HUEX Gravel

HUEX takes its name from a simple idea, Huelva is Extreme, and its gravel weekend sets out to show how much of that province can be crossed by bike. It is run by Terraincognita, the events company behind races such as Sierra Nevada Límite, in collaboration with the provincial council, and everything starts and finishes at El Rompido, on the Costa de la Luz beside the marshes of the Río Piedras.

The two sides of the event have very different characters. The race is a fast, tactical day where speed and group riding count from the gun, heading inland over forest tracks, farm roads and quiet lanes into the Andévalo, through villages such as Villanueva de los Castillejos and San Silvestre de Guzmán. The ride is a self-supported navigation adventure with no closed roads or pacing groups, looping through much of the province: the dehesas of the Andévalo, the woods and whitewashed villages of the Sierra de Aracena, the ochre mining landscapes of Riotinto, and the Doñana marshes on the way back to the Atlantic.

The provincial council has also promoted the weekend as a way into Huelva's seafaring history, pointing to landmarks such as the Columbus monument and the Muelle de las Carabelas at Palos de la Frontera, the port Columbus sailed from in 1492. And the organisers' pre-event social ride drew a few dozen riders to El Rompido simply to share the trails, which says a lot about the community they are building.