Is it any good? Would it be worth hiring a bike instead of using my 100mm hardtail?? cheers

Did it for the first time at the weekend. It would be possible to do it on a 100mm hardtail, as with many things it depends how good you are on a bike, and what bike it is, a 456 Summer Season would be better off than a racy hardtail.

There are some fairly challenging bits – similar in technicalness to the Laggan Black run IMO, but in much longer sections than at Laggan. The first third and last third would be fine on a HT, the middle bit might be a bit more challenging,

It's a Merida 50-D with 70degree head angle, so nothing like a summer season. I'm okay bike handling wise, but sounds like a hire bike might be a better option?

Check when the uplift closes as I do not think that you have long now.

I did it on a 140mm front 100mm rear full sus and thought that that was about right for me – I am now wondering about doing it on my HT although thats got 140mm travel. On one of my runs I was passed by a kid on an Orange Crush.

If you hire a big bike you'll have the option of taking it down the WC course as well if you fancy. I think I'd rather be overbiked doing it for the first time, once you know the route you can decide whether you'll be able to do it on your HT.

15th Sept is the end day for uplift.

You'll be fine on a hardtail, it's not so mental that you can't just ice your way down. Have fun!

Cheers for all that. We are camping at glen nevis this coming weekend so i think i will go up there on the saturday anyway and just see when i get there, i can always do the witches trail thingy instead 🙂

Just remember to put your seatpost down.

High seat + steep head angle + Nevis red = Granite faceplant potential

Yes i did the Granite Faceplant thingy when concentrating on an up coming up bit and my wheel went into a hole 😕

Did on 90 mm Yeti ASR – no problem
Did Laggan black the day before and it was tougher IMO

I was there with a few mates back in June. Most of us were on 140mm travel or so full sus bikes but one guy rode it on a Merlin Malt 4 with 110mm travel Magura Ronins and seemed to manage OK by and large. I think it'd be a bit more fun with slightly less XC angles but it can definitely be done.

I slid off the last part of board walk on a full DH bike at the weekend. Not as grippy as you can be fooled into earlier on.

It was quite slippery on the Saturday – I was struggling to trust it at all as I minced down it.

I saw one guy fall off if on one of the first stretches, but that was due to not paying attention rather than slipping off it.

We went on a lovely sunny day a couple of weeks ago and on my first run I hit a rock very near the start, in between two boardwalk sections. It wrecked my front wheel and I took quite a big tumble – so I would say, take it easy on your first run and don't try and show off like a 12 year old in front of your middle-aged friends.

I had my Soul the first time I went up, and I wasn't a particularily good rider at the time either, it went well… It does suit a bigger bike tbh but you could ride it on any half-decent bike as long as you've got a half decent head to go with it. Treating the first descent as a "sighting lap" makes a lot of sense though, it's not like a trail centre where you need to charge in first time, on a full day you can get 8 runs in without too much bother. The price of failure is extremely high in places so just do be aware of that.

I love it… It's not the best trail in the world but it's varied and challenging and you only need to ride upwards for about 10 seconds

I rode it on a beautiful day http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=unckVkapIt0

The first run on the red was just getting my head around it but the second run was just fantastic. I would take it very easy on the first run and just learn it, then do it again for the big 😀

I did it on a full suss.

What happened at 2:05?

All the dabs edited out?

Neeps at FW red.

I was there on a business trip without my bike a few weeks back. Had to rent a bike from the place at the bottom of the Gondola, and have to say.. the bike was NOT in a good state.
Chain slipping all the time (looked like a worn cassette)
Chain guide got jammed at every bump. The brakes were poorly set-up too.
The bloke in the shop was nice enough, but the bikes (spesh big hit) were trashed.
Swapped it twice, but none were much better than the first.

So, don't count on finding a good rental. Not from them at least.

So, does anyone here know where you can hire a 'good' bike at the Nevis range.
Demo8 maybe?
Santa Cruz V10

or something worth the WC course?
In case i'm there again soon without my bike, and need to rent.

Oh, since we're doing videos, http://vimeo.com/13251128.

Had a wee chat with 2 lads on hire Bighits, they seemed happy enough but that was earlier in the season, it might be that they just run them til they fall apart this late in the year. I did end up doing a little bit of work on a hire hardrock the first time I was up, for someone who was having loads of gear issues but it was just adjustment, I think maybe they'd knocked the mech a little. Don't know of any other hire places I'm afraid.

cheers for that NorthWind.

I suppose i'll just have to make sure i take my own ride next time then.

nothing wrong with speccy bighits.

great bikes.

nothing wrong with speccy bighits

I don't think it was the bike, more the (lack of) maintenance that it had received

that was the problem. Maintenance.
I was quite pleased about them being there to rent (initially) as they would be not too dissimilar to my own SXtrail.

