yay or nay

it was very wet on the main tracks by the shrine run last week, and i doubt it is any better this week.

I am of the opinion that all the newer trails, which seem to cut up more should be left until the weather is either much colder and they freeze or it starts to dry up in the spring.

Nay, took a walk up there earlier and it is a mess.

People just dont learn that trails like that don't dry out during winter.

They looked bad from the road last Thursday+ we have had plenty of rain since then.Foggy up their yesterday when i past on the road.Problem with the Cranham trails they have no width and are not rock based so will get slaughtered this time of year if people keep riding them especially after the very wet Nov.They wont leave them alone 😡

Everything on the escarpment is boggin, totally agree with th ecomments above, best left for a while.

Checked out Hazel Wood near Nailsworth last weekend, no one had ridden the trails but the water / mud / leaf mush was difficult enough to walk in and would have been no fun to ride.

Leave it a while to drain.

single riders on some of those trails is bad enough, but big groups are really a very bad idea.

Well the hard job is trying to persuade certain riders to stay off. Having pointed them at this thread they will still want to ride Cranham even in its current condition.
MrMo you know what I have to face! I think it would be easier to convince Dinejad to recognize Israel, than it would to convince certain riders to leave Cranham alone.

cranham, only when its frozen during winter months please! plenty around to string a ride together and avoid the bad bits surly?

Graham i am well aware and it is one of the reasons i rarely ride with the club these days. I like Cranham but it has a season and to ride all year round is doing it and the riders no favours. It cuts up and when the weather improves the trails have been trashed and are no longer fun. As i have mentioned before Cranham really doesn't suit big groups, 4-5 max, above that riders get lost the ride gets disjointed and you get no where fast.

Tracks like the original race track and some of the tracks out towards painswick beacon can take it but many of the newer tracks can't.

For now i will stick to solo riding on the hard tracks such as over Cleeve, waterhatch, etc. tracks that allow a decent ride to be put together and where the tracks aren't trashed and walking plays a major part in the route.

Whereabouts are the Cranham trails? Obviously not to ride now. I'm over Tewkesbury way.

look on a map for Cranham Village, it is above Gloucester, off the A46. Cranham is the woods that are on the north of the village, they aren't actually Cranham Woods. Cranham is just a shorthand way of referring to a group of connected woods.

To get the most out of them it helps to have a guide, some good single track, but getting a little over used. Particularly at this time of year.

If you want a guide i am sure someone would show you around.

Steer well clear! I would have thought that a responseable (sp?) club like chelt &county would have a bit more sense that to ride over there this time of the year. What about cleeve? Or is it too hilly for them? STAY AWAY 😈

lookmanohand, believe me I have tried till I’m blue in the face! But for some of them Cranham is the only place to ride, and they want to ride it regardless of the conditions or damage they may be causing.

I think cranham gives "more bang for the buck" as the yanks would say. A lot of MTBing these days seems to be focused towards getting as much technical / fun riding as possible in a ride. I know if I want to get someone interested in MTBing Cranham is the place to go – although only in summer.

I suppose those trail pixies who put in the Cranham runs are a victim of their own success as no where in the Cotswolds has as much quality riding in a small area. (Big thanks to the pixies by the way)

I've wondered if perhaps during the winter if trips further afield (Dursely, Malvern, Bredon etc) would open up more options for riding if everyone is bored of local places.

There are some great routes round here but I think people are becoming less focused on putting the miles in and more focused on the fun factor which leads them to aim at cranham.

Bredon….shudders…. the walk down the northside to Elmley Castle is a death march i won't forget in a hurry, if you thought the field of doom was bad, you haven't seen anything….

I now see what you're up against G 😉

i prefer Cleeve anyway, Cranham is a place for a warm summers evening and a quick blast, or an autumn nightride before the rains start.

Mmmmmmm for real guilt free mud try the Cotswold way along the bottom of cranham woodz, hardpack underneath but proper 5" of mud on top!

But that would involve looking at a map, and doing a bit of exploring, shock horror…. 😯

cranham is no trail centre! best clubs understand this.

Bredon's pretty good on the Kemerton and Westmancote sides all year round. Anyone ridden Malvern much? Walked the dog plenty of times, but always thought it was mostly a no go for cyclists.

lookmanohands your be alright in Cranham this time of year i am told you spend most of the time jumping and flying through the air doing cross-ups so you damage the trails.A little bird told me well actually a man on a Cove 🙄

Managed to get the ride to go over Cleeve..

dobiejessmo, I might be partial to a bit of "airtime" every now and then! I'm trying to work on the little known hover technique :roll:! A man on a cove you say, mmmmmmm, some say he's abit partial to tweeking nipples.

😆