Where did you ride today?

crispy1980

Coed y brenin for me yesterday. Was supposed to get a ride in this morning as we camped but the beers took over last night

mintedox

Winter hill, Rivington and Darwen today, all day muddy ride topped off with a couple of pints. Gisburn tomorrow i think. I need a bird.

stubs

Burscough to Haigh Hall along the very muddy Leeds Liverpool towpath for Cream Scones then calling into several canalside pubs on the way back just to check that the beer was ok. Luckily the beer was okay though we had to have 2 just to double check.

kieron_67

rode follow the dog at cannock, bit muddy but a good day

carlosthejackal

7 mile loop of the local woods. I usually leave the missus in bed for a lie in on a weekend and go out about 7am for a couple of hours, but she was up by the time I left, so I didn't want to go out too long as I knew she'd be doing breakfast. And the wine we had last night didn't make for good energy levels! So 45 minutes of mud-plugging singletrack and a bit of loose, rocky downhill (just missed out on KoM on Strava, arse) and I was home having scrambled egg on toast. Lovely...will probably do a bit longer tomorrow.

screemin187

A few miles in and around the shores of Lough Neagh

97th choice

Tollymore' forest, couple of hours round the usual routes. Its still nice and dry and running well. Usually finish on the champs run but missed out as was having so much fun on the new bike and lost track of time.

an_original_name

did a couple of runs down the wynyard DH track. just killing time until the bike part opens on friday really. bought my season pass today. $588NZ well spent!

felix.london

...

Andy 1974

Took a ride up to the Earlsburn Wind Farm,which is past the Carron Valley trails,easy enough ride and brilliant views.

Sleipnir's Master

Well last week i did the "Borders Circle"
Dalkeith to middletion down the B7007 (which is stunning i may add) to innerleithen couple of pasties and a look through Alpine bikes later, i headed to Glentress. Done the 9km black route juddddddddered my self to death on solid mud with more boulders than a fat womans ass. From there onto Peebles and another pastie later onward to eddleston Butttttt half way to eddleston some twat was sitting right behined me in his car (at this time it was dark so all i could see was lights). So i pulled over to let them pass, turns out it was the fuzz/police stoping to ask me why i wasn't wearing a yellow bib! i already have 2 rear lights and reflection strips on the jacket. Anyway on from eddleston past the leadburn, through howgate, roslin, bonnyrig back to dalkeith! 55miles

http://static.panoramio.com/photos/1920 ... 295900.jpg B7007
http://static.panoramio.com/photos/1920 ... 295873.jpg Tyne Vally from Glentress
http://static.panoramio.com/photos/orig ... 295848.jpg Glentress
http://sphotos-h.ak.fbcdn.net/hphotos-a ... 2639_n.jpg ride minus the Glentress route.

It should be noted that the black route has changed and they have not updated the map.!

Northwind

Today I did not ride but yesterday I did the Scottish Downhill Association's trial race, on the new Glencoe Red. Now I don't want to put people off the trail, but with the weather and associated hammering it'd taken, it'd become less of a red route than I'd expected... I thought it might be a bit dull doing a downhill race on a red but it'd evolved into a proper little dh course. Not really hard (though some bits were pretty damn slippy and caught a lot of people out) but hard to ride fast.

Maybe on a dry day it's redder, but if I'd managed to convince my mates into entering they'd have killed me!

Grand day out anyway.

stubs

Northwind wrote:

less of a red route than I'd expected

There you have the basic problem with grading routes. Someone used to riding at say Cannock (randomly picked dont shoot me) could end up in a helicopter if they approach Glencoe red the same way. We need an independent body to do the grading rather than the trail centre saying we have 4 routes lets call them black, red, blue and green. If its not done we could end in a situation where the insurance companies start doing it and we will all end up wearing armour and air bags and riding bikes equipped with stabilisers on fire roads.

Briggo

stubs wrote:

Northwind wrote:

less of a red route than I'd expected

There you have the basic problem with grading routes. Someone used to riding at say Cannock (randomly picked dont shoot me) could end up in a helicopter if they approach Glencoe red the same way. We need an independent body to do the grading rather than the trail centre saying we have 4 routes lets call them black, red, blue and green. If its not done we could end in a situation where the insurance companies start doing it and we will all end up wearing armour and air bags and riding bikes equipped with stabilisers on fire roads.

Insurance companies? I'd be interested to see how many personal accident claims are for trail centre incidents in the grand scheme of things. I don't believe trail centres are insured for this in terms of liability insurance?

Something tells me we're a long way off that for various reasons.

stubs

It doesnt matter if trail centres dont carry insurance to cover an accident they will have public liability cover and if someone employs a solicitor with a triangular fin on his back and succesfully sues a trail centre and or the landowner then things will change. I have no idea how much it costs to get someone off a mountain to hospital by helicopter but I bet it costs thousands if not tens of thousands, then you have time off work and all the other expenses pretty soon the bill will grow exponentially.

