A vague and hazy memory,mine was October 1995 ish,Teggs Nose to Macc Forest, down Charity Lane, left and down past the Chapel and back on to the road.
At this point both of us made our minds up, thats enough of that! I was on a fully rigid Concept Ascender, 21 speed grip shift, Tektro v brakes and bright green Michelin Wildgripper tyres ( more like no grip ).My mate was on a Canondale fully rigid thing, can’t remember what model.We then rode back to Teggs Nose carpark on the road as we couldn’t take any more of that off road stuff!Did the ride in white trainers,denim jeans, cotton t-shirt and a quilted lumberjack shirt, was a bit warm !I can re-call not being able to walk properly for a good few hours after that!. 😛

in 1990 on a 1989 specialized rockhopper comp, in red, with trigger shifters, I was 9 & 1/2 stone and fit as tits. On Woodbury common rode around like a mad thing for about 3 hrs. Loved it.

I bought a Mongoose Zero-G SX and two weeks later I did the Kinder loop in the peaks. That was about 98, I was a pure roadie at the time, was a shock to the system. Especialy as I’m a Southerner. Did the South Downs Way later, that was far harder than I thought it would be, thought I’d go up a hill – cycle for 100 miles – and go down a hill at the end 😳

Like most of us I was hacking around woods on a BMX or some such from being a little nipper. Never thought of it as “off road”. My first planned off-road route however was probably late 80s. My folks bought me a Spesh Hard Rock. In fact the next Peaks Pootle is on the same route that was my first proper off road route…

…or it might have been up Rushops Edge, down Chapel Gate, up Jacob’s etc. Both around the same time.

1979
over cutgate with the ctc and some calder clarion riders.
back over the strines road…………. 😥

It was 1990, I was 15, and home from school with a cold.

My dad comes home with a bright yellow Muddy Fox Courier Comp that he’d bought on a whim – gotta love my bike crazy dad!

I eyed this machine up, and took it for a spin up the village green.

The next day, feeling considerably better, I skived off school. I took off in my lycra shorts, rode up to Uffington Castle on the Ridgeway and then did 5 miles along the top of the Downs and back down through Wantage.

I was hooked! 8)

Or 7 years earlier if you count this……

Isle of Arran in about 1988, on some hired BMXs with knobbly tyres. At one point my brother ran me off the trail into a bed of nettles so I pushed him off a bridge. Hard to imagine how I didn’t end up a world dh champion or something after a start like that.

October 1987, Pentlands.

McMoonter will be along shortly..85?

EDIT only mountain bike rides should count or else about 1974 in my folks’ garden.

1996ish, Orange c16R, rigid forks, cantis. Walna Scar road & Grizedale forest in the snow. Had owned an MTB for about 6 months but only pootled locally, this ride was also my first ride with clipless pedals (VP101 Shimano clones).

1978 in Sheepscombe and Cranham woods and jumping up Juniper most nights after school. All on a chopper.

1977 St George’s wood Morpeth, raked around there for years.

only mountain bike rides should count or else about 1974 in my folks’ garden.

what does that mean?

It means he’s bought into the marketing name for taking a bike off road.

Have a think.

It means he want’s a special prize I think.. or an award.. we used to call them chuftie badges..

Whimple Woods.. East Hill Strips.. etc ’83 onwards
EDIT: I dunno if this qualifies as we didn’t have mountains round our way or access to Mountain Bikes.. 😳

i used to live in the UK’s second most inland village of Lillingstone Lovell, and i used to cycle up to wicken woods and blat up and down the fire road. i remember once coming back, the front side-pull u-brake calliper bolt came undone and fell in the wheel; i went over the bars onto tarmac 🙄

McMoonter will be along shortly..85?

Ist ride & first endo ’85 somewhere around the Green Cleugh in the Pentlands

Though I did ride over the Minchmoor Road from Traquair to Selkirk on a Dawes Super Galaxy with camping gear in ’84

Schoolboy rides were on sit up and beg prewar bikes and usually included frying sausages as a rule.

Les Gets about 7 years ago 🙂

Ah in that case. 1977 we did the Ridgeway, I rode a Birds of Colindale.

Ton – is that the road way back? I did that a few years ago as I was too tired to go back over (Was v boggy) – nothing changes! 😀

McM – nice route 🙂

erm a few years ago on a Halfords special, with grip shift gears, it wasnt too bad actualy..
then i could go into my early childhood years and i used to go all over on my bike ( nice road bike with drop handlebars, used to love that..also had a chopper bike (those bikes were great werent they (those clunk clunk gear shifting in the middle of the bike frame…ace ! multi coloured tassles hanging out the hndlebars..lol

The beginning of my MTB resurgence started from Wheelbase in Staveley on the weekend of my Grandparents’ Golden Wedding anniversary and took in some of Green Quarter Fell and Staveley Head Fell. So that was only about 5 years ago!

