Viewing 40 posts - 1 through 40 (of 70 total)
  • Bike Park Wales. Trails I must ride and those to avoid and places to eat in tow
  • withersea
    Free Member

    Heading over for a trip to BPW next week. Suggestions on what to ride and skip much appreciated. For a point of reference I enjoy technical riding, but I am not someone that leaving the ground by more than a few inches!

    Recommendations for eating also appreciated.

    Cheers folk.

    zelak999
    Free Member

    A group of us went up on Monday for the day.
    Its great fun you will love it!
    Top 3 highlights for me were:
    1. Terry’s Belly – long, long arm pumping descent with bits and bobs to pump off if you desire.
    2. Sixtapod – fast and flowy.
    3. A470 – uber fast with loads of tabletops etc very easy to get it wrong and crash out (which 2 of us did.

    We didnt do any of the blacks as the reds and blues were enough!
    Food in the Cafe is pretty good, the uplift drivers take a break from about 13:00 so it gets a bit crowded.
    Good choice of burgers/wraps/baked potatoes with a choice of fillings. Breakfast looked good but they stop serving breakfast style thingys at 12:00.

    Lester
    Free Member

    must dos
    terrys belly
    sixtapod
    long blues with a bit of everything depends on how fast you want to go. great fun and smiles all the way.
    food in the bpw cafe is pretty good especially veggie burgers and bpws own beer to finish.
    afterwards miss the traffic and have chinese buffet and the nearby sshopping centre, although there is a nice indian not far

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    thepodge
    Free Member

    Can’t remember names but look on the board by the uplift pickup for red technical rather than red flow.

    There is a place in town just down from weatherspoons that’s fairly recently opened that does nice pizzas and niche beer.

    withersea
    Free Member

    Cheers for the initial responses. For the food looking for places to eat out after riding as topping down for a couple of days. Looks like we’ll be avoiding the black if the red and blue are that good.

    What sort of leg armour (if any) did you take?

    Kamakazie
    Full Member

    Bunch of Grapes is a great pub on the way back down the A470 before you get to Pontypridd.

    Denis99
    Free Member

    Just got back from BPW today.

    Sixtapod is closed at the moment.

    My favourite was Melted Wely / blue belle / bush wacker.

    The blues I rode are all very smooth and fast.

    Vicious valley/ A470 / willy waver is a good combination of if fervent grading and trail character.

    Very enjoyable day.

    benp1
    Full Member

    Terrys Belly and Willy Waver were both ace

    baddddad
    Free Member

    if (like me) you’re not super gnar but like a challenge, dai hard (black) is really fun (the gap at the start is the hardest bit). The other two blacks from the top are a bit more serious

    kimbers
    Full Member

    Food in the Cafe is pretty good,

    Without wishing to rehash the peel centre thread

    That has not been my experience, at busy times, is lunch the food is precooked and reheated so the last burger I had there was half chewy, half rock solid

    rumbledethumps
    Free Member

    All of it if you can and are capable! Its bloody brilliant. The options are endless. Willy Waver and Sixtapod were ace.

    gelert
    Free Member

    All the responses are spot on. Terry’s Bellend is very tiring but a great starter – berm city. Wibbly Wobbly / Sixtapod / Willy Weaver all fab.

    We did Deep Navigation which is Black and was rocky rocky fun. Coal Not Dole was ok. Rim Dinger a bit easy and not like I expected from reviews. A470 was cool and I wasn’t jumping much but on 2nd go was loving the jumps – well shaped.

    The uplift is terrible though. We rode up faster. Terrible service. See Antur Stiniog for how to do uplift… fab.

    Definitely full face if you have one and knee and arm pads highly recommend. None of our group came off but the gear gives you confidence.

    Wish we did Die Hard but we were all too tired by the time we thought we could do it! Next time…

    Have a great day. Enjoy.

    andysredmini
    Free Member

    If you enjoy technical then the Reds and blues will be as dull as dishwater. Get on the blacks and go slowly the first time then build up to going faster. There are a couple of drops that you may want to either session then hit properly on a full run or you can get off and push around them. The Reds and blues are more like beginner trails are not very challenging.

