All Of Afan In A Day

Fancy a challenge? How about Epic Afan, a winter challenge to ride every trail at Afan Forest Park back to back in 10 hours…

Epic Afan

Winter miles don’t always invoke smiles. Epic Afan was all about bringing a bit of fun and adventure to the winter months.

Endurance racers Matt Jones, Scott Cornish and Ant White were looking for something interesting to do over the winter. Rather than hiding inside with the turbo trainers they came up with ‘Epic Afan’ at Afan Forest Park. They challenged themselves to ride every trail at Afan, in ten hours, back to back. Then, they’d challenge everyone else to have a go.

Endurance rider Matt Jones organised the ride: “I had the idea to find a mountain bike ride that would be an all day outing without the bog that the UK hills can turn in to in the winter. I’d ridden a couple of the trails at Afan but knew there were loads more so I was keen to check them all out. We all had a chat about it and decided just to see if we could ride the whole thing in a day.”

The route involved taking in all the trails at Afan including both the tame and technical routes.

Matt again: “The route pretty much planned itself! It made sense to get the most exposed section out of the way first, so Skyline Trail came early on. Blade would obviously then be done at the same time. Using W2 as the link between the two trail hubs made sense and doing the easy miles at the end of the day was used as a warm down after the battering the trails would give us. We even took in all the family trails which were a welcome break from the rough stuff.”

This added up to around 80miles and 11,000ft of climbing. Skyline and Blade came first, followed by the first half of W2 to reach the main Afan Forest Visitor Centre. There was a quick break for some much needed Mule bars, and then they picked up the pace and dispatched the rookie trails: Penhydd and Blue Scarr.

As the light faded night was turned to day with all three sporting Exposure Lights to take on the second half of W2 on some of the most technical trails in the forest. Matt: “We’re all experienced endurance racers so riding in the dark wasn’t too much of a concern. The navigation is the thing that can go wrong when you lose the light and you get tired. Afan is really well signed though so it was pretty easy despite a couple of minor errors and a slightly re-order to do the rookie trails sooner.

To be honest, I really enjoyed the riding when the light when down. We were on White’s Level as we lost light which is a super fun trail. We got support from Exposure Lights we could run the lights on ‘high’ as we didn’t have too long to ride in the darkness. It was fun, even though we were getting pretty tired.”

The ride was finished with a ‘warm down’ of 22km on the family trail that follows the old railway route in the valley. Resisting the temptation to stop off at the pub just before the end the group finished with burst to make the average speed a more respectable 8mph.

The ride wasn’t entirely straightforward though; some early mechanicals limited the average speed to ensure a ride ending malfunction didn’t occur. Scott also threw himself off the trail for the second time in as many weeks, busting a rib. Thankfully he’s a physio, and managed to self-diagnose that he’d be OK to soldier on.

Matt: “15minutes into the first climb Ant had a mechanical and Scott managed to have a crash! Scott thought he had broken a rib and at that point I thought we’d have to change our plans. But, he’s a physio and seems to know best so we cracked on!”

If you’re looking for a winter challenge, why not give Epic Afan a go yourself? You could try and beat our time of nine and half hours – or split it over one or two days and take in the scenery! Do something epic this winter to keep the smiles in with the miles.

Want to try Epic Afan for yourself ? Visit strava.com and search for the EpicAfan loop to see the full 80 mile segment.

Ridden by Matt Jones, Ant White and Scott Cornish.

Thanks to: Mulebar, Exposure lights and Weldtite

Photos by Wayne Carter @ www.wayne-dc.com

Barney Marsh

Barney Marsh takes the word ‘career’ literally, veering wildly across the road of his life, as thoroughly in control as a goldfish on the dashboard of a motorhome. He’s been, with varying degrees of success, a scientist, teacher, shop assistant, binman and, for one memorable day, a hospital laundry worker. These days, he’s a dad, husband, guitarist, and writer, also with varying degrees of success. He sometimes takes photographs. Some of them are acceptable. Occasionally he rides bikes to cast the rest of his life into sharp relief. Or just to ride through puddles. Sometimes he writes about them. Bikes, not puddles. He is a writer of rongs, a stealer of souls and a polisher of turds. He isn’t nearly as clever or as funny as he thinks he is.

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