Originally Posted by
pbass
What kind of pedals does it have? If it came with those plastic sort of "temporary" pedals, that's something I'd swap out right away even if you're not sure yet if you want to stick with flats or try clipless(whatever works for you--plenty of people, myself included, prefer flat mountain bike-style pedals on gravel bikes, but clipless certainly has it's appeal as well - neither is "better" than the other, it's personal preference).
If you take that rig out on any remotely rough stuff you're gonna want more grip than those cheapo stock pedals provide, IMHO. I just got some Kona Wah Wahs--the composite/plastic ones--for my son's bike and they're great bang for buck at $60. Plenty of grippy pins, and light. At least your feet won't be slipping around while you get used to riding this beast.
Other than that, tubeless FTW - no reason to wait on that.
**Update**
I wanted to close the loop on this, but also let people know about a shoe I found. I ended up getting the Shimano 540 pedals (they were out of the A60s). Then the woman at the shop showed me a Shimano shoe for about $120 but when she looked for it, they were sold out of that model. Then she showed me the Shimano XC7 which were about $220. I appreciated her recommending the lesser-priced shoe first, also I was sure about the plastic looking cable on the XC7. But I really like the micro adjust mechanism on these shoes, it's easy to adjust on the fly.
I didn't want to spend $320 that day but there you have it.