    CaptainFlashheart
    Free Member

    Terry’s Bellend is very tiring but a great starter

    😆

    soobalias
    Free Member

    vicious valley left up the fire road to blue belle then insufficient funds.
    uplift is fine if you are on a day pass, some chance of a slight queue just after lunch, love to meet the man that beats the bus up there.

    iain1775
    Free Member

    Terry’s Bellend is very tiring but a great starter

    I do wonder about the previous typing history of someone who’s phone autocorrects belly as bellend 😆

    Northwind
    Full Member

    In a day you can ride it all tbh so no reason to ration yourself. I got put off doing the top blacks by a local who told me they were all jumps, which turned out to be bollocks, wish I’d done dai hard… and I missed half cut I think, just by mistake- rode a parallel trail instead. But basically just have a go at whatever you feel like, it’s good for that.

    philwarren11
    Free Member

    Best combination for me is…

    Viscious Valley, Bonneville then Insufficient funds.

    Worst trail is wibbly wobbly imo.

    I think terrys belly is overated and so is A470.

    Standard warm up is Sixtapod onto Willy Waver.

    withersea
    Free Member

    Cheers all. Have uplift booked, didn’t realise you could do it all in one day!

    Insufficient Funds is my favourite. I get an impression it doesn’t get ridden as often as the others.

    ThePilot
    Free Member

    You’d be hard pushed to do it all in a day if going in the week. Drivers break for an hour’s lunch at 1pm and the last uplift was at 3.45 on the day I went despite it was a clear sunny day and light until at least 5.30.
    You’ll probably manage to do all you want to do in a day though. The trails are pretty samey. Bit like riding a roller coaster over and over. Fun at first but the novelty soon wears off.

    philwarren11
    Free Member

    Thinking about it i love Dai Hard, Pork Belly and Insufficient.

    LoCo
    Free Member

    All trails good, maybe not black pro line unless you’re gurt awesomz…
    And Rim dinger is a bit shite IMO 😉

    Food wise I’d suggest Crickhowell, 20 mins drive good cafe & pubs.

    Scienceofficer
    Free Member

    I’d never done any kind of uplift before I went to BPW. It was a great day. But I couldnt shake the feeling that I should have been riding up to the top! I managed to ride all the blues, all the reds and some of the shorter blacks further down the hill. They were all fine. I hear that the blacks from the top are perfectly fine too, but since I can’t really jump the qualifiers really put me off. It’s a great place to go and practice, but there’s not really any sense of adventure there.

    The food from the cafe, and the service was below par, and I felt the drivers were taking the piss the day I was there. They called the last run early, there were more drivers present than were actually driving, and two out of the three didn’t bother going up for the last run. The same happened just before lunch too. It felt like they were just free loading in their job.

    There were plenty of guys there who’d taken a punt on catching the bus without a day pass, and most were complaining since they were generally only catching one in three/four vans. I’d not bother going without a day pass based on that.

    Lester
    Free Member

    Got to disagree on the drivers and the cafe
    I felt that the drivers were all helpful and friendly and were always trying to get you up to the top quick, never seen anyone knock off early, for lunch or last trip.
    My veggie burger has always been nice, but if every stops at the same time there will always be a queue, maybe stop earlyish fir lunch and do one ride up instead of uplift?

    stevied
    Free Member

    I think terrys belly is overated

    Yep, thought the same. Ends up a fair way from the pick-up point too so it’s a bit of a slog back up to the bus.
    All the rest are great and the ride from the cafe down and round to the pick up point is a good warm up too..

    Scienceofficer
    Free Member

    Yes, the drivers seemed like nice guys. When they were actually driving, you’re right, there were keen to get people moving, show people how to use the straps etc… They were remarkably keen to slack off early though it seemed.

    My burger was just about cooked, plonked on a plate and stuffed under a heat lamp, apparently in the hope that we would randomly discover it. The whole impression was that the cafe staff were only there cause they had to be. I found Terry’s belly OK, but it did get a bit samey the further down you went. It is a blue mind.

    mindmap3
    Free Member

    Biggest issue I have with BPW is the uplift – it just doesn’t seem very efficient.

    First time we went it was pretty good. The second time we did it it wasn’t; there seemed to be an awful lot of waiting about and it didn’t feel like the drivers were flying up and down. The uplift at Antur seems to be way more efficient.

