Dirty Reiver 2018
In a somehow random way we've heared people discussing at other gravel events throughout the last few years: ”Have you been there already?” or “We’ve heared this,.. we’ve heared that...” - but above all we heared “You must simply ride it.” Curiosity killed the cat - but we survived the Reiver with a smile on our face.
During the time our curiosity for that event went sky high.. but the moment we received an email from the organisors, saying we could take over as main sponsor, it literally exploded. After confirming to present that event of which we simply heared only best things about, most of our teamriders and us immidiatly planned the trip to participate.
What’s the Dirty Reiver? In case you haven’t heared about it yet: it’s a perfectly organized 200km gravel challenge with between 3.500m and 4.000m of elevation (depending on your GPS it seems).
Participants traverse gravel forest access roads that service the vast areas of forest covering the border region of England and Scotland, and it takes them through remote areas providing outstanding viewpoints across this spectacular part of the UK.
The Dirt Reiver provides an incredible amount of best vibes among its riders on track. We stopped counting the amount of great chats we had and nice people we met. With having 1.000 registered starters in total it’s the biggest European event of its kind.
With having all kind of weathers during the past years - from thunderstorm to snowfall, from hail to burning sun, and sometimes even all of it during on day only - we were lucky for having the most ideal weather this year, full day sunshine - but still with more than 20° Celsius difference between the start in the morning and highest temperature sometime in the afternoon. The Kielder weather has a will of its own, even if the sun god is in its best shape, it seems not to have its full power in this area..
We are happy our main animal Stefan "Fish" Vis captured the event and our experience on film (click below to watch), if you like what you see: find out more about the event at https://www.dirtyreiver.co.uk
We'd be happy to ride with you at one of the future editions!
