Weston Beach Race: 16-18 Oct, gates 7.30am, £30 a day

The Weston Beach Race returns to Weston-super-Mare on Friday 16, Saturday 17 and Sunday 18 October 2026. The organiser, RHL Activities, has the dates on its own event page and on its ticket platform, and Visit Weston carries the same three days. (RHL Activities, Visit Weston)

Updated 2 October: RHL now gives the gate time, 7.30am, confirms Friday is free to watch, and says its own on-site camping has sold out. Ticket prices are unchanged. Tickets will also be sold on the day, subject to availability. (RHL Activities, Weston Beach Race 2026, RHL ticket platform)

This is the 43rd running of the race, which RHL confirmed when it announced eight-time world champion Billy Bolt for the 2026 event. Bolt finished second on the sand in 2025. (RHL Activities)

Tickets and prices

RHL’s FAQ says spectators need a valid ticket for Saturday and Sunday, that Friday is free to watch the SXS class, and that “tickets will be available on the day, subject to availability”, though buying online is recommended. The same FAQ says the discounted family tickets are only sold online, so do not count on a family ticket at the gate. RHL has not published gate prices. (RHL Activities FAQ)

Prices below are taken from RHL’s own ticket platform, first on 5 September and rechecked unchanged on 2 October. A non-refundable administration fee of £3.50 applies per order, not per ticket, and is included in the total shown at checkout. (RHL ticket platform)

• Adult weekend (15 and over): £58
• Child weekend, ages 7 to 15: £13
• Family weekend, two adults and up to two children aged 7 to 15: £140
• Group weekend, four adults: £230
• Adult Saturday or Adult Sunday: £30 each
• Child Saturday or Child Sunday, ages 7 to 15: £7.50 each
• Grandstand upgrade, Saturday or Sunday: £15
• Grandstand, Friday: £5

Weekend, Saturday and Sunday tickets cover the public viewing areas and the event village. Note the age bands: an adult ticket starts at 15, and the child band starts at 7. RHL does not publish a price for under-7s.

The prices went up once already this year. RHL’s own notice said spectator ticket prices and rider entry fees rose at midnight on 31 July. (RHL Activities)

What happens on each day

Saturday and Sunday are the race days, and both are covered by the day tickets. Friday is the extra day the event has grown into: Visit Weston says meet-and-greet sessions return on the Friday along with free spectator access to the Friday SXS side-by-side class, and that the grandstands have been expanded to double capacity after demand in 2025. (Visit Weston)

The £5 Friday item on the ticket platform is a grandstand seat, not entry, which fits that description of free Friday access.

RHL’s event page gives the gate time: gates open at 7.30am, at Marine Parade, BS23 1AL (what3words ///fault.strict.hears). It has set up a timetable page, but on 2 October that page was still empty, so there is no race-by-race schedule yet. RHL says the tide shapes the schedule and the circuit, which is why the running order comes late. (RHL Activities, RHL timetable page)

Away from the track, RHL lists trade stands, food and drink, kids’ activities, a big screen with commentary, and a fanzone show in which Danny Butler’s trials team takes on his own extreme mountain bike crew. Dogs are allowed on a lead.

Parking, and what it costs

There are three options with published prices, and they are not the same price.

• On the beach. Parking on the sand is run by North Somerset Council at £12 per day per vehicle, card and cash accepted, available to riders and spectators, and bought on the day rather than pre-booked.
• Weston-super-Mare Cricket Club, BS23 4NY, is RHL’s official off-site parking partner, from £11 per day, for cars, sprinters and transporter-size vehicles, a 10 to 15 minute walk from the seafront, and pre-bookable.
• Blue Badge holders: disabled parking is on Marine Parade Road, close to the event and the main seafront areas. Spaces are limited, allocated first come first served, and a valid Blue Badge must be displayed.

(RHL Activities, Parking for the Beach Race)

If those fill, the town’s ordinary car parks are the fallback. Tariffs and locations for all 45 of them are in our guide to parking in North Somerset.

Camping

RHL says its own on-site camping is sold out, and that its partner Riverside Holiday Village still had pitches when the FAQ was last updated. It names three options on its camping page.

• Riverside Holiday Village, the official camping partner, a five-minute drive from the beach, from £80 per night, pitches 7m x 10m or 9m x 17m with electric, arriving Friday 16 and departing Monday 19 October.
• Weston-super-Mare Golf Club, £180 per pitch, plus £10 per adult wristband, with under-10s free.
• Unity Beach, Brean, TA8 2QY, caravans, lodges and touring pitches across the bay; RHL gives no price.

(RHL Activities, 2026 camping)

Getting there and getting out

The race pulls thousands of vehicles onto a seafront that has one main approach. North Somerset Council has not published a traffic order for the 2026 event, so there is no confirmed list of road closures yet. Check the live picture before you set off: our roadworks and travel page tracks what is closed across the district.

One practical warning that has nothing to do with the race. This is a tidal beach with soft sand and mud, and cars that leave the marked parking area get stuck in it every year. Park where you are marshalled to park.

This page

Written on 5 September 2026 from the organiser’s own pages and rechecked on 2 October, when the 7.30am gate time, the Friday and on-the-day ticket details and the camping changes were added. The race timetable and any road closures are still to come, and this page will be updated when they are.