The Guidax Gravel Festival first arrived on the gravel scene in 2022 and wowed participants with a combination of spectacular scenery, challenging racing and a great festival vibe. Back for 2024 with a new name – the Utopia Gravel Festival, the event promised to be bigger and better than ever before. Jorge Padrones fitted a race number to his handlebars and headed to Spain’s Gorafe Desert to join in the fun.
“/yuˈtoʊpiə/ Utopia [countable, uncountable] An imaginary place or state in which everything is perfect. From the title of a book published in 1516 by Sir Thomas More, which describes a place like this.”
Undoubtedly, the organisers could not have chosen a better name for this event. It matched perfectly with what we experienced on the weekend, the only thing not matching with the definition is the “imaginary” part, as this event was real, although it happened in one of the most surreal places you can find on earth - the Gorafe Desert.
We all have in our minds our concept of perfect gravel riding - an image defining it or an image that evokes that gravel feeling. The Gorafe Desert is one of those places that brings to you the iconic image of gravel and adventure with its badlands and lunar landscapes, a utopic playground for gravelling.
It’s not only badlands and desert that we have crossed during this event. As the starting point was the town of Baza, we also had the opportunity to cross some mountains and enjoy an alpine landscape with beautiful forests, then some transitional terrain before we got to the desert. From that point onwards until you crossed the desert, the views were stunningly unreal and no matter where you looked, it seemed as though you were on a different planet. It was a real privilege to gravel ride in this area.
As the Utopia Gravel event was a festival, it was much more than 'just' a race, it was a compendium of activities and for a change, not only the on-bike events, but also some of them away from the bikes, that helped to create some bonds and community around the event.
The weekend started on Friday with a hill climb challenge up one of the iconic hills around Baza. The route climbed a hill where David Valero, a native from Baza and MTB bronze medal winner at the Tokyo Olympics (who was also participating in this event) trains every day. The three km of uphill were hard and long if you did not pace yourself, but the views at the top over all of the Granada Geopark and the snowcapped Sierra Nevada mountains beyond made up for the pain. Also worthwhile was the ride to the hill climb and back, which we all made as a group and where we took the opportunity to chat with riders that we already knew and to meet new people too.
After the hill climb challenge, there was the registration and rider presentation while we shared some drinks and celebrated the podium finishers of the hill climb challenge. The main course was on Saturday with the Gorafe Epic, a race which covered 165 km and included 3000 meters of climbing. There were also 110 and 55 km routes for those who preferred a shorter experience, but even these courses were enough to get a taste of the local region.
The Gorafe Epic is a proper race. It's part of the Gravel Earth Series, so the level of participants was very high. Although the morning was cloudy and cool, in the end, it did not rain a lot nor was it too cold and it just kept at a nice temperature for bike riding. If we had experienced the opposite, to have a solid sun for hours in the desert, it would have been a very different experience!
It was a hard course, but it was compensated by the beauty and surrealist nature of the landscape that helped inspire you to keep pedalling. As a curiosity and a bonus, at one point the course even crossed over an old and abandoned iron bridge designed by Gustav Eiffel!
A well-stuffed buffet with food, drinks, sweets and coffee was awaiting us after our long hours in the saddle. It took seven hours for me, but only 6.37 for Carolin Schiff, the Elite Women’s winner and 5.30 for Mattia De Marchi, the Elite Men’s winner of this race. We all deserved a good recovery session to help replenish our power, as the weekend was not over yet.
In the evening after the prize ceremony, we could enjoy some live music while we chatted with other riders and talked about the day’s ride. It’s always very nice to socialise at these type of events as it helps to create a sense of community - especially for those people like me, who tend to think that gravelling is something more than just racing bikes.
Sunday was the day for a planned Social Ride - an easy 35 km ride to some natural hot springs that are found in the area. The more intrepid members of the group enjoyed a warm swim and then we all went back to Baza to conclude a fantastic and Utopic weekend in which we met old and new friends, had some great experiences and rode our bikes in some of the most unique landscapes and terrain on planet earth.
Images courtesy of Utopia Gravel Festival