Swithland woods
Braggy Park
Weston Park
Belvoir loop

That is the sum total of riding here, there is the odd decent bridle way but they join nothing.

If you find said illegal trails tell me where they are.

Bit further out of Leicester between Whitwick and Thringstone, the trails through Cademan and Grace Dieu woods are good, quite a few different routes to choose from. You can also include Whitwick Quarry, Bardon Hill and Blackbrook Reservoir if you want a longer ride. 😉

oi, thats my patch, don’t you go bringing outsiders in… 😉

specially them good looking charismatic ones!

Sounds like a few people have had bad experiences of Leicester, but in all honesty it’s not much different from any other city of a similar size in the UK. It has some rough areas, but as a contrast a few of us were in the city centre this Saturday, had a few beers in a couple of nice bars followed by a very decent Italian, all very civilised and completely harmless.

There is loads of mountain biking once you get away from the city, and where I live in South Leics a thriving mountain biking community. It’s not technical, but there are miles and miles of bridleways for XC style riding – and this very quickly gets you into quite beautiful typical English countryside with great pubs. There are a couple of very good cycle clubs, and the FNSS series is great fun.

I’ve lived in the area 12 years now, and I’m pretty well travelled – it really isn’t as bad as some on here would have you believe. One myth though – the curries are pretty average compared to the West Midlands or Bradford!

‘Harry too’ – drop me an email once you get here, we’ll take you out for a ride one evening and show you a few places that will put a smile on your face I’m sure.

Worked in Leicester for a year and a half. Lived in Nottingham, really don’t like Leicester. Nothing going for it, when you have Nottingham only 30/40 mins away.

Having said that Leicestershire countryside is nice, no mountains, but nice.

I worked there on/off for 2-3 years, living the full Alan Partridge Travel Tavern experience.

I can’t quite explain why (although the Partridge bit didn’t help!), but I didn’t like the place at all -Much less so than other places I’ve spent time in, some of which haven’t been particularly nice.

It may be superficial (and I may well be wrong), but there didn’t seem to be quite the basic friendliness from the locals that you get in most places in the UK, north and south.

One positive: As others have said, riding a road bike around the quiet roads of the amusingly-named villages in the surrounding area can be quite nice.

Given the choice, I’d live nearer to Nottingham.

ive lived in a few places but hail from leicester and its where i live now. i have never felt intimidated here. nights out can get a bit dodgy, as can anywhere else ive lived. but i wouldnt go out in the city centre anywhere on my own.
there is very little mtb action to be had. the places that are mentioned above are ok but just be careful. my advice is stick some slicks on your mtb and go out towards market bosworth. loads of quiet roads for you to while away the evenings.
so far as places to stay, there are loads of hotel in the city centre. having a house here ive never stayed in any. the travel lodge next to the station is very recently refurbished so is probably worth a look. if you want to stay out side the city then the marriot or the hilton that are down near junction 21 are both supposed to be quite nice. again there is a hotel in Blaby
http://www.brook-hotels.co.uk/hotels/brook-westfield-house-hotel-leicester
this is quite nice and is an easy commute into town if you are working in the city centre. especially on the bike as you can do it almost entirely without going on the road on a paved disused railway line.
just like anywhere there are good and bad places to go. but all these tales of it being like somekind of war zone just doesnt match my experience of the city i was born in and continue to live in.

bwaarp, real sorry to hear that about your friend. that is real shitty.

Lol at the comments here!

To be honest MTB’ing is not great in Leicestershire unless your just interested in XC. There are a few bridlepaths etc but you just have to wonder around and try and find them.

Love the Leicestershire Countryside though for road biking and really miss it now I live in Surrey.

bwaarp.

The ‘illegal’ stuff is not really the stereotypical trails that only a few people know about in some rich blokes woodland – it is more footpaths and specifically ‘no bikes’ stuff that can get you into an altercation.

Think Bradgate Park – highest point to lowest point? Beacon hill – same.

You get the idea. Just be there late or early and you should be fine.

The stuff over near Whitwick – especially Cademan and Gracedieu has some really quite good bits in it – and a less snotty attitude.

By the way, I didn’t encourage you to do any of this – I don’t want a trolling off a load of people who live in areas that are great for riding and can afford to keep to bridleways and waymarked trails.

Oh and one more thing about cycling in Leicester – Julie’s Cycles – what a laugh. I’ve met random riders on two separate occasions in the Peaks and Pennines and got chatting – they were still familiar with this shop – don’t go there! They are condescending, cliquey and generally unpleasant and they try to flog all sorts of mis-sized or inappropriate stuff to newbies. I cannot think of a good word to say about the place.

I also agree that Curries in Broadford are generally superior to Leicester (if you go mainstream), but there are some cracking curryhouses in Leicester anyway.

LOL Julie’s cycles,,,,,,,,,, Dannyh that is spot on! I had an ex go in there to buy me an xmas prezzy as she thought, humm bike shop, he likes biking etc etc. I got a lg sleeved training top made by speedo.Yes that well known as a cycling brand! Size XXL because im 6,3? The fact i was built like a cyclist (eg 73kg) didnt come into it. Great days,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,Thanks Julie’s for keeping us guessing at Christmas

i used to work in julies up to 2002. most of the above is spot on. and and major contributing factor in why i left.
that said, websters arent any better. in fact i’d say they are worse.

I’ve lived in Leicester all my life and now live in a suburb on the edge of Charnwood and agree with what’s been said about the riding, not great for MTB but lovely for road riding.

I will disagree about the violence etc. I’ve been to a lot of the bigger cities in England on drinking weekends and Leicester isn’t really any different. There are some pretty crappy areas to live but you get that in all cities don’t you?

Pretty bad picture that some others are painting tbh!

I live in Anstey, about 4 miles as the crow flies from the city centre and the picture most contributors are posting couldn’t be more different from my experience. Granted I would never live in the city but it’s far from the war zone many would have you believe it is, infact Nottingham is far worse IMO.

As echoed above, MTB is limited to tracks and bridleways, some fun stuff but not MTBing as many would recognise it. the road riding is good though and lots of pretty handy racers have hailed from these parts.

+1 fathomer. it aint all bad in Leicester… Plus there’s quite a few strong riders come out of Leic over the years both on and off road so its not all that bad for riding,,,,,,,,,

I disagree about the websters staff,

they have always been spot on and friendly every time i’ve been in there, the new place is amazing (if not a little bit too specialized)

if thats ‘amazing’ you have very low standards! 😉

Websters in the old days (90’s) was awful. Don’t know about these days, but back then it was mainly just Martin sitting there in the dark, practicing the look of someone who’s just bitten into something rotten…. abit concept store like, if the concept was, a trolls cave……

Websters were on some itv programme about improving your business. Some expert went in and suggested a load of changes, one of which was cheer up a bit. When they did the revisit some time later, they’d changed nothing. When challenged as to why Martin basically said ‘I didnt want to’
I’ve never met anyone as rude as him. And I used to work for ken at julies!

toppers3933 that is a great story, id love to see that programme.. I think when they opened bike park things started to improve for a short while, but with Mr Rathbone working for them at that time, it was always going to go to back to sh#it in the end… 😉

i did have a look for it to post a link so it didnt sound like i was talking crap. cant find it though. so make of it what you will.