Red/Blue/Black Runs - Can someone please explain

npowell28

Hi everyone. I'm sure i sound thick here, but what are red runs, blue runs and black runs. I'm guessing its a way of grading the difficulty of a track, but what does each mean exactly. I've had a google but couldn't find an explaination.

Thanks

Airienteer

Yeh they are a grading of difficulty. Green is the easiest, followed by blue, red and then black.

rhysduk

Have a look here.
That should settle any questions, not that you shouldnt post questions of course
Rhys

dave_hill

Airienteer wrote:

Yeh they are a grading of difficulty. Green is the easiest, followed by blue, red and then black.

But don't assume that all trail centres use the same criteria for grading - for example, I find that so-called black runs in the Welsh centres are a lot easier to live with than the blacks at some of the 7 Stanes centres.

Problem is there's no standard by which to judge, so each organisation takes its own advice.

Also don't forget that occasionally you'll come across the odd double-black section (speaks for itself) and there are also some orange-graded or "bike park" trails in the Scottish 7 Stanes centres. These usually have a high proportion of woodwork, jumps and so-on (a good example is the Dark Side trail at Mabie in Southern Scotland - this is nearly 4km long and it's all on boardwalks. It's never more than 1m off the ground but in width it ranges from 1m wide down to about 100mm!

cee

dave_hill wrote:

Airienteer wrote:

Yeh they are a grading of difficulty. Green is the easiest, followed by blue, red and then black.

But don't assume that all trail centres use the same criteria for grading - for example, I find that so-called black runs in the Welsh centres are a lot easier to live with than the blacks at some of the 7 Stanes centres.

Problem is there's no standard by which to judge, so each organisation takes its own advice.

Also don't forget that occasionally you'll come across the odd double-black section (speaks for itself) and there are also some orange-graded or "bike park" trails in the Scottish 7 Stanes centres. These usually have a high proportion of woodwork, jumps and so-on (a good example is the Dark Side trail at Mabie in Southern Scotland - this is nearly 4km long and it's all on boardwalks. It's never more than 1m off the ground but in width it ranges from 1m wide down to about 100mm!

agreed... and further, the orange graded bike park stuff has 3 levels.

stumpyjon

The biggest problem with the grading system is that it doesn't distinguish between techincal difficulty and overall difficulty, i.e. how fit you need to be. Some black stuff will be black because it has loads of jumps, woodwork and drop offs, other black routes are graded black because they are 40km long and have loads of climbing, both are difficult but require very different skills and experience :?

Northwind

stumpyjon wrote:

The biggest problem with the grading system is that it doesn't distinguish between techincal difficulty and overall difficulty, i.e. how fit you need to be. Some black stuff will be black because it has loads of jumps, woodwork and drop offs, other black routes are graded black because they are 40km long and have loads of climbing, both are difficult but require very different skills and experience :?

Bingo, I tried to write this last night but totally failed.

Also taken into account is what you could call consequences of failure... a 12 inch wide boardwalk at ground level is blue, at a foot up it's red, at 10 feet up it's FULL FAT BLACK!!1! It's not any harder (other than psychologically) but if you mess up, you mess up about 10 times harder.

stubs

Sometimes they cant even agree on difficulty levels at the same trail centre. Some of the black stuff at Llandegla and Coed Ybrenin is easier than the red. It seems like the trails are being graded by 2 different people.