    Northwind
    Full Member

    It is a bit weird that it’s a totally purpose-built venue and yet the pickup point is up the hill and the trails end somewhere else… It’s like they decided to balance out innerleithen’s uplift that doesn’t go all the way to the top, theirs doesn’t start at the bottom.

    poey50
    Free Member

    It’s true that the uplift at Antur Stiniog – and Forest of Dean come to that – seem quicker and more efficient but both of those run for most or all the way on roads rather than tracks. There is a lot of height at BPW – certainly compared to FoD so that takes time. The drivers are increasingly careful about making sure the bikes are well secured at BPW, which I appreciate, but that adds to some hanging about. If you’ve tried to do a day riding up then the uplift looks attractive.

    What I don’t understand is why all the drivers have to stop at the same time for lunch rather than stagger the break. As it is, there is a massive scrum in the cafe from 1.00 – 1.30 which I imagine doesn’t help the cafe very much either.

    Alex
    Full Member

    Agree with Poey. And if you time your runs badly the ‘lunch break’ can be 12:45 till 14:15 depending on if you get the first bus up after the break.

    Been 5 times, last time noticed how much longer it was taking between loading and going (Antur is definitely the gold standard here!), first couple of runs took ages, improved after that. All the van drivers seem really nice fellas, but a staggered lunch and moving the start of the uplift 100 feet down the hill would make a big difference.

    I’ve not ridden the blacks from the top. Ridden everything else a few times including all the blacks from half way. Dai Hard is definitely doable although I want to do the qualifier double. Loads of people ride round it now..

    I LOVE Willy Waver! Vicious Valley is my fav red and insufficient funds is always a good way back. The little jump line that runs parallel to the uplift is good too.

    spicer
    Free Member

    If by techy you mean steep and really techy- basically a proper dh track- then 50 shades of black is incredible. There are quite a lot of jumps and drops though, not really ridable unless you’re happy on a black dh track. I always enjoy rim dinger too

    Northwind
    Full Member

    Fairer on the drivers, though, rather than all having a break on their tod. And the break’s quite good if your group’s got split up as sometimes happens.

    The closing early peeved me a little, must admit. It seems like “9.30 to 4.30” means the drivers expect to down tools at 4.30, so they stop going up the hill around 4?

    gelert
    Free Member

    I LOVE Willy Waver! Vicious Valley is my fav red and insufficient funds is always a good way back. The little jump line that runs parallel to the uplift is good too.

    +1 this.

    This thread has made me want to go back again. Our August uplift day was a downpour all day. Didn’t dampen our spirits but it was annoying to be standing about so long for every uplift.

    Two of us did literally pedal up quicker than the rest of our group using the uplift – we were choosing which route to take back down and guessing which one our buddies had gone for and low and behold our group appeared off the bus. Couldn’t believe it.

    philwarren11
    Free Member

    They stagger lunch now dont they?

    nwmlarge
    Free Member

    I’ve always had good service on the uplift but I agree the lunch time thing makes no sense.

    I think that a pump at the top in the hut or by the uplift queue would be great.
    there are plenty of companies selling public use pumps now and indeed work stands.

    Can’t wait to go back in a couple of weeks.

    Hob-Nob
    Free Member

    Two of us did literally pedal up quicker than the rest of our group using the uplift – we couldn’t believe it at the top we were choosing which route to take back down and guessing which one our buddies had gone for and low and behold our group appeared off the bus. Couldn’t believe it.

    If you can climb at a reasonable lick, its 20 minutes from the cafe to the top.

    It’s fairly comparable with a quick turnaround on the uplift, the difference is knocking 20 minute climbs out back to back, all day.

    LoCo
    Free Member

    I think that a pump at the top in the hut or by the uplift queue would be great.
    there are plenty of companies selling public use pumps now and indeed work stands.

    Would need replacing on a weekly basis, see Cwmcarn jetwash for evidence

    If you can climb at a reasonable lick, its 20 minutes from the cafe to the top.

    11 mins on a (legal) ebike 😉

    gelert
    Free Member

    The Beast of Burden climb is actually a tonne of fun in itself. Forget the fire road (horrible) and go on the single track all the way up. It’s a cracking climb – has to be one of the best at any TC. Not at all boring. Very flowy. Gaining height effortlessly with the uppy downy rollers… jump a root… round a tree… downy uppy. Fun.

    I reckon I could do six climbs in a day but I’d paid to be taken up… and six was all the uplifts we managed to get all day. On a very rainy day you can imagine people gave up and went home so it wasn’t very busy at all – the busses were just never there or were sitting in the distance doing naff all.

    It wasn’t just at lunch they were crap. The drivers were nice enough but we didn’t go there for a chat.

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