Are gravel bikes heavy now? From what I remember (admittedly 10 years ago) "gravel" bikes were pretty much cyclocross bikes to begin with just with slick tires.
I sold my fancy lightweight cyclocross bike around this time and built myself a fully custom bike with a hodgepodge of parts - I wanted something that looked a bit vintage cool and also not as stealable so I went with the pinnacle of late 1980s touring frames (steel) which is obviously not light but not all that heavy either. Bought lightweight 29er rims + 35C quality touring tires, wide flared dirt drop bars, nice 9sp bar end shifters with a triple crank up front (9sp being my favourite in that you can still friction shift it easily if needed and the bar ends can easily switch from indexed to friction at the flick of a switch). The thing absolutely flys on gravel, pavement, dirt roads, shitty sidewalks - basically is my do everything bike for general use from groceries to exercise.
Yeah that sounds about right. Probably people are doing these races on what they already have (fat bikes and mountain bikes) which are obviously not ideal at all. A gravel race shouldnt have any drops or major obstructions so why would you ever want shocks and whatnot?
My opinion is that general use "road" bicycles peaked in the late 1980s and everything we have now are just modern re-inventions of that. A touring bicycle is basically just a gravel bike and also the ideal commuter, grocery getter, and fire road bike. With some "sport touring" bikes being criminally underrated (and also some being more just cheaper road bikes)
Mountain bikes on the other hand have improved tremendously and of course any bike designed for racing (road, cyclocross, etc) has as well.
I sold my fancy lightweight cyclocross bike around this time and built myself a fully custom bike with a hodgepodge of parts - I wanted something that looked a bit vintage cool and also not as stealable so I went with the pinnacle of late 1980s touring frames (steel) which is obviously not light but not all that heavy either. Bought lightweight 29er rims + 35C quality touring tires, wide flared dirt drop bars, nice 9sp bar end shifters with a triple crank up front (9sp being my favourite in that you can still friction shift it easily if needed and the bar ends can easily switch from indexed to friction at the flick of a switch). The thing absolutely flys on gravel, pavement, dirt roads, shitty sidewalks - basically is my do everything bike for general use from groceries to exercise.