Europeans take the GS Trophy

The 2014 GS Trophy is a wrap, with Team Central and Eastern Europe winning the event.

The GS Trophy is a skills competition run by BMW, pitting big-bike adventure riders from around the globe against each other, showing their off-road prowess and other skills on their Beemers. This year’s event ran in the Canadian Rockies, with teams coming from as far away as Japan, Italy, Brazil and other far-flung corners of the world.

The event lasted seven days in total, coming to an end yesterday (Sept. 14). Riders covering 2,300 kilometres of riding and doing 20 special stages.

The winning team from Europe (known as CEEU, comprised of Wojciech Zambrzycki, Maciej Gryczewski and Karel Rahcek) led from Day 1, not leaving a whole lot of doubt through the competition as to who would come out on top. Their end total was 276 points; the second-place team from South Africa had 227 points and the third-place team from France had 198 points.

The top 10 was rounded out by Argentina (182), USA (174), Alps (160), Russia (158), Latin America, (158), Canada (153) and UK (142).

While the hometown team may have finished ninth, it sounds as if the Canadian location was a success, at least. BMW’s marketing gurus said the scenery and riding territory were amazing this year. Of course, the location changes every event (the next one is in 2016), so don’t expect to see the big Beemers back in the Rockies any time soon.