Across Salisbury plain yesterday, not too muddy!

Vortexracing – no, not up the mountain. Along the estuary, skipped through the junction, skirted round Penrhyn Bay, and through Llandudno, and then up and round the Great Orme – love that part of the ride, and the descent from the Rest and Be Thankful cafe is a blast 🙂

Will be heading up the mountain for midnight tonight, but will be on foot.

Enjoy your ride!

will do

Ta

must make a pint of trying a ride up the great orme next year. There appear to be loads of tracks when you lokk down from the cable car.

There is, the Orme is a little world of fun cheek 😉

Looks like my last ride of the year was on Christmas Eve! A frankly insane ride in central London dodging lemming pedestrians. It was quite good fun once I got into the flow of it but mentally draining…

Not been on a bike since then which could be entertaining when I start my track racing early in the New Year. Guess I’d best go prepared for a thrashing!

Just back from my local loop – quick spin around this end of the Hope Valley, bit wet but the weather makes it moody. Valley bottom – Great Hucklow – Windmill – Bradwell Moor – back down into the valley – mixed road and trails, just enough before tonight climb up Mam Tor for Midnight. Couple of pics:

Great Hucklow towards Ashford in the Water

Windmill’s infamous junction:

Bradwell Edge from Bradwell Moor:

Have a great New Year!

It’s gonna be a nightride tonight to see the year in on-top the hills

That sounds good, think that’ll have to be my plan for next year, this year I will be cycling over to a mates to party! 🙂

Sufferfest ‘A very dark place’ about an hour ago, I did a mini sick at the end of the third interval.

Rode the local woods on my spangley newly built 29er yesterday 😀

Just ridden out the front with the kids before it buckets down with rain….Nice

already had mine.. easy local loop with my G/F to tip me over into four figures and 1005 miles for the year 😀

Dec 28 by spodhopper, on Flickr

gentle little pootle discovering what extra carnage the orks from the FC have left across the chase, another 3 brilliant trails gone, so we’ll wait for them to fookoff and go and build some new ones.

did re-discover a cracking old trail, was a wee bit slippy in places and had cake and coffee and met another sillytrack forumite who came for a spin with us today and has an invite to come back and play for a proper big one when it all dries out a bit.

Classic road ride with my club mates
Ivinghoe Beacon, Ashridge,Amersham, Aylesbury,Stewkley and home.

Just off out for a gentle pootle along the Exe estuary with the GF. Quiet way to end a good year.

chakaping – just peddle very hard and very fast, and try not to be sick

I managed surprisingly well, though I didn’t spend much (ok, any) time in front. Felt a bit queasy on the home stretch but kept my breakfast down.

Worryingly, I think I could get quite into this road riding lark.

(I unwittingly lied before btw, think he is/was only European champ)

A quick run up to the Carneddi, around Moel Wynion, a dash through the local woods, and back home for me. Annoyingly on getting home I realised I put a small gash in my knee. How? By falling over clambering up slippery rock. The infamous one last run!

65k’s of Yarkshyres finest moors near Grimwith Res, i’m foooooked that’s 2011 over with… I’ve a feeling 2012 will be even more exciting.

Just got back in from a solo blast round Grinton & Reeth, last of the year but i suspect it will be the first of the new year too.
Peace & love folks:)

Out with the roadies this morning for a final Saturday Chain Gang ride. 44 miles in 2 hours. Whatever happened to the suggestion we ‘slow down’ the winter rides???

A pity our usually coffee shop at the end was closed tho’

Here’s to more in 2012 🙂

tazzymtb –
had cake and coffee

Bet that was at Mammoth 🙂

As per my thread the other day I went up to the borders as my old man has just moved back that way. Despite being advised to go to some other places, I did end up going to Newcastleton yesterday as a) it was nearest b) I was hungover and c) I could pop in and see my cousin who lives there and who I had not seen for 21 years. To be fair the trail is a bit dull except the first bit of red and maybe the end bit but on the plus side I did get to freak out my cousin by turning up on her doorstep and asking for a cup of tea (I did have to ask in The Local Shop for Local People where she lived though, my memory is not that good).

Think I am going to head up Gisburn on Monday as its just up the road but for some reason I have never been. Will see if I have recovered from new year enough to enjoy it.

