Team InFocus - Arson

In 2016 Portugal was in grip of one of the worst droughts in its recent history. With high winds and average temperatures above 30 degrees ( 86 Fahrenheit) the country, unfortunately, provides the perfect target for heavy wildfires.
Until August last year nearly 116,000 hectares (286,600 acres) of forest, an area the size of 100,000 soccer fields, got burned.

Also the Algarve region, that is a famous tourist destination and provides some of Europe's best mountain bike trails, was hit by massive wildfires last year with almost 500 brave firefighters trying to secure the area.

What's worse about theses fires though is the fact that most of them are set on purpose by arsonists.

Ride Portugal, a company that builds some of the most stunning trails around, was another victim of these wildfires in September 2016. While three big fires were burning the landscape to the ground around the trails the police caught an arsonist that was just setting the fourth one!

Brian and his crew had to rework a lot of their trails to make them ridable again. The people of the Algarve area are more or less used to wildfires and face it with a positive attitude. After fire comes new life and the trials around Lagos now turned into an area of burned forest with fresh and lush flowers and greens spreading on the ground to claim back their habitat.

Team InFocus and Moment Pictures took a trip down to the Algarve to see and experience these trails first hand and all we can say is we were anything but disappointed. Thanks to Brian and crew for digging hard and creating such incredible trails for us to enjoy.