Went back there last summer, still great fun.

Garburn Pass in about 99 on a steel framed Specialized Hardrock (black and yellow). We pushed the bikes up, and then pushed them back down again!

About 97/98, a quarry in bradford. Could see it from my flat on manningham lane. So decided to take my claude butler up there. During the foot and mouth outbreak in 2001 it was one of the only places I could go offroad. I’d just ride up to the top and back down again for some exercise. Not very exciting.

‘Proper’ ride… 1996 on my new ‘doing well in GCSEs’ present – a second hand Trek 970 from Martyn at York Cycleworks (RIP). New fangled XTR V-brakes, Cannondale Pepperonis, Syncros stem etc. Was lovely.

Anyway, a mates dad took a few of us up north of Helmsley and we did what I seem to remember being mostly fire-road but an excellent ride in the height of summer. Then drove back towards Helmsley and went up past the swimming pool and did a loop up there. That kick started a couple of years of riding from York to Helmsley on the road, doing an off-road ride and then riding home again. Madness… And the rest they say is history…

About November 2003 I think, in the pentlands. It took about three hours in awful weather. I remember being given a route option, and picked the one with the most climbing. Previously I’d only ever cycled to work, and most of my exercise was in a gym. I remember having sausages for lunch and then going to bed straight afterwards 😀

Funny how some things change and others stay the same: I still love climbing, I can do the same route in about half the time and I no longer eat meat (or have to have a sleep after a ride). 🙂

I had an old Diamondback around 1995 which I used to do some bridleway and farm track stuff, but then I swapped that at Guildford Cycles for a rigid steel Rockhopper and picked up a copy of MMB in the shop at the same time, which had a 15 mile loop around this place near me which i thought I’d follow. That was Leith Hill and Holmbury Hill. I bonked massively on the climb from Upfolds Fm up past High Ashes when a group of riders came past and stopped and gave me some food. I think they were Surrey Univ riders but the only thing I really remember was their ridiculous looking shoes and silly pedals.

1986 or 7 i did the press barons trial at brands hatch on a raleigh mtb i did get an award for the most unsuitable vehical,,
then in 88 i rode in a race series based around milton keynes welyn garden city ,,,

never looked back,,, as all the riders are in front

Ladybower Circle from the then newly published Mountain Bike Guide back in 1991 on my very grey and yellow Marin Pallisades Trail.
Not another bike to be seen! Oh how things have changed.

After years spent ragging around the woods on my BMX… it would be January 1990 on a bright yellow Marin Muirwoods (Shimano 200GS! 8) ) up onto Mendip and back down again, resplendent in a Vetta CorsaLite helmet, rambling socks, an old pair of cords, stupidly thick sweater and a Barbour gilet.

A whole new world of fun…

High Street, about 20 years ago.

can’t really remember, but apart from p**sing around in the woods from when I was a littleun, it was probably about 1992/3 and would have been something around Great Ayton, maybe from Roseberry Topping to Captain Cooks Monument.

Guess it would have been sometime around 1983 or so on my old BMX, we used to spend hours hooning around the woods on whatever bikes came to hand. Different path distinctions didn’t mean much to us back then – if there was something on the ground it got ridden!

Much the same mindset continued into my early mountain bike days – I got my first in 1988 and road all over the Lakes and Dales on it 🙂 Took a break after the school days (’94) and didn’t start again until ’99. Since taken another break, but trying to get myself back on track again this year!

drunki please stop the personal attacks.

As Mr Drac implies, I was distinguishing between off road rides and mountainbike rides…tongue as ever in cheek.

Memory’s a bit foggy here but circa 1982 up the Pentland hills on a Spesh Rockhopper bought from Robin Williamsons in Stockbridge. I’ve still got the photo’s somewhere.

87 – Raleigh Maverick through the local woods in Bearsden that I used to ride previously on my BMX. Been hooked ever since. Loving the picture of McMoonter. I’m currently trying to gather old pics, ride reports, reminiscent ramblings etc about Glasgow Mountain Bike Club. What a laugh reading through the old reports and looking at old pictures. Surely now is the time to scan old copies of MBUK featuring Team Moont?

1986? I’d bought a mountain bike for taking some leg work out of the further flung Munros. I think my first use of it was in to Glen Tilt. I didn’t get “into” cycling until around 2005 though.

McMoonter – I recognise that as the old Green Cleugh track. Thank the **** they re-aligned it,

First proper ride was in 1990 age 15/16 with a pink Raleigh Mustang up Ben Vorlich (Loch Earn) then onto Callander.

I only had one offroad tyre on the rear and a front pannier rack. It was rubbish.

drunki please stop

sorry sir.. got ideas above my station for a second there..

sorry for speaking out of turn.. 😳

EDIT: not rising to it.. sorry