Just got back from a 20 mile loop around Surrey Hills. Very boggy in places compared to Wednesdays ride. Then had a “bonus” 5 mile road ride when my cheeky short cut went horribly wrong!
Note to self: Be more careful when copying GPS marks for car parks.

Had a nice little local bimble – I gate crashed a girls ride and had an ace time!

3 hrs on North Shrops roads and they can consider themselves well and truly owned.
Happy New Year to everyone (and that includes the numpties who don’t know how to overtake, and a special mention to the dude who had the courage to threaten to get out of his car 😕 )
¡Feliz Año!

My last ride of 2011 was with a mate on Bodmin Moor. The conditions were less than ideal with lots of standing water, mud that you could lose a tank in & very strong wind to the extent that we had to pedal on the downhills.

That being said it was my mates first ride up there & we had great fun. Roll on 2012 & even more riding 🙂

Been laid up with a bad back most of this week so last ride of 2011 was Sherwood Pines on Christmas day. Only other people there were a few surly rogue dog walkers wandering along one of the singletrack sections.

Yep just about to leave, did a fairly long one (for me) yesterday slippy slidey, dog faster than me on the down bits, but even in the rain and wind sloggin across some single track mid field I remember reflecting that there was no other place I’d rather be at that moment just as the right tune came on.

So I’m off now and I shall further reflect on what has been the sh1test year of my life to date, lost a mill, buried my mom and my best man, heard a couple of days ago my riding mates 14 yr olds throat cancer has returned..

Hey ho can it get any worse?

Was over Swinley for a couple of hours earlier, very sloppy. Just shy of 2000 mile for the year, so that’s next years target mileage sorted.

red blue and green routes linked at Brechfa yesterday on new Gryphon build,

Not long got in from a nice 3 hour ride in the Forest of Dean with two lovely young ladies for company. Took a lesser used route out to Dowies, plenty of fun, slick singletrack and an unusual amount of mud for the FoD 😯 All followed by the last bacon butty of the year 😳

Here’s to many more in 2012 (rides, that is, not just bacon butties!)

first ride in months (that’s changing I can assure you) and last of the year was a 6 mile local pootle, proper muddy/a bit rainy/a bit.

On the plus side the wife met me half way round so we could throw a ball for the dog, that made it so much more worthwhile 😀

Now going to Sainsburys to buy a bike mag and some mixers for my rum

Yesterday was the last ride of 2011 for me. A cracking 20 miler round The Long Mynd with a few friends, yeah we got wet but it didn’t dampen our spirits at all.

Monday will be the first of many for 2012

Hamsterley black route was yesterday’s last ride of the year for me. Frozen in places- boggy in others! Well worth the slog up to the transmitor though! All the best for 2012

Cycled from home in Hazlemere to favourite viewpoint in the Chilterns, Whiteleaf Hill, then did many slippy slidey downhills off it before meeting wife and daughter in Princes Risborough.

I’ve done my first ride of the day but my last ride of this year will also be the first ride of next year. Heading out about 10.30-11 for a couple more hours on the mtb and start 2012 at the top of a great descent. Did it solo last year but have company this as so many folks were jealous of my last new year.

Just back from 17 miles around Leeds. Went to try and find the new offroad trail from Temple Newsham to Roundhay Park.

Last one of the year for me today. Heres to loads next year. 🙂

A sloppy Bringewood.

It is done. 18kms around the local woods. Good to run into 3 different groups of kids out biking and found some of them building a gnar trail which I’ll check out next year. 4001.38 kms for 2011 and 40650m elevation gained. All in my own time, for fun. No commutes here 🙂

Muddy one in Wentwood forest yesterday and an hour’s blast around town this afternoon. Good to see the local outdoor skate park packed with kids on bikes/scooters . . . why Newport City Council have seen fit to demolish it (just a couple years after it was built) next year to make room for another football pitch I have no idea 👿 . . . the adjacent pitch was virtually empty in comparison 🙄

eye, yep, had a muddy ride yesterday over Summit area at Littleborough and around Blackstone Edge…nice loop with a good grassy downhil decent closely followed by my sons running Husky dog …just kept on running…. 😉

Had a muddy slog to QE park this morning then spent an hour with the QEPC trail builders mid ride felt really good giving a little back to the trails I have ridden for years