Does anybody ride on Cissbury Ring? I’m on a South Downs National Park discussion forum and there are a few people gently worried about riders riding up and down the (medieval) lumps and bumps.

I understand there’s a bridleway through the middle that’s fair game.

Anyone ride there? Any thoughts?

I know that the vast majority of riders would avoid the sensitive bits of land and I think it would be good if the cycling community promoted an ethical and responsible approach.

MTBers must be massive users of the South Downs Way. Anybody here in contact with the Park? Any ideas for seeing off a confrontation and promoting cyclists as friendly and good?

Cissbury Ring is an Iron Age hill fort, so at least 2000 years old.
There are also neolithic flint mines on the site that are likely to be 4-6,000 years old.

I’d stick to the bridal way.

APF

This is what Strava says is set up as segments;

most avoid it but there is a loop (onyl ridden 10 times).

tbh, if it’s not a segment on strava it probably doesn;t get ridden much…

AFAIK it’s not a bridleway though the middle, but cyclists have recently been given permission to use the path as long as they don’t deviate. Got a link to the forum?

“F” doesn’t look too good. The others are all bridleways, assuming I’ve got my bearings right.

yes although F appears to have been ridden 10 times by 8 people which is tiny – most of the climbs have more than 1500 riders on the leader board and thousands of rides.

Thanks all. Here’s the forum John: South Downs NPF

It’s quite new. I think it would be helpful to have a few friendly cyclists on there.

here’s the thread about Cissbury;

http://southdownsforum.ning.com/forum/topics/bikes-on-cissbury-ring

Interesting that original reason for fencing was horse damage.

This one just seems to rehash all the old arguments;

http://southdownsforum.ning.com/forum/topics/mountain-bikers?id=6409074%3ATopic%3A26280&page=1#comments

none of it’s terribly current though.

Yes, there’s a steady stream of traffic using the outer paths, so skirting round the ring on the lower reaches, never been on the ring proper and I can’t say I’ve seen anyone else.

You’d struggle to avoid it completely, most of the climbs out of Worthing converge there I presume this is as they’re based on ancient rights of way.

Actually a few voices of reason on there (I know at least one of them) suggesting that a bit of give & take & common courtesy is required on all sides – bit like life really – much more than sticking to some arbitrary path classification that seems to just serve to confuse & give people a soap box.

By Cissbury Ring in the OP, I take it to mean the inner area bounded by the inner ramparts & the fence the NT erected. There’s no bridleway in there. You have to lift a bike over a fence/gate to get there.

I regularly see people riding in the inner area, more so in summer. And i’ve seen numpties skidding down the rampart by the SE gate. I can understand why people get annoyed when they see that.

As everyone else has been saying, You’re not allowed to ride on the ramparts of Cissbury ring, one of the reasons was that a few ( well, possibly 10 or 12) years back some people had effectivly cut a pump track around the whole ring. I didn’t know that the ban on riding through the centre has been lifted though as I thought this had been downgraded to a footpath, but to be honest I can’t really see the point of doing that as there are better and quieter trails in the surrounding area…

Oddly enough, the Strava segments shown on the google earth pic are in that pic don’t show the two best (and legal) ones.

Still, all the trails up there are a bit sloppy and slippery at the moment.

Oh and the SDNP authority has a land access rep who does trail running and mountain biking. When the authority was being set up they were (and still are) extremely supportive of the mountain bikers, just remember the forum is not the Park Authority, just interested parties.

Update. Just rechecked my OS maps. No, there are no Bridleways that cross Cissbury ring.

There are gates across the trail as well and the ban on cyclists is made quite clear (lots of signs on the gates) so please don’t ride there. If you want to do some technical trail riding in the area then go and try out the trails that Steyning MTB built…much more fun and all legal too 8)

Info on them here at http://steyningmtb.tumblr.com/

Hi, back in august, on the sheep track, I meet the national trust ranger responsibile for the ring. Nice chap and was certsinly not against ridding in and around the ring except for specific parts. Basically the ramparts are out of bounds as they are worried about erosion. The particular area of concern is near the east gate where people have been riding down the rampart. To be fair the erosion here is becoming fairly obvious. Personally i would have thought most people would think it inappropriate to ride around the ramparts. It is an ancient monument after all. Segment F above is most definately a no no. The path through the middle is fine to ride. The sheep track is also fine. I also assume the east side decent is fine as this was not mentioned.