Alderley Edge

hammersteve

Hi. I hope someone can help. I do a 15 mile route most nights, the main part being the road up the Edge from the village to the Wizard and am keen to know how much elevation is involved. This will help me to guage how realistic some other rides might be. Thanks if you can help.

Ands

Have you tried plotting it on bikeroutetoaster.com (or similar)? Just had a look and it says 90 metres ascent from the main road junction in the town centre up to the Wizard.

Artists Lane is about 80 metres ascent up to the Wizard according to ride data from my Garmin I did yesterday, and bikeroutetoaster says 78m for Artists Lane so they seem to give pretty similar readings

Pokerface

I ride that one all the time. What's the average gradient?

I'm guessing around 12-15%?

hammersteve

Thanks a lot, very helpful

a_n_t

Pokerface wrote:

I ride that one all the time. What's the average gradient?

I'm guessing around 12-15%?

average? nah, I'd guess 7/8%

thegibdog

Artists Lane 79m in 1.78km, 4.4% by my reckoning:
http://bikeroutetoaster.com/Course.aspx?course=222332
Max ~ 8% according to bikehike.

Macclesfield Road 88m in 1.71km, 5.1% up to where it levels off:
http://bikeroutetoaster.com/Course.aspx?course=222334
Max ~ 9%.

Pokerface

I was thinking of the steepest bits. Seems steeper than 9% (in comparison to other hills I've ridden).

Will see what the old Garmin registers for gradient next time I go up it.

P_Tucker

The average of the steepest bits eh? I'm sure if you found the "wall" of a pothole or similar, although only 3.2cm long it could average over 53%.

Pokerface

P_Tucker wrote:

The average of the steepest bits eh? I'm sure if you found the "wall" of a pothole or similar, although only 3.2cm long it could average over 53%.

Really? Is this going to be your thing again now? Shadowing my every post and making idiotic comments?


I thought we were past this.

Pep

I did it a dozen times, I would say average probably near 10%.

bikeroutetoaster should be a good tool to estimate it.

freehub

I reckon it's around 7% average, and around 10% max.

Pokerface

Went and checked today. Garmin maxed out at 10% grad.

thegibdog

Hills always average dissappointingly less than you'd think. The following are according to BikeHike:

Mow Cop ~ 11%
Pyms Chair ~ 11%
Ramsbottom Rake ~ 10%
Gun Hill ~ 7%
Blaze Hill ~ 7%
Brickworks ~ 6%
Cat & Fiddle ~ 3%

I think the averages are pretty reliable but having quoted the maximums previously I'm not too sure about them. I'm guessing they use contour lines which are unlikely to be sufficient to calculate gradients at such a detailed level. For instance BikeHike gives a max of 23% for Ramsbottom Rake which sounds fair enough but Mow Cop maxes out at 16% apparently...

Lucky Douglas

From my Garmin history, as reported by Ascent:

Village to Wizard Distance 1.2 miles, climb 323ft max gradient 11.8

Artists Lane to Wizard Distance 0.8 miles climb 256 ft max gradient 11.6

These numbers feel reasonable to me - Artists goes up in a sort of series of steps, that gives you a bit of a recovery along the way.

freehub

thegibdog wrote:

Hills always average dissappointingly less than you'd think. The following are according to BikeHike:

Mow Cop ~ 11%
Pyms Chair ~ 11%
Ramsbottom Rake ~ 10%
Gun Hill ~ 7%
Blaze Hill ~ 7%
Brickworks ~ 6%
Cat & Fiddle ~ 3%

I think the averages are pretty reliable but having quoted the maximums previously I'm not too sure about them. I'm guessing they use contour lines which are unlikely to be sufficient to calculate gradients at such a detailed level. For instance BikeHike gives a max of 23% for Ramsbottom Rake which sounds fair enough but Mow Cop maxes out at 16% apparently...

I dunno how accurate those averages are, I reckons pyms chair averages over 11% as when it gets going it never goes under! And Mow Cop is far easier than Pyms chair, I'd say the Rake is about same difficulty as Pyms Chair.