Carbonfiend, when I’m in Town I join up with a Group from Rapha who ride upto/into/home over Epping Forest way. We use part of your route to get out of Town.. They had a CX ride there today but I’m not up there 😐

I know I am a bit late to the party but I ride it on everything, gravel, singletrack etc. 3PCX was a highlight as was the world cup XC route at dalby, just have to ride everything a little bit slower. Also attempted a dirty 100 miler in the moors over gravel and bridleways and ended up with my collapsing in a silly mess.

Do it. They’re great.

Now I’m thinking

Do I need a cx bike or a winter road bike?

Why not both?

I don’t get paid enough

Lyrcra if just riding, and not really stopping off anywhere

Baggies if stopping off places as I don’t like people staring at my willy mound

No one’s interested in staring at an insecure boys packet

Skin suit for that pro CX look surely 🙂

My terrain of choice 🙁

New soffits anyone.

I’ve ridden mine on the road, on farm tracks, on rooty singletrack, on trail centre red trails, to Scotland. It’s ace.

Anywhere I’ll take my xc bike, my cx bike can go.

@bikebuoy yeah there’s a few ways into the forest from the Canal, one I do sometimes is from Enfield lock. It’s pretty popular with a lot of riders too Strava segments everywhere 🙂 I really like the contrast you get from being so close to the big city yet smack in the middle of nature.

I’d echo what taxi man says

I’ve got a light 29er mtb and compared to that, of road my cross bike is rubbish

If you set up a rigid 29er with some very light thin tubless tyres (ie bontrager X0 1.9) and a longish stem and short bars. Then its a million times better off road than a cyclocross but not that much slower on road. It will be slower on the road obviously but not as much as you think.

Ok this is a ride I did from Twyford to Swinely on my rigid 29er. I managed to average 15.7mph on the road section to Swinley and that was with my 2.25 Racing Ralphs on.

http://app.strava.com/activities/232088852/segments/5649352500

over half an hour I can normally average 19-20 mph on 25mm road tyres on that route-ish.

The thing with the 29er rigid is that on some single sections I’ve actually got my best times (ie labrinth at Swinely) over the Full Suss.(although if I try to do the full trail with out stopping my times are quite alot slower on the 29er than my Full Sus as I tend to tire much quicker)