The largest action sport festival in the South
The Festival
The largest action sport festival in the South. It's a celebration of adventure, the outdoors, rad humans, and rad music.
We built this festival to unite and celebrate extreme sports and use it as a catalyst to promote environmental action.
How It Started
The River Games didn't start as a festival. It started as a movement.
Founder Travis Sims built The Cliff Cruise — a waterway-cleanup movement that uses extreme sports as a catalyst for environmental action — and Extreme Vertigo Events, his production company. Those two forces landed in Chattanooga and, in 2024, became the Chattanooga River Games: a city-partnered festival where the competition, the music, and the cleanup are all the same event.
The City is a co-author of this thing, not a backdrop. The Games run in partnership with Chattanooga Parks & Outdoors, Outdoor Chattanooga, and the Chattanooga Tourism Co.
The Team
Travis Sims — Founder & CEO
Travis is the heart, the passion, and the party behind the Chattanooga River Games.
A pro cliff diver of 10+ years, Travis started at Casa Bonita in Denver before founding Extreme Vertigo Events and The Cliff Cruise — a waterway-cleanup movement that uses extreme sports as a catalyst for environmental action.
Kayleigh Perez — Project Manager
Kayleigh keeps the River Games running. She manages the operations, vendor coordination, and the thousand moving parts that make three days on the Tennessee actually happen.
Why Chattanooga
Chattanooga is one of the most underrated outdoor cities in the country — a place built on the river, shaped by the mountains, and powered by a community that actually shows up for adventure.
The Tennessee River runs right through downtown. Ross's Landing sits at the heart of it. When Travis was building the River Games, the location wasn't just convenient — it was essential. The river isn't the backdrop. It's the whole point.
Chattanooga has the bones for this. It's a city where you can mountain bike before breakfast, kayak at lunch, and catch a world-class act at sunset — all within a few miles of downtown. It has an outdoor culture that's real, not manufactured, and a community that was ready for exactly this kind of festival before anyone even asked.
The City of Chattanooga became a partner from day one. Chattanooga Parks & Outdoors, Outdoor Chattanooga, and the Chattanooga Tourism Co. didn't just show up on a sponsor wall — they helped build the thing. That kind of partnership doesn't happen just anywhere. It happens in a city that already gets it.
Ross's Landing isn't just a venue. It's the center of everything Chattanooga stands for: the river, the mountains in the distance, and a downtown that chose adventure over sprawl. When you're watching a 65-foot high dive with the Tennessee River behind it and the Walnut Street Bridge in the frame, you'll understand why this festival couldn't exist anywhere else.