Today was the Knaresborough Bed Race. We haven't attended in the past, but made our way there today to enjoy the festivities with some friends from Arkansas that live here in Harrogate. Some info on the bed race below.
The Great Knaresborough Bed Race is something different: it is part fancy dress pageant and part gruelling time trial over a 2.4 mile course, ending with a swim through the icy waters of the River Nidd.
First staged in 1966, Bed Race has spawned other similar events in the USA, Germany, New Zealand and elsewhere in the UK. It is great fun, an amazing spectacle and, being held in Yorkshire, a truly serious competitive effort, pitting teams against their fiercest rivals, their erstwhile friends or even against themselves. Whatever happens, it is never good enough and each vows to be back to do better next year!
The event was born out of the enthusiasm of the newly-formed Knaresborough Round Table in 1966, an organisation looking for a major charity fund-raising push. They came up with the idea of a time-trial in which teams would follow a pre-determined course pushing beds around the town.
It could have been a chariot race, a tug-o-war, a raft race on the river, a soap box derby or any of a hundred other ideas. But they plumped for a bed race, and somehow that unique combination with Knaresborough's almost perpendicular climbs and cobbled streets, the swim across the Nidd and the fancy dress pageant have worked together to make this such a huge and successful community event.
Due to falling membership, the Round Table cast around for another organisation to help and the Knaresborough Lions Club became joint-arrangers in 1993, taking over the whole event from 1998. Like their predecessors, the Lions are a bunch of volunteers who stage the event for charity. Funds are raised by the Lions, by the teams themselves for their own good causes and by other charities who get involved on the day. It is thought that the total raised is between £80,000 and £100,000.
The Great Knaresborough Bed Race is something different: it is part fancy dress pageant and part gruelling time trial over a 2.4 mile course, ending with a swim through the icy waters of the River Nidd.
First staged in 1966, Bed Race has spawned other similar events in the USA, Germany, New Zealand and elsewhere in the UK. It is great fun, an amazing spectacle and, being held in Yorkshire, a truly serious competitive effort, pitting teams against their fiercest rivals, their erstwhile friends or even against themselves. Whatever happens, it is never good enough and each vows to be back to do better next year!
The event was born out of the enthusiasm of the newly-formed Knaresborough Round Table in 1966, an organisation looking for a major charity fund-raising push. They came up with the idea of a time-trial in which teams would follow a pre-determined course pushing beds around the town.
It could have been a chariot race, a tug-o-war, a raft race on the river, a soap box derby or any of a hundred other ideas. But they plumped for a bed race, and somehow that unique combination with Knaresborough's almost perpendicular climbs and cobbled streets, the swim across the Nidd and the fancy dress pageant have worked together to make this such a huge and successful community event.
Due to falling membership, the Round Table cast around for another organisation to help and the Knaresborough Lions Club became joint-arrangers in 1993, taking over the whole event from 1998. Like their predecessors, the Lions are a bunch of volunteers who stage the event for charity. Funds are raised by the Lions, by the teams themselves for their own good causes and by other charities who get involved on the day. It is thought that the total raised is between £80,000 and £100,000.
Oh my goodness, I don't see how that many people could have gotten through Knaresborough.. What a crowd. Such a fun event and the river swim would have had to been chilly. Looked like a great day for it and all seemed to be having fun. Loved the beds.
ReplyDeleteLove,
Mom & Pop