Wild & Woolly event cancelled for 2023! Historic Boxing Day scramble loses venue

The famous and historic Wild & Woolly Boxing Day scramble, one of the world’s oldest off-road events, has been cancelled for 2023 due to difficulties securing a suitable venue. A staple of the festive season motorcycling scene since the 1920s and often characterised by deep mud, freezing weather and riders sometimes in fancy dress, the Northamptonshire event had been due to take place in Long Buckby on December 26th.

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The free-to-attend event usually attracts 100s of spectators who flock to the venue to see a wild, two-hours-plus-two-laps mud bath marathon which many riders fail to complete.

However, just a week before this year’s race organisers, the Northampton Motorcyclists Club (NMCC), issued a statement on social media that the 2023 event had been cancelled due to the planned venue no longer being available – but added it hoped the event can make a comeback in 2024.

The statement said: “It is with regret that we have to inform you all that there will be no Wild & Woolly 2023, due to our current venue at Long Buckby not being available to us this year. The landowner wants the track and parking areas for the sheep throughout the winter period and we have to respect that.”

The club added that another venue had been offered as an alternative but that its landowner wanted to know how many spectators would attend “so we don’t block up the village, access roads and make a mess of their land” and, as a free to attend event, the club felt it could not predict the answer.

The NMCC also said the possibility of running the event every two years to give the land a chance to recover was being discussed. “We are absolutely gutted as a club to not be able to run this year,” it added.