Between them, Harry Tanfield and Sophie Wright had ridden one gravel race earlier than signing as much as their newest enterprise, however the former WorldTour duo are actually set to participate in much more, as a part of Ribble’s new gravel crew.
Launched at the moment, Ribble Outliers is a six-rider crew made up of seasoned gravel execs and WorldTour novices. The squad will compete within the calendar’s greatest occasions, together with the UCI Gravel Sequence and the Life Time Grand Prix sequence, which counts the marquee Unbound Gravel.
All six riders – Tanfield, Wright, Metheven Bond, Hayley Simmonds, Ben Thomas and Jenson Younger – had been current at a launch occasion in London on Thursday night, the place they chatted with sponsors and ate margherita pizza, a stone’s throw from Buckingham Palace.
“I got here on board in December,” Wright, a former Fenix-Deceuninck street professional, advised Biking Weekly. Between her and Tanfield, it was the 25-year-old who boasted the one gravel race on her palmarès, an eighth-place end on a borrowed bike at an occasion in Girona, Spain final September. Round that point, she defined, she was planning to signal with one other crew, earlier than the concept of Ribble Outliers was put to her.
“It simply sounded actually interesting, and I signed the contract. The whole lot occurred actually quick and easily,” Wright stated. “I’ve carried out six years on the WorldTour and it’s positively going to be completely different. In street racing, you’re working collectively as a crew. Gravel is particular person racing, and that’s form of how I began racing years and years in the past, with cyclo-cross and mountain bike.
“Now, I simply really feel like I’m prepared for a change. I need to attempt one thing fairly completely different, and likewise return to my off-road roots.”
(Picture credit score: Ribble)
Tanfield’s dedication to the crew has steadied a interval of instability for the previous WorldTour professional. After his earlier street crew, Saint Piran, folded on the finish of final yr, the 30-year-old scrambled to place collectively his squad, a bid that left him feeling “burnt out”.
The newest race content material, interviews, options, evaluations and professional shopping for guides, direct to your inbox!
“I used to be nonetheless eager to race, clearly,” he stated. “At that second, I used to be considering, ‘That is killing me [trying to start a team]’. I had the choice to begin one thing recent, and that possibility was Ribble.”
How a lot expertise does Tanfield have of gravel racing? “Zero,” he grinned, wearing a fresh-out-the-packet Ribble Outliers t-shirt. “I’ve at all times beloved doing street races with gravel in them, and I assumed, ‘Effectively, why not? Why not truly give it a attempt to see what it’s all about?’
“I’ve heard that for the Gralloch, you need to line up like one hour earlier than the race – and it begins at a ridiculously early time as it’s – and then you definately go down this actually small monitor, after which everybody’s preventing for place for this 20-minute berg or one thing like that. It’s going to be wild.”
Ribble Outliers will race this yr on unreleased carbon gravel bikes from Ribble. One of many prototype fashions was on show on the launch occasion, though the riders don’t anticipate to obtain their bikes earlier than Might. Till then, they are going to compete on Ribble’s present, off-the-shelf gravel machines.
The crew’s first race will come subsequent Sunday at Turnhout Gravel, a UCI Gravel Sequence occasion in Belgium. “It’s going to be attention-grabbing,” stated Tanfield excitedly. “We’re definitely going to be getting some appears to be like in all of the pink. We are able to’t actually cover anyway.”
It’s that garish package that the riders got here to choose up in London, a brightly-coloured uniform for his or her latest journey.
“I turned up with a humongous suitcase,” stated Wright, primed for the swag. “I’ve received a Tesco service bag,” Tanfield laughed. “I couldn’t be bothered carrying the suitcase round, and I’m doing two flights tomorrow. It was a fortune to verify it in. I’m simply going to ship it to Belgium.”
Ribble Outliers’ full 2025 programme could be discovered on the crew’s web site.