I work in an office where the worst accident we have had is a paper cut but the insurance company still makes us pay for £10 million liability cover on top of the building and contents. I recently wrote a company cheque for over £4,000 for the business insurance yet the company has never made a claim and hopefully is never going to. Anyone who dies at there desk will be dragged out of the back door and propped up against the wall in the public car park

Northwind

stubs wrote:

There you have the basic problem with grading routes. Someone used to riding at say Cannock (randomly picked dont shoot me) could end up in a helicopter if they approach Glencoe red the same way. We need an independent body to do the grading.

I'll do it

Thing is the trail probbaly usually isn't like that, but it'd been hammered by the weather. When it's dry and in good shape it'll still be a challenging red for some but overall I reckon it'd still be in the ballpark. And the fact that it's lift-accessed would put off a lot of more casual riders (people still say Nevis Red's a "red downhill" after all and get put off, when it's no such thing)

The other thing is that trails get their grades for different reasons, and so one red trail might seem harder than another just bceause of differences in riders. But yes even with that excuse grading is all to balls.

ilovedirt

To be fair, there is a difference (i think) between a red graded XC trail and a red graded downhill trail. At least in france it seemed that way when I went for the first time this year. One of the red routes I rode in chatel was crazy steep and techy in places! But then I assumed that was because it was a red graded downhill trail and not an XC trail.

bennett_346

ilovedirt wrote:

One of the red routes I rode in chatel was crazy steep and techy in places!

Which one? Been twice, great place.

ilovedirt

I believe it was called Komatrotrail, was awesome. Only got to ride chatel on the last day of our trip for a few runs, so I hit that one a few times, and a couple of others. Mental fun! Got a go pro vid of it here

bennett_346

Ah yes, great trail, really flowy though could do with more gap jumps i thought.

Great vid btw, i've tried that rear facing cam before and it gives great results!

Sleipnir's Master

stubs wrote:

Northwind wrote:

less of a red route than I'd expected

There you have the basic problem with grading routes. Someone used to riding at say Cannock (randomly picked dont shoot me) could end up in a helicopter if they approach Glencoe red the same way. We need an independent body to do the grading rather than the trail centre saying we have 4 routes lets call them black, red, blue and green. If its not done we could end in a situation where the insurance companies start doing it and we will all end up wearing armour and air bags and riding bikes equipped with stabilisers on fire roads.

Amen brother.

gezebo

'Grading' is something that gets argued about in many other sports eg Climbing, and also changes considerably given different weather conditions eg In paddling the grades of rivers can change in given different water levels, sometimes being harder (or sometimes easier) in higher/lower water levels.

Its well known in climbing that Scottish VS's (Climbing grade) are often harder than Welsh VS's.

Ultimately it comes down to either completing a trail cleanly or not and making the decision for yourself on whether you are able to ride it. Grades are simply a rough guide.

Anyway back to the point of the thread... I had a damp ride around the Marin area today :-)

ilovedirt

bennett_346 wrote:

Ah yes, great trail, really flowy though could do with more gap jumps i thought.

Great vid btw, i've tried that rear facing cam before and it gives great results!

Cheers mate, it helps if whoever is behind you doesn't stop halfway down the trail

The Northern Monkey

83.6km from Brecon to Cardiff along the Taff Trail, our team of 5 raised over £1200 for charity

70\ʹspenguin

The Northern Monkey wrote:

83.6km from Brecon to Cardiff along the Taff Trail, our team of 5 raised over £1200 for charity

Kudos!

How was the RL?

The Northern Monkey

70\'sPenguin wrote:

The Northern Monkey wrote:

83.6km from Brecon to Cardiff along the Taff Trail, our team of 5 raised over £1200 for charity

Kudos!

How was the RL?

Thanks

Loved it... no sore arse or hands, legs had a good few more km in them!! Really comfortable to ride!

Stuck with 3 of the team for the first 10km or so, after that I marched on on my own

J_asonR

Today was my second ride after getting into XC and was my best ride so far! A lot of fun in the mud and puddles through the New Forest! Clocked in at just under 20kms in 1 hr 10..

Thought I was going to die after the first 400metres as I looked up at the first hill of the day (which I usually drive up), and I almost did! Hill climbing without warm legs isn't ideal.. However I quickly warmed up and got on with the job in hand and felt like I could do another 20kms at the end of it!

Briggo

stubs wrote:

It doesnt matter if trail centres dont carry insurance to cover an accident they will have public liability cover and if someone employs a solicitor with a triangular fin on his back and succesfully sues a trail centre and or the landowner then things will change. I have no idea how much it costs to get someone off a mountain to hospital by helicopter but I bet it costs thousands if not tens of thousands, then you have time off work and all the other expenses pretty soon the bill will grow exponentially.

Making assumptions, good work.

mintedox

Gisburn today with a mate who's just got a new bike after his was pinched months ago. 1x9 wasn't the best idea, he says he isn't coming again.

felix.london

mintedox wrote:

Gisburn today with a mate who's just got a new bike after his was pinched months ago. 1x9 wasn't the best idea, he says he isn't coming again.