At that price, why not just buy a hardtail? I’m not a fan of gravel bikes. I did my time on rigid mountain bikes and I wouldn’t go back for love nor money. A couple of rides on different old railbeds in my area have just reinforced my choice in my eyes. On one of them, there was a very rocky bit for about 200 meters. I had ridden down it earlier and was returning via the same route. When I went through it, I did it about around 15mph. As I was coming back up to it there were a couple of gravel bikiers that were slowly picking their way through the rocks as close to track stand pace. I was faster going through it up hill.

On another railbed, I was at the top of a pass when a couple of people on gravel bikes went by. I was taking pictures (see the Bike pic mission thread) and headed down the hill about 15 minutes after they passed. I caught them at about 4 miles. They had to be traveling at about 16 mph to get that far in that amount of time. I was traveling at almost twice their speed on a smoothish road with lots of washboards. My suspension (front and rear) was working hard and I’m pretty sure from past experience that they arms and legs were really tired (I’ve been down this road many times on a rigid mountain bike). I even got to pass a car later on.

I’ll sacrifice a bit of speed on pavement...I’ve done lots of rides with a mountain bike on pavement...for more utility off-road.