a firm decision: the tandem is sold, no one is going to 250 km on it.

Disappointments in hardware: wheels, pedals, SRAM

Dmitry's main disappointment is buying aluminum wheels. He believes they're almost a waste of money: modern wheels should be wide and carbon, and for road cycling, they should also be tall, while aluminum ones weigh almost two kilograms. He bought the road Cannondale Synapse spontaneously after seeing an ad on Avito. He's long been tired of changing wheels on a gravel bike: if you want to ride both gravel and road routes in a week, you need a second bike. For training and racing on the road, he recommends tires 28–30 mm, and 32–34 mm for very relaxed riding.

The third interlocutor complains about Look road pedals — they are lightweight and functional, but constantly squeak. He appreciates bikes with standard components — threaded bottom bracket, regular seatpost, no internal wiring — because after a frame where everything was branded and each part had to be waited for a month, he wants to buy parts at the nearest store. He is disappointed with SRAM: the groupset is functional, but shifts worse and holds the charge worse, and he doesn't need wireless connectivity. After switching to Shimano, he has never regretted it. Ilya didn't like SRAM's shifting logic when he tried someone else's bike.

Dmitry races on Speedplay pedals with a built-in power meter and admits that they are not suitable for mud: on Fury Road, after each puddle, the spike had to be washed by lowering the foot into the water to get up again.

Expensive bicycles, victories and defeats

The third interlocutor deliberately throws in the thesis that expensive bikes are not necessary, and bikes from AliExpress are bad. The argument turns out to be more of a joke. They agree that about 200 thousand rubles is now the minimum for a bike on which you can compete without problems. An expensive beautiful bike in itself motivates you to go for a ride, but no frame will help without training. The story about a cheaply bought aero helmet by a triathlete, who updated his equipment for new photos, ends with his phrase that this is normal for triathletes.

Dmitry speaks frankly about defeats. He started actively training in 2021, and in 2024 he often left the race: he came with the idea that he had to be in the top three, and gave up when he realized that it was not working. To this was added a technical meeting, health problems on cyclocross and a month without skiing. This season he had one win and third place at the Grand Fondo on Igor, and the plan for 2025 is just to drive races without unrealistic goals. The third interlocutor, on the contrary, has never suffered from ambitions and is ready to work for the team.

All three of them talk about why people break down: until you start, you are a fast racer in your head, and the first races inevitably come down from heaven. The fast guys in Strava have from 15 thousand kilometers a year, and you can't catch up with them in five thousand. Besides, they have had these volumes for several years, and no one has canceled genetics. Dmitry adds that it is much more fun to develop management skills than physics. At the end of the season, he bought a 27.5-inch hardtail to remember his spot skills in St. Petersburg, and went to an enduro race where every ninth bike was electric.

Teams, trends of 2025 and work as a nurse

Ilya's main goal for the next year is to assemble a FATRACING racing team. He himself will ride the 250 km Tsar Grader and road races with the team, and admits that cyclocross is difficult for him. Among the trends, he names the unification of communities (collaboration with Dmitry's team and joint scoring of gravel races according to his points board), teams that go from Moscow to St. Petersburg and Novgorod, and the double 250 km distance at Tsar. Dmitry is still waiting for a decision on sponsorship support: whether he gets a gravel or road bike will depend on the calendar. The gravel community seems more open and less stuffy to him than the road community, where the entry threshold is higher and there's nothing to do without a team.

In terms of hardware, the interlocutors are waiting for even more gears, tires from 50 mm, the pursuit of light frames and aerodynamics, affordable Chinese electronic groups, the standard of Boost axles in gravel and a separate niche for monstrcrosses. Do not exclude individual credits for electrograviaries. They also recall the renaissance of fixes on cheap frames from Aliexpress, against which the prices for rare fix parts are surprising.

Towards the end, Dmitry shares that he's studying to be a gestalt therapist and is taking on clients. Since 2019, he worked as a nurse in the neurosurgery institute's intensive care unit. The shift work prevented him from establishing a normal training week, and over time, he found it increasingly difficult to cope emotionally, leading to his resignation in late August. He answers chat questions, saying that a bike for a beginner girl should be lightweight, and running in winter is beneficial but won't maintain fitness if done less than using a trainer. Earlier in the stream, Dmitry talks about puppies: the dog had ten, and eight are still looking for homes—the link is in the episode description.

Timestamps

1. 07:31The beginning of the stream, acquaintance and puppies
2. 12:43Winter: running, gym and swimming in the river
3. 18:35Why do I need a coach
4. 30:04Tsar Grader: food, water, lounger and rubber
5. 36:45Ilya's plans and the FATRACING team
6. 39:28High-speed gravel or mesilovo
7. 49:17Tandem on Tsar Grader
8. 56:14Coach-friend and the hardest race
9. 1:00:58Frustrations: Pedals, wheels, Synapse
10. 1:09:34Standard Nodes and SRAM vs Shimano
11. 1:15:23Road, gravel, and teams
12. 1:20:46Do I need expensive bikes
13. 1:32:13Victories and defeats
14. 1:45:46Trends of 2025
15. 2:04:14Gestalt therapy, work as a nurse, and chat questions

Mentioned in this episode

Tsar Grader · Fury Road · La Strada · Shulz Gravel Weekend · Unbound · Cannondale · Specialized · Shimano · SRAM · Speedplay · Tufo Thundero · Sire