ABR Festival 2026 and a Weekend in the Bog of Doom
ABR Festival Delivers Another Unforgettable Weekend of Adventure For The Triple D Lads!
There are motorcycle shows, and then there's the Adventure Bike Rider (ABR) Festival. Set against the stunning backdrop of Ragley Hall, this year's event once again brought together thousands of adventure riders for a weekend that perfectly captured the spirit of life on two wheels. The days were packed with opportunities to test ride the latest adventure motorcycles, sharpen riding skills on dedicated TRF off-road trails along with the infamous 'Bog Of Doom' - which if truth be told, we spent most of our time in!!
Having a breather in the heatwave conditions.
It's easy to forget, wandering between the stands and stages, that the ABR Festival didn't start out anywhere near this polished. The whole thing traces back to 2009, when Alun Davies set up adventurebikerider.com as little more than a forum for riders who loved bikes, travel and talking nonsense. A couple of years later, an online argument about whose camping stove could boil a litre of water fastest ended the only way it could - with a group of forum members riding out to a campsite in Cumbria to settle it in person. That "First to the Boil" meet-up in 2011 was the first ABR Rally, and it kicked off a string of low-key gatherings around the UK that eventually grew into the ABR Midlands Rally, held for years in a farmer's field near Stratford-upon-Avon.
By 2018 the Midlands Rally had outgrown what could reasonably be called "a few mates in a field," and the first official ABR Festival was held at Seals Farm in Chacombe, capped at 500 riders with a handful of portaloos and a covers band on an uneven stage. Clearly there was an opportunity for something bigger.
The following year the festival moved to its current home, the 400-acre Ragley Hall estate in Warwickshire - seat of the Marquess and Marchioness of Hertford, with parkland laid out by Capability Brown - and attendance jumped to 2,000. Bar a Covid-enforced pause in 2020, it's grown every year since: 17,000 riders came through the gates in 2025, and this year that number climbed past 20,000.
Triple D Crew and their Mates line up for a trail photo.
There was an impressive selection of manufacturers and independent exhibitors displaying everything imaginable relating to adventure travel. With over 200 trade stands packed into the grounds and more than 27 manufacturers in attendance including KTM, Ducati, Honda, BMW, Royal Enfield and Suzuki, plus fast-growing names like Hero's Xpulse 200.
According to MCN, over 14,000 test rides were logged over the weekend, with queues forming early each morning. There was also a strong showing from KTM showing off the latest range of motorcycles and gear.
Parts Dom realises his back wheel is well and truly stuck but still manages to find some lift.
Away from the tarmac, the off-road side of the festival has become just as much of a draw. Over 50km of trails now wind through the estate: the TRF Trail for smaller trail bikes, the Bridgestone Trail for heavier adventure machines, and - the one every rider talks about afterwards - the REV'IT Bog of Doom. Only a handful of riders manage to get through it clean each year, and we can confirm from firsthand experience that most people spend a good deal longer in it than they planned to.
Team effort to extract Dom from the Bog of Doom!
Away from the trade stands we listened to tales of epic expeditions and exploration from some of the world's most inspiring motorcycle travellers, Richard Hammond, Charley Boorman and Lyndon Poskitt to name just a few.
The "Hamster" spent Saturday at the festival with a genuinely eclectic collection of his own bikes on display, including a Honda MTX50, a 1929 BMW R11, a 1946 Indian Chief, a 1978 Honda CB750, a Brough Superior and a Ducati 900SS - a fair snapshot of just how broad a life on two wheels can be.
Charley Boorman, still best known for Long Way Round and Long Way Down, appeared across both Friday and Saturday sharing stories from his travels. And on the Travellers' Tales Stage, Lyndon Poskitt talked through what might be the most ambitious trip of the lot: setting off in 2014 on a heavily modified KTM known as "Basil Bike," on which he spent five years and covered 234,000 miles across 74 countries, racing in an off-road event on every continent along the way.
Stepping away from the bikes, the festival came alive with live music, fantastic food and the biggest beer tent we have ever seen!!! The campsite was also buzzing with extracts of past adventures mixed with plans for the next great journey, with a few bonus tall stories thrown in! From first-time visitors right through to experienced riders who have travelled across continents to be there, the sense of community was impossible to miss.
More than just an exhibition, the ABR Festival continues to celebrate everything that makes adventure motorcycling special - friendship, camaraderie, exploration and the endless promise of the road ahead.
