GRAVEL ( AND CHALLENGE SECTIONS ) The forestry gravel roads were a highlight for everyone who rode them . These are bits of private forest you just can ’ t get into , but thanks to Sean Clarke at Forest Trail Events , the gravel riders rode the cream of them . Those who took on Sean ’ s Challenge sections spent considerably longer in there ... These Challenge sections were a bit of a step up from last year , with everything from open , freshly planted forest winding around the saplings to slippery water crossings and a MX track . Every year riders are told that only those with knobbly tyres can do these harder Challenge sections . There ’ s a reason for this ... they ’ re hard . There ’ s even a list of acceptable tyre options . One GS rider on 70 / 30 road / offroad tyres found out the hard way about tyre choice in the first Challenge section ... he opted not to go into any after that . He did get a prize on the Saturday night to commemorate his faux-pas . To be fair , it wasn ’ t just riders with a poor tyre choice who fell foul of the first section , one of our marshals showed his roly-poly skills in front of the camera ( it happens to us all , Chris ). A water-splash in the second Challenge section proved the perfect spot to capture some overexuberant riders . A word of advice ... if you see a photographer near a trail ‘ feature ’, they ’ re there for a reason - and it ’ s probably not to make you look good ( looking at you , Ian ...). Out of the water-splash , there was some gorgeous single-track heading up a treetunnelled ridge , which got slipperier as more wet tyres went over it . At this point a herd of charging Rhinos ( BMW ’ s R-series GS models ) came through with their brave riders . These trails can be tricky on smaller bikes , let alone on a Big GS , so hats off to Hunia , Brad and David for piloting their R1200GS ’ through this incredibly slippery section . I figured I could do worse than follow this spectacular herd of Rhino for the rest of the Rallye , like a motorised wildlife safari . New for 2024 was the opportunity to ride at Ben Townley ’ s Pukemara Dirt World . This is a huge facility with a wide , flowing motocross track winding its way for over 20km around the hills north of Benny Bee ’ s near Rainbow
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