Members of the Sumner County ARES group and the Sumner County Amateur Radio Association took time from their busy schedules and volunteered to assist a sister ARES group in supporting the Gravel Revival 2025 event in Hickman County Tennessee. Some travelling over 100 miles and 2 hours. That was nothing compared to some of the riders who travelled over a thousand miles to come from states far away just for this weekend jamboree!
Radio operators from both groups spread out around the Hickman County area to designated Rest Stop locations and mobile Sag unit assignments. The Gravel Revival has multiple length Runs and Bike races. The 4 main bike races were held on Saturday October 18th and were 30, 40, 60 and 100 mile events.
After checking in at Net Control Radio Operator W4JDM, Jon, was assigned as SAG, Support and Gear, unit. Radio Operator NG2S, Brian, was assigned and deployed to Rest Stop 2 at Wolf Creek Farm. Cell coverage was limited at best and non existent in most of the area. Radio communications was the only way to reliably communicate in the area and even that had its challenges due to some weak signa areas.
Because the only form of communication in the area was radio the air waves were very busy. At times you had to wait for clear air to pass any traffic.
At Rest Stop 2 a 33′ mast was deployed to support a roll up J-Pole antenna. A 50 watt mobile radio in a pelican type case and powered by batteries was the station utilized. Because there was no internet, wifi or cell coverage at Rest Stop 2 a Starlink system was also deployed. This brought another communications form to the Stop. Race staff was able to link their phones to the Starlink wifi and call/text others that may have had some limited coverage at their locations. Internet was also available with the Starlink setup. 2 riders through the day required SAG support to get back to the Start/Finish area. 1 was due to a fall and injury. The second was due to unrepairable bike damage. There was also a mix up with some food for the riders that needed to be relocated to Rest Stop 3. All communications with Net Control and their coordination made any major issues into nothing more than a minor inconvenience that took a few moments to resolve. This is what we do. Radio Operators getting out in the field and setting up communications for an effected area that has no other forms. This is the ARES mission in a nutshell!
The SAG unit operated by W4JDM was busy all day. From starting out as a 40 mile sweep unit he was redirected numerous times for downed riders or riders with mechanical bike issues. After the numerous support calls Jon was reassigned to do a final sweep of the 40 mile course to confirm there were no riders left stranded anywhere on the course. Since there was no cell coverage in most of the area navigation had to be done with paper maps or possibly off line digital maps if you had a stand alone GPS device or downloaded the maps in anticipation of the event. Being unfamiliar with the area it wasn’t easy to get around the windy, twisty, hilly roads.
While I do not have all the numbers I can report that there were numerous injuries, multiple bicycles were damaged beyond field repair and at least 1 rider required transportation to the hospital for some severe lacerations to his arm from a fall. These gravel bike events are on a whole other level than the typical pavement rides and the people are a different breed. Some wiped out, got patched up with large bandages and gauze, got back on their bikes and continued on! To say these people are tough and serious about their rides would be an understatement!
The day was lots of fun as the weather was beautiful and the radio was very active. If you ever want to experience a fun and busy support event then I would highly recommend you volunteer for the Gravel Revival 2026.
While the communications side of things were successful that doesn’t mean some lessons were not learned. If at anytime you do something and do not take anything away from it then it was just a wasted opportunity to learn. The lesson could be from additional gear you may need or a better way to communicate something, maybe even just a idea on how to solve a small problem you didn’t anticipate. The point is to make every event a learning event and take something from it. The who thinks they know everything and nothing more can be learned is the least knowledgeable!
