Weston Under Wetherley, near Leamington Spa, Warwickshire, next Sunday, 3rd July.
There’s a map here so you can get an idea of where we’re likely to be riding. (You do know how to recognise a bridleway on an OS map, don’t you ?)

It would be nice if you entered, as organisers generally make a donation to charity from the proceeds, but it all takes place on public RoWs, so if you think getting caught entering a trailquest would be like getting caught going shopping with your mum when you were a teenager, you can hang around outside and follow me when I set off.

I’ll do all the map reading and route planning, all you’ve got to do is sit on my wheel for three hours.
Although,it might be advisable to bring a map, as you’ll need to find your own way back to the start after the chubby duffer on the Rohloff 29er has disappeared off in the distance.

you are on a one man mission 😀
I cant do next weekend but good luck

Although,it might be advisable to bring a map, as you’ll need to find your own way back to the start after the chubby duffer on the Rohloff 29er has disappeared off in the distance. snapped his frame is sits sobbing in a hedge

So is the challenge keeping up with you?

Comment removed by author after reconsideration.

There are a great many other things I also think are lame, I think I will continue to not do all of them

I hope your not a salesman in your day-job.

Can’t say your “offer” really makes me feel that you going to change many minds.
Leamington Spa, well know capital of MTB-ing.
3hrs of exciting* flat bridleways, oh yeah!
Being abandon by your ‘host’ as the frenzied excitment of the TQ take over.

Thanks but no thanks. 😉

*I lived in Warwick, so feel I’m allowed to comment.

EDIT: PS: I don’t think TQ is lame, but like MTB racing, it has no interest to ‘me’ in the slightest.

Shouldn’t you be marketing this towards people that don’t think trailquesting is lame?

…all you’ve got to do is sit on my wheel for three hours.

I think you just knocked off a few of the fence-sitters.

Top quality marketing or not, it still sounds like a very efficient way to ruin a ride.

Think it would be easier to convince Orange 5 riders that other bikes are available.

Bridleways?!

<Duncan Bannatyne voice>

For that reason – I’m out.

</Duncan Bannatyne voice>

Thanks Graham for the free advertising, I am the organiser of this trailquest, and having ridden the area several times over the past few weeks, I can assure any potential riders that the riding is not just “flat bridleways”. If anyone thinks this trailquesting lark is easy/boring, just try to clear the course I have set in the 3 hour time limit – most of you will go home crying!

Yes, Leamington is not reknowned for it’s techy stuff, but you can still have a good few hours out and about enjoying being outside. The fact that a map is involved is really secondary – there’s a shedload of cracking pubs in the area, and you could use them to supply liquid refreshment.

Give it a go, at least if you live in the Midlands, apart from half a day of your life (and a tenner), what have you got to lose?

Thanks for the tip, I’ll add the Trailquest to the 3 Warwickshire Audaxes I’ve got pencilled in not to do next Sunday.

So you’re offering me a chance to go to somewhere I don’t want to go, ride behind someone for three hours and potentially cry?

…and you want me to pay £10?

…and this is how you think you can attract people to try out TQing?

large418 – Member

just try to clear the course I have set in the 3 hour time limit – most of you will go home crying!

Sounds even better 😕

Think of it as HONC, without the direction arrows, but with a time limit. 😛

your thread about rebuilding your wooden bungalow was much more interesting.

Sounds cwap tbh. I’ll give it a miss

Love the comparison of the comments here with this thread.
“It was a crap route, but that’s the way the arrows were pointing, so that’s where we had to go”. 😀

i would give it a go, but its a heck of a drive away

considered the local one a few years ago, just never got round to it

You’re a bit of a patronising **** aren’t you?

I thought this one was funny too.
30 000 acres of forest + one marked trail has been bulldozed = The Forest of Dean has been wrecked.

Is there a limit on numbers? The way you’re selling it, there must be hundreds signing up

This has convinced me that TQ is indeed lame.

Leave the man alone, he just wants to share the joy that he finds in Trailquesting with some others.

