whats the general opinion on whinlatter. did it yesterday evening and had very mixed feelings over it. what does anyone else think?

I dislike trail centres generally but I really enjoyed it 🙂

the jumpy bits are nice the rest is so so

the jumpy bits are nice the rest is so so

I haven’t done both loops yet, just the first one and enjoyed it. Enjoyed it so much I thought it was too short so will need to go back to do the full route. Was using mud tyres in the wet though and they were the wrong choice for the rocky sections.

It certainly seems mega-popular – rode over Whinlatter from Loweswater on Saturday for a road ride and there was a steady stream of mountain bikers riding up from the Braithwaite side.

the reason i asked was that both loops took well under 2 hours and the north loop at least felt like endless climbing for the size of descent. south loop descent was cool but there are signs of wear and tear already as it looks like too many people think they should be using their brakes, one tabletop/berm tarnsition thing is well cut up by braking. still got big grins by the bottom.
the slaty shale looks like a nightmare in the wet

it’s riding really well at the moment – holding up ok despite the large no.s of people it has attracted.

add in the blue route (7.5km) too – good fun.

It’s great but do the blue loop and the ace singletrack bridleway down to Thornthwaite too. North loop isn’t great apart from the last descent.

It’s a great bad weather alternative and is a nice night ride. Like Grumm says, it’s more fun to start and finish in Thornthwaite, especially with the blue route open. I prefer the north loop to the south – the climb’s more interesting (apart from the fire road section perhaps).

Didnt like it, but one mans meat another mans poison and all that.

North loop isn’t great apart from the last descent.

I disagree, the climbs up the steep fell have great views and are not easy to ride, then after the boring fire road bit the forest singletrack is good, never mind the exciting zigzag downhill to the VC…

Yeah actually since they put the new tricky singletrack bits of climbing in the north loop is a lot better. Still prefer the other one though.

The blue loop is brilliant imo – easy enough for beginners but lots of fun options to jump off etc for the more confident. A couple of huge berms as well.

I think its great now that they have added the blue route on. Its taken it from a 1h30 for both loops to a genuine 2hr loop and even more if you add in seldom seen climb and descent.

A genuine 7 stanes alternative and can be made into as big a days riding as you like. Agree with SFB about the climbs. I find them rather pleasant tbh.

The blue is great fun – I’ve even managed to persuade my better half to give it a go (Warning: better stay away from the blue route Friday evening – there may well be an angry lady explaining which orifice I should stick my Bombers up 8O)

What’s seldom seen?

of course, I’d rather do the tour of Skiddaw or Borrowdale Bash, but a lot of the Saturday riders are keen on it…

Fun. I think that sums its up for me. Great scenery for trail centre too

It’s my local trail and I like it, the last two sections of the northside are good fun and the whole south descent is good too. I’m up there regularly on week nights after work to get in a quick hour or two play time on the fun sections.

It is taking a battering with the amount of people that ride it though, but hopefully they will keep on top of that maintenance wise.

how long does the blue take?

Depends how fast you go!

It’s about 7k and not too much climbing so 20-30 mins maybe?

Its more “swoopy” than technical, which suits me fine!

But then again, any riding is just plain good…right?

I quite enjoyed it when I went round. I don’t think the blue was open then, but did the North & South red loops.

I was suprised how quickly I got round it though.

It was wet when I went & I found the rocky sections to be very slippy – worse than I have experienced on other rides, although I later realised that as I was using my bike that week for a Center Parcs cruiser the tyres were pumped up rock hard which probably didn’t help!

I’d definitely like to go back.

I liked it a lot, the climbs were ok apart from that fire road section on the North loop, and the descents were really nice and flowey just could of done with being a bit longer. I’d defo go again

Had time for bimbling the blue and red south loop with my novice mate this morning, on the Cube Acid hire bikes from cycle wise.

Blue – good warm up and my mate enjoyed it
Red South Loop – fine, and nice to have some singletrack climbing, esp. the switchbacks. Views were good and descending was nice enough. Quite a lot of loose slate chips made some corners slightly “interesting” at times. Smooth really so ideal for hardtails.

Cube Acid – surprisingly comfy HTs but a bit too racy so climbed well but with nervous downhill handling which understandably scared my novice mate. I normally like non-drifty tyres, but the Smart Sams were fast and drifted very predictably on the hard slaty surface once you got used to it.

I look forward to going again if when the area but would prefer one of my own, slacker, trail bikes.

Being on call I couldn’t go out with the guys up around Cross Fell today, so popped over to Keswick to ge one of my bikes serviced and thought Whinlatter was the ideal option……I did the red and then the blue and actually think it rides better all the time – I didn’t like it at first so maybe it is jujst me getting used to it! I still think it has enough going on to make you think a bit, although I think some sanitisation has gone on on the north loop, giving some small drops a run off.

Parkedtiger LMAO at the bombers comment!!!!