www.bikemaps.co.uk

counterculture

i stumbled across this site by accident the other night, well worth a look,i bought the aviemore-strathspey set, worth a tenner, but it covers stacks of places around the UK, printed on waterproof paper too so you dont have to worry about it getting shredded when your out. the maps seem pretty good, obviously i wont know how accurate they are till i use them next week.

www.bikemaps.co.uk

The Northern Monkey

Skiddaw Summit - 17 km
The longest mountain bike descent in England! A surprisingly smooth, furiously fast freefall towards the chimney pots of Keswick. Unfortunately this also means the longest, most tedious uphill push in English mountain biking

Now that sounds like fun

OwenB

bigbenj_08 wrote:

Skiddaw Summit - 17 km
The longest mountain bike descent in England! A surprisingly smooth, furiously fast freefall towards the chimney pots of Keswick. Unfortunately this also means the longest, most tedious uphill push in English mountain biking

Now that sounds like fun

Video of the downhill here http://video.google.co.uk/videoplay?docid=-5458294551436128313

topsey_turvey

Skiddaw Summit - 17 km
The longest mountain bike descent in England! A surprisingly smooth, furiously fast freefall towards the chimney pots of Keswick. Unfortunately this also means the longest, most tedious uphill push in English mountain biking

Might disagree with that. Cross Fell to Garrigill is far longer than that. Skiddaw to Keswick is widley accepted as being 5 miles. Don't see where 17k comes from, unless they mean the journey up and down. Cross Fell-Garrigill is widely accepted to be 10 miles, one way. And you can ride most of the way to the top

sniper68

I was thinking along those lines.....but wherever you look/read The Skiddaw DH is always named as "The Longest Legal Mountain DH in England :?
Just run Cross Fell-Garrigill through Memory Map-11.6km(7.25miles)It IS longer than Skiddaw,however you can't actually summit Cross Fell as the last 950m is footpath only,whereas Skiddaw you can summit...hence the longest Mountain DH.

topsey_turvey

Even if you can't legally get to Cross Fell summit, there is a bridleway from Garrigill to Kirkland that goes over a shoulder just west of Greg's Hut. You can come down, legally from there. Besides, have you ever seen anyone at Greg's Hut worrying about going to the summit?

The Skiddaw descent is given the title of the longest, because most downhillers have no idea how to read a map, so will never find themselves anywhere Garrigill, never mind Cross Fell. To say this is not a mountain descent, because it doesn't start from the top is being an anorak in extremis

sniper68

Topsey Turvey wrote:

To say this is not a mountain descent, because it doesn't start from the top is being an anorak in extremis

I'm NOT saying that.....the books/mags/route websites etc are.I think they're saying Skiddaw is the longest from summit to bottom.Who decides on "the longest/best/easiest/hardest"?i don't know or what actual criteria they look for.
The Skiddaw DH might be the longest(according to "them")but its by no means the best/hardest/most technical IMO

Helvellyn is a far better ride 8)

chrisinleedsuk

ibbo68 wrote:

I was thinking along those lines.....but wherever you look/read The Skiddaw DH is always named as "The Longest Legal Mountain DH in England :?
Just run Cross Fell-Garrigill through Memory Map-11.6km(7.25miles)It IS longer than Skiddaw,however you can't actually summit Cross Fell as the last 950m is footpath only,whereas Skiddaw you can summit...hence the longest Mountain DH.

So from what I've read the descent line itself down Skiddaw is about 7-8km. Even if you included the 1km of footpath up to Cross Fell summit in your 11.6km that would make the descent 10.6km still making it the longest. That to me sounds awesome but is it good to ride? Might go take a look in a couple of weeks time...

sniper68

Holy Thread resurrection Batman :shock:

chrisinleedsuk

Ha ha, I was inspired after seeing 45 minute descents on Diaries Down Under.

DodgeT

Might be long, but looks pretty boring on that vid... Must admit I skipped a lot of it, but most I did see was just like fireroad??

snotty badger

It has been graded but is still fairly rough.

I went up early last year, the first part is a push but after that its ridable IIRC. Very fast decent, but littered with moving slalom gates (walkers) still manged high 30mphs and turned the the edge of my brake rotor spokes brown!