Newbie from just outside Portsmouth

I come from Portsmouth and though I haven't lived there for 20 years, I used to ride as a kid with all my mates and explore in the way that only kids do. There are plenty of great trails in easy reach of Purbrook - I used to live in Cosham so its pretty much the same area.

At the top of the road that QA Hospital is on, you can go off road back on yourself at the roundabout so that you are going above the hospital. There are loads of chalk trails there along the top of the hill back towards the fort and lots of bowls for jumps and tricks etc. This side of the road I mentioned is mostly a play area is where we used to hang as kids and see how much air we could get out of various jumps we found.

If you go up the road with QA on and turn left instead at the roundabout you can access the old chalk pits and there is one particularly fine downhill that we christened 'The Pylon Run' as it goes from the top of Portsdown Hill rapidly down to the pylon at at the bottom. I remember it being pretty crazy, fast and technical and ended up on my backside more than once.

Also from that roundabout at the top of Portsdown Hill you can go towards Wickham and Southwick. After about 5 or 6 miles on this road there is a right turn to a place called Hundred Acres. This is a forest and there are miles and miles of singletrack there. Not much in the way of elevation, but some great trails none the less. It gets muddy this time of year, so be prepared for that!

Further afield but still easy to reach by car there is some truly outstanding riding at the Queen Elizabeth Country Park, this is up the A3 towards Petersfield. We used to ride there from Portsmouth most weekends on the backroads, there is a great pub on the way called the Bat and Ball near East Meon I think. We used to stop here to take on water (not beer, we were 15), its apparently where cricket was invented if I remember correctly. Anyway, QE country park has great riding, up to the top of Butser Hill and a massive open moor style downhill where you can hit 40+mph, or there is all the forest trails in the park proper with plenty of up and downs. From here you can also hit the Southdowns Way which is excellent. We used to head from here to a place called Kingley Vale, I think this in Sussex and nearer to Chichester so this is a pretty monster route, about 60 or 70 miles I think overall and, unsurprisingly, used to take literally all day to do.

Anyway, hope that helps, it was 20 odd years ago so apologies if any of this has changed or been closed off etc etc!
Matt

Queen Elizabeth country park just up the road from you. Something more long distance is the Shipwrights Way, a 40 mile mostly off road/traffic free route from Bentley Station to Gun Wharf - we rode this last month and really enjoyed it.

Check out sussexmountainbiking.com they have loads of information on nearby trails!