Wow… BikeFest 2026. What a day. 

Firstly, from the bottom of our hearts, thank you.

Octa Ride has always been about one thing: community. BikeFest simply wouldn’t exist without the incredible support of our family, friends, volunteers, exhibitors, sponsors, bands, entertainers, charities and, most importantly, every single person who bought a ticket and came along to support us.

It takes months of planning and an unbelievable amount of work behind the scenes to bring an event like this together, and seeing thousands of people enjoying the day made every late night worthwhile.

Most importantly, together we’ve raised money for an incredible cause, the East Anglian Air Ambulance. We’re still finalising a handful of vendor figures and event costs before we can confirm the final donation amount, but we’ll announce it as soon as everything has been reconciled. We know many of you are keen to find out, and we’re excited to share it with you.

Food & Queues

We also want to address the biggest piece of feedback we received: the food queues.

In the interest of complete transparency, the catering at the event was organised exclusively by the venue, not by Octa Ride. As part of hosting BikeFest there, all food catering had to be supplied by the venue, despite us requesting permission to bring in additional independent food vendors.

We shared our expected attendance figures well in advance and were assured the catering arrangements would be sufficient. Unfortunately, demand exceeded what was available on the day, resulting in queues and wait times that many of you experienced.

We’re naturally disappointed by this, as it was by far the most common criticism of an otherwise fantastic day. Please know we’ve listened. When BikeFest returns in 2027, as we fully intend it to, we’ll be making it a priority to secure a venue or arrangement that allows us to bring in multiple food vendors, giving everyone more choice and dramatically reducing waiting times.

The FMX Show

We also wanted to explain what happened with the freestyle motocross display.

The show was booked and advertised as featuring two riders. Unfortunately, we weren’t informed until around 6pm the evening before the event that one of the riders was no longer available.

During the remaining rider’s practice session, he unfortunately landed heavily after overshooting the landing ramp and injured both ankles. Following the incident, it was the rider’s decision to cancel the performances rather than continue while injured. We know many people were looking forward to the FMX display, and we’re just as disappointed as you were that it couldn’t go ahead. We wish Bob a full and speedy recovery.

 Looking Ahead

For only our second BikeFest, we’re incredibly proud of what was achieved. The atmosphere throughout the day was amazing, the feedback outside of the food queues was overwhelmingly positive, and seeing the biking community come together to support such an important charity reminded us exactly why we started this event. No event is ever perfect. We take every comment, suggestion and piece of feedback seriously, and we’ll use everything we’ve learned to make BikeFest 2027 even bigger, better and smoother.

Thank you once again to everyone who attended, exhibited, sponsored, performed, volunteered and supported us.

We’ll see you again soon. 

Joe & Ellis