The Dirt(y) Double – Gravel Racing: The Dirty Reiver and North London Dirt Contributed By Team Parcours Member Steve Turner
When we think about gravel riding we perhaps think, away from the roads and into the remoteness of the countryside, which is true and The Dirty Reiver ticks all these boxes. However, you don’t think of gravel riding in London...
“In Northumberland, gravel is everywhere. London hides it.”
Steve Turner one of our 2026 Parcours Ambassadors took on the Dirty Double – taking on The Dirty Reiver, In Northumberland, and then just a few days later the North London Dirt.
“If Dirty Reiver is defined by remoteness, North London Dirt is defined by contrast.”
Steve embraces outdoor riding all year round, and talks through what keeps him going, and then tackling these two contrasting gravel races. He also talks about the confidence he’s gained through his bike equipment, and why, and also the strong community he’s built through meeting people at races over the years.
Riding and training over winter is always tough, both for the bike and myself, especially as I don’t have a turbo to train on at home. I get out on the bike when I can, regardless of the weather. I think of it as prep; I won’t get to choose the weather on event day, so training in the unknown has some benefit. What keeps me going on the bike and heading to the gym is the thought of the season ahead, which for me really starts with heading to Kielder Forest in Northumberland for Dirty Reiver each April.
The Dirty Revier
Dirty Reiver was the first big gravel event I took part in. Having started riding as a lockdown cyclist, I’m one of the ones who stuck with it, and in 2022 headed north with a ticket snagged at the last minute from the wait list.
I’ve been back every year since, partly because it’s an incredible place to ride a gravel bike, but mostly because of the people I’ve met there. This year was the best yet. Focal Events, the team behind Dirty Reiver, were celebrating ten years of the event, and I’d arranged to meet up with friends made there and at other rides over the years.
Although I’m now based in Kent, I grew up in a village at the foot of the Pennines, and there’s something about Kielder that takes me straight back there and feels instantly familiar. The weather, the openness and the ruggedness of the landscape all feel connected to the terrain I grew up around. Kielder Forest itself feels almost exaggerated when you ride through it for the first time. Gravel roads stretch endlessly through the forest, disappearing into the distance as if they were built specifically for bikes. Turn almost any corner and there’s another perfect gravel track waiting for you and you can feel properly away from things while riding.
I love the history in the landscape too. Long before gravel bikes and aid stations, these borderlands were part of the Reiver Marches, contested frontier country between England and Scotland. The Border Reivers moved through these valleys centuries ago, using the same terrain for raids, smuggling, and survival. It’s hard not to think about that while riding through the forests now. The name Dirty Reiver suddenly feels very fitting and riding there feels like you are part adventurer, part explorer.
This year was also a little different for me as it would be the first time in a few years I would be riding my own bike. In 2024 I rode a loan bike from Reilly Cycleworks. It was great, and after trying a few different models, wheels and drivetrains across that year, I ordered a Reflex. It wasn’t ready in time for Dirty Reiver, so they lent me one final bike, a Reflex set up with Parcours Wheels FKTs on a SRAM mullet setup.
The bike was amazing, in no small part thanks to the wheels.
Joining Team Parcours for this season meant that I was back in Kielder on my own Reflex, again rolling on FKTs. The only difference was that this time I’d been able to spec the rest of the bike exactly how I wanted it. For me, it was perfection, and the FKTs are easily the best gravel wheels I’ve ridden.
While they are fast, it’s not just about the speed, but how confident they feel. They hold their line incredibly well, especially on fast gravel descents which I love to ride and rougher corners where you’re constantly balancing grip and momentum. I found myself naturally carrying more speed into corners rather than scrubbing it off beforehand, and over time that really adds up.
That confidence has changed how I ride the bike and over the last few months I’ve ended up hitting PBs on sections I ride regularly and even picked up a few KOMs along the way. Not because the wheels suddenly made me stronger, but because they’ve made the bike feel more predictable underneath me, especially when the terrain gets rough. To me that feeling matters more than outright speed figures ever will, especially over longer distances. 
The Orange Collective
Dirty Reiver also ended up shaping far more than just my riding calendar as I first met my now close friend Ash there, staffing the POC tent.
Later, our paths crossed again at North London Dirt, where I shared my plans for the year ahead and realised our paths would continue to cross. Alongside the old Safety In Numbers rides, those events planted the seeds for the Orange Collective, a group we now run which sees us riding at many of the larger gravel events as well as hosting our own rides while looking out for others, enjoying being outside with like-minded people, chatting nonsense at feed stops, and ending the day sharing stories.
Looking back, those rides showed me what cycling could be when it focused less on exclusivity and results, and more on shared experiences and making people feel welcome, something I try to pay forwards.
Back to this year, and a few weeks after Dirty Reiver, I found myself at the start of another regular feature on my calendar, North London Dirt.
North London Dirt
“If Dirty Reiver is defined by remoteness, North London Dirt is defined by contrast.”
The ride starts at St Mary’s Church in Stoke Newington, surrounded by cafés, traffic, and the noise of the city already fully awake.
I work in London, so normally my experience of it, is offices, trains, and busy streets. North London Dirt reveals a completely different side of the city. A start line in a tiny London churchyard rather than the open castle grounds of Kielder.
“In Northumberland, gravel is everywhere. London hides it.”
Threading together canal paths, alleyways, parks, industrial estates, and forgotten strips of off-road riding, North London Dirt follows a route that feels almost secret. You weave through tarmac and man-made geography, searching for gaps in the city, slowly escaping further into the countryside before eventually looping back again and feeling the city build back around you. There is also history here too, as these are the paths created by people over hundreds of years to get in and out of the city, before the trains, cars, tunnels, and bypasses; these were ridden and walked for hundreds of years by those who needed to get somewhere.
“Dirty Reiver starts in the wilderness. North London Dirt slowly unravels a city layer by layer, and despite how different they are, both rides leave me with exactly the same feeling.”
Both are built around shared experience. The conversations while getting ready, the smiles while rolling along, checking in and regrouping at junctions, helping each other through mechanicals, stopping for food, and laughing through the difficult moments. That’s the real reason I keep going back.
Not just the riding, but the people.
“Both rides also end exactly as they should: dusty bikes leaned against a wall somewhere, pizza and beer in hand, conversations already drifting towards the next adventure before the current one has even finished.”
Looking forward…
That, more than anything else, is what gravel riding has become for me, and the rest of my season has plenty more of it still to come. Next up is Frontier 300, a 300 km coast-to-coast gravel ride across the border of England and Scotland. Stone Circle, 220 km of gravel passing Stonehenge at sunrise just after the summer solstice, and in August, I’ll be leading a group around the Cantii Way, a three-day 240 km bike-packing route around the Kent coast that we’ll be completing in a single day and swapping pizza for fish and chips.