I’m tempted to do one now, something that uncool may have gone all the way around to being cool again, like flared trousers.

Then when you are all madly doing trailquests in a few years time I can slag you all missing the uber niche moment before it went mainstream, and for being so out of fashion you probably shop in TK Maxx.

Is it fancy dress?

Yes, some people turn up in flat shoes and baggy shorts, although most of us dress properly in lycra.

What is a Trail Quest?

Still not clear on that one? You just follow someone for 3 hours?

“It was a crap route, but that’s the way the arrows were pointing checkpoint was, so that’s where we had to go”

I think a point of agreement from the last thread was that TQ had an image problem,to be ruthlessly honest, you aren’t actually doing anything to dispel that.

Why not simply ask people to come along?

Y’know, like an invitation; what you’re doing is the equivalent of holding a dinner party and attempting to get guests by suggesting that you will eat all the food, leave them in tears, and blindfold them.

Just Googled it.

You take the only thing less cool than Mountain Biking, Orienteering, and mix it with Mountain Biking!

Why are people so negative?

Trying to prove how much more Rad and Gnarly than each other or something?

I’m thinking of how to go about doing something similar in London actually Graham. Sort of like Treasure Hunt, with clues and stuff. Getting Anneka Rice’s Bottom to help out would be nice….

Quite like the idea of using towpaths and that; don’t all have to me extreme nadgery technical trails you know.

Elf – check out the Oxford cycle co-op’s Alley Cat Races/Rides: http://www.cycleoxford.com/headington_art_ride

I’ve done a couple – an ‘art attack’ one (ride aroud in white paper boiler suit being spraypainted!), and a hallowen one dressed as a mummy. Great fun and sort of like a trailquest (map and checkpoints) but with clues to find the checkpoints, lots of dressing up, taking part in groups, and BBQ and beer afterwards 🙂

if you do one I’ll come (but I’m afraid my derriere can’t compete with that of Ms Rice)

I’m afraid my derriere can’t compete with that of Ms Rice

Ooh I dunno, Sue; I dunno about that….. 🙂

One of my best rides in recent years was along the River and then canals and old railway lines near enough the whole way from London to Brighton. I really love just bimbling along enjoying the view, chilling out and relaxing.

I really love just bimbling along enjoying the view, chilling out and relaxing

+ Lots.

However, the offer is to be brought to tears by following Graham in Leamington Spa…

Why would it? Graham seemed a very nice pleasant feller when I met him at Mayhem last week. A gentleman, in fact. Mind you, he did have a thousand yard stare just after the end (24 hour soloist, in’t he?!), and I’m not sure if it was a smile, a grimace, or just a sign of his deranged mind…

Not exactly sure why some folk think he deserves such negativity. For what, enthusing about his passion and trying to get others involved?

I’m sure Graham is an ineffably pleasant fellow, and I’m equally sure that TQ is actually excellent fun, but he’s just not selling it well today.

As the topic title suggests, the challenge I set was for all those who think trailquesting is a bit Wurther’s Original, as it was put on another thread, to have a go at keeping up with me while I aim to cover 50+km of mixed terrain in 3 hours.
If you want to enter and ride at your own pace, fair enough. I’m just trying to wind up the internet mountain biking gods.

“I’ll do all the map reading and route planning, all you’ve got to do is sit on my wheel for three hours.
Although,it might be advisable to bring a map, as you’ll need to find your own way back to the start after the chubby duffer on the Rohloff 29er has disappeared off in the distance.”

So your feeling confident eh! Graham.
3hrs? I doubt your frame will last that long! I’ll give you a cheery wave as I sail by, and let them know at HQ you’ll be a trifle late.

I’m just trying to wind up the internet mountain biking gods.

But a better way is to invite people, publicise the event, describe the terrain, guess at the likely checkpoints, inform and educate us about how you would plan out a route, point out the routes that would be fastest, point out the common mistakes, analyse the options, rather than attempting to suggest that you will be quicker than everyone else, and will therefore humiliate them after inviting them to an event.

It’s the way you sell it…