We had an outing at Ashridge yesterday, stopping off as we all do at brownlows for a full breakfast. Now to say Ashridge is currently biblically muddy is understating it. Mud, roots, more mud, standing water, slime, more roots, slop, fallen trees, bog snorkelling, sticky stuff requiring advanced speedway sliding skills. At the cafe 50% of the bikers are roadies – so they are relatively clean. Another 30% (ourselves included) are MTBers who are filthy dirty and have clearly been enjoying themselves. The remainder are spotless FS riders with bikes that look like they just came out of the ‘show me your brand spanky new FS builds after you’ve spent a day polishing them’ thread on STW.

What gives gentlemen/gentlewomen of Berko?

In Winter certain bits of Ashridge do seem to produce a special kind of sticky clay-based clag, if it’s just rained then it’s runny enough to clear but give it a day or so to stiffen up and it’ll jam any wheel solid within 100 metres.

Good fun in the summer though, bakes hard, it’s like riding super grippy concrete.

I went for a walk up there yesterday and I’ve never seen it so muddy!

I was up there with a friend sat afternoon and boy is it muddy, but great fun 😀 and just adds to the skills