Knaresborough Bed Race 2023
June 2023
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On the second Saturday of June every year, the North Yorkshire town of Knaresborough is filled with celebration, cheers, and most importantly, a lot of fast moving beds.
The bed race is a significant event in the town's history, where as high as 90-odd teams compete in a racing competition through the town. The twist is that each running team is pushing a bed (not an actual bed mind you) with a member on board.
The event starts with every team gathering in the Knaresborough Castle grounds to prepare for the Best Dressed Bed competition, as the other main part of the event is decorating your bed however you want in relation to a given theme, that being 'That's Entertainment' for 2023. Once the winner is announced, the beds form a parade down the high-street that included a marching band, with the Best Dress Bed winner leading the other teams.
The parade ends at Conyngham Hall, where the teams will need to quickly strip the decorations off the bed and get prepared for the race, which takes them all around the town, ending with a swim through the River Nidd to end back at Conyngham Hall.
(Since I had other duties for the event, I was sadly only able to photograph the beds in the castle grounds before the parade.)
