HOPE WMN 2022 Round up
Hope WMN have been back with a bang in 2022; we’ve been busy at events, rides and working on projects behind the scenes to bring you plenty to get stuck into. Here’s a little summary of what we’ve been up to this year - rest assured we’re planning to get cracking with even more opportunities to join the fun next year.
Hopefully our summary will remind you of good times and whet your appetite for next year: We’d love to catch up with even more of you or hear your ideas for events or rides in 2023.
You may have noticed we’ve had a bit of a rebrand and relaunch this year, kicking off in March with a series of blogs from some of our sponsored riders, ambassadors and a fabulous Hope Factory Women’s ride meet up and ride.
Filled with excitement and enthusiasm from the March factory ride; we set about arranging 8 further rides at riding hotspots and events throughout the gloriously sunny summer.
We were mega stoked to ride with over 120 women on some classic trails across the country. Massive thank yous (and lovely to meet yous) to all the riders who got involved at Builth Wells, Gisburn, Barnoldswick, Llandegla, Swaledale, Calderdale, Ruthin and Calver.
Most recently we had a very chilly Pumptrack session at the Pendle Panthers’ pumptrack in Barrowford where 26 riders turned out despite the December cold, with all donations going to Pendle Panthers.
This year we trialled a small (£5) fee to join the rides, which we donated to local charities who maintain trails and help injured riders in the areas we visited, including Welsh Air Ambulance, Forest of Bowland MRT, Calderdale SRT, Ride Sheffield, Tweed Valley Trails Association, Ride for Charlie, Swaledale MRT.
Lots of our rides involved collaborations with friends from the bike world, huge thanks to our pals at Hope MTB Marathon, Oneplanet Llandegla, Juliana Bicycles, Singletrack Magazine & Cotic Women of Steel for helping us organise the fun and guide rides.
We’re planning a lot more rides for 2023, with the aim of 2 guided rides a month during British Summer Time – so keep an eye on our website for rides near you. If you have ideas for a collaboration or know a sweet riding spot that we haven’t tried yet, we want to hear from you! Please drop us a line and share your clever ideas.
Meanwhile our riders and ambassadors were out and about throughout the year, flying the Hope WMN flag and contributing awesome and inspiring stories over on our Hope WMN blog.
As if all the riding itself wasn’t enough; we’ve also been working with communities and events furthering women in mountain biking. This year we’ve provided financial support for the fabulous Steezy Collective, tackling the epic Lakeland 200 challenge and creating a gloriously inspiring film along the way. You can enjoy Part 1 here which was subsequently shown on the big screen at Kendal Mountain Film Festival this November. Part 2 is here.
We’ve also been along to women’s races and events including Gowaan Gals Festival, Limitlass MTB festival and Dirt Divas MTB and Gravel Festival laden down with raffle prizes, stickers and goodies as well (of course) as shiny Hope kit. Some of you may have heard Hope sponsored rider and all-round shredder Martha Gill in conversation at Tweedlove too.
It’s been great meeting so many of you at events and races this season and we hope to bump into more of you at more awesome women’s events in 2023. In addition to an increasingly packed womens MTB event calendar – we’re really excited to be joining forces with PMBA again this year to bring not one event, but a whole 3 round series in 2023! Check out the PMBA website for details of the races at Gisburn, Ae and Kirroughtree.
So, as the dust settles on an exciting and busy year at a re-invigorated Hope WMN HQ; we’d love to hear from you with ideas for rides, events, collaborations and adventures we really should know about in 2023. If you joined us for a ride or an event this year, thank you and high five for making each one a blast, and if you haven’t bumped into us and said hello at an event yet, let’s hope to rectify that next year!
Words: Rosie Holdsworth