ONe problem with any rental FS bike is the problem with suspension set-up. This big-hit came with a rubbish stock fork, which had an underweight spring for me.

Maybe a good option would be some differing spring weights on offer at time of rental. Booked in advance this would not be too much of an issue? surely?

"Maybe a good option would be some differing spring weights on offer at time of rental. Booked in advance this would not be too much of an issue? surely?"

Well, sounds like changing the chains on time is too much of an issue so probably this is a bit advanced

Rode it 4 times on Sunday on hardtails. If you can ride blacks you'll have no bother, if you're used to reds you might struggle a little on the middle section.

We met a couple who'd hired bikes and gone up to ride what they thought was a mellow red ski run. Quite amusing.

Pick your line, get the weight back and commit. 8 pints the night before optional.

Note: Closes sept 15th until May next year.

bruneep – yep dabs edited out 😆

I was out with kitecris on Sunday and fully agree with him.

It's a demanding red (bordering on black) but a lot of it is psychological. Anything that you can't attack you can roll if you keep the saddle down and the weight back.

Top section is fast singletrack and boardwalks, middle is rock-runs and then it mellows out at the bottom into some really fast wider trails with berms and a few jumps.

We made it top to bottom 4 times in a row with no problems and we all ride HTs with about 100-120mm of travel. Fair bit of arm pump at times but if you stop for a few mins it's fine. It's a tough old trail but also a stupid amount of fun.

Did it for the first time on Saturday on the P7 with 140mm RC40's. It's certainly 'redder' than a Glentress red and have to agree with twiggy, plenty of arm pump.
The top boardwalk section is scary fast once you get confident how grippy & well banked it is (in the dry!). We had a shower about lunchtime Saturday and the top section stayed pretty grippy, but the bottom section just after the bedrock was like ice and I finished up in the bog, which sounds just like mr plow! In fact as I was picking myself up and checking for broken bits, someone came off at the same point and landed in the bog the other side of the boardwalk.

I mangaged 5 runs and would've done another had it not been for the rain and a pretty dead leg from the crash.

Highly recommended though.

Rob

Cheers everyone, we just got back but didn't do it in the end as we didn't have enough time. Next time though eh?

I dont really think you missed that much. In terms of red runs some of the other highland trail centres' red runs are more demanding skills wise IMO. I rode the red on my Cove STD FR/DH bike but only did it once as it was quite dull on that. The red is best ridden IMO on a trail bike & my DH bike was overkill. The big danger is just going too fast & getting out of controll on the boardwalk. If you go off the sides in some bits it looks bad. Even so the boardwalk is quite wide. The rest of it was not very exciting.

If you are looking for gravity fun at Fort Bill I still think the DH course, is superb and a real classic. That rides well in all weathers(good grip even in the fairly common rain), but definitely one for big bikes if you want to enjoy it. My favourite highland trail centre is still Golspie.

We just got back from the Nevis Range. It is a really tough run, definately far more technical than the average red.

A friend was on a 120mm specialized hardrock and he managed fine.

We also did the world cup downhill, and whilst there were sections of the downhill that were a lot tougher than the red I actually thought the DH and the red were both quite similar in terms of challenge on the whole.

I didnt enjoy either that much though, because as someone else has mentioned, in places the price of failure is significant and that dented my enjoyment . I'm amazed there arent more significant injuries, we did see a guy part way along the boardwalk who had taken a tumble and looked in a pretty bad way

For me, its worth doing once, but I'll not be too bothered about going back.

We had three trips down this year and we all love the track, we try to get started when the Gondola opens for bikes then get 7 or 8 runs in over the day.

I changed my stem to a 70mm, increased my fork travel to 130mm and set my seat down a good bit and I was fine, last year I had 100mm forks and a 90mm stem and found it a real handful. My new set up didn't stop me going over the bars yesterday though, but I did get a dab free run later.

I wouldn't tackle the downhill, the Red is enough of a challenge for me.

I have been glad of my full face helmet and pads a few times though, someone yesterday lost a lot of blood coming off the boardwalk, red grass and heather isn't a nice sight.

A few photos and a video from when myself and twiggy went up in september this year.

Radioman – Member

"I rode the red on my Cove STD FR/DH bike but only did it once as it was quite dull on that. The red is best ridden IMO on a trail bike & my DH bike was overkill."

Don't take this the wrong way but- well, duh. In related news, XC bikes are a bit small for DH trails.

I failed to get back up last week due to car problems 🙁 And it closes tomorrow. So I guess I'll be back in May.