[Closed] 1 day at Coed y - what would you ride?

as much as possible. 'tis fun! beast...

I usually do The Beast and then the Tawr if I have time/energy.

MBR and red bull.

Yep, MBR and Tarw for me too, but possibly saving time to do the Pinderosa/Dreamtime sections as a warm down.

Beast every time (Poss with the short cut at the far end of the Dragon's back). You're then doing pretty much all the MBR & Dragons back.

The Tarw is looking it's age these days (IMHO) with a lot of fireroad & only a few bits of good descent scattered about.

In all honest ?

I'd drive up the road and do Penmachno.

CBA with CYB.

do the start of MBR then half way round take the fireroad to join Dragon's Back at the start of gomez and finish dragons back, best of both trails

I'd probably do the Beast but skip out the pointless fire road loop at its furthest point. A nasty steep road climb is necessary to avoid that part but it's far, far shorter.

Trailmaps from the Visitors Centre / Bike Shop show the route sincluding roads / fireroads so it's easy to navigate and miss out a lot of these grindy, pointless climby bits for the sake of a £5 spend

ChrisL+1

You may have enough energy to do the best bits of Tarw afterwards

ChrisL - you can skip that loop [u]and[/u] avoid the silly steep climb if you take the fireroad off the tarmac road initially as signed, then fork left instead of right at the next junction - this brings you out at the top of the tarmac climb.

what andy7T2 and ChrisL said.

Either the Beast or MBR & Tarw.

Tarw is a bit pants but good for old times sake.

Is it just me that doesn't really mind the long, pointless climbs at CyB?

Nice to have a bit of boring fireroad to chat and cover a bit more distance.

Don't feel like I've done the route properly if I cut bits off.

chakaping - Member
Is it just me that doesn't really mind the long, pointless climbs at CyB?

Nice to have a bit of boring fireroad to chat and cover a bit more distance.

Don't feel like I've done the route properly if I cut bits off.

Yeah - I agree. I only ever go to trail centres with mates so it's nice to have some sections where you can spin along and have a chat....

Chakaping - very true, and on a nice day the views from that bit over to Cadir Idris are stunning. It was fun in 6" of snow last year too 🙂 .

It is a bit of a dull section otherwise though, especially if the weather isn't favourable.

Lowey, -I'd drive up the road and do Penmachno.

CBA with CYB.

You sir most probably preffer pedally trails with lots of climbs. I wouldn't say that Penmachno doesn't have tonnes of fireroad climbs either. Still good fun descends around but nowhere near good as CYB Dragons back - MBR.

you can download and print the trails maps,

As for the long road bit, the fast fire road descent is rough nice. Old school karrimor.

As there seem to be a bunch of regulars on here - does anyone know what the problem with the magic bit of Gomez is i.e. how to avoid puncturing on it? I went through and punctured the front, a guy came through behind me and double punctured, my mate rolled in (who never punctures and got a rear puncture) ... where I was changing my tube there were about 3 other tubes left out there too (not mine of course). There had been a slight drop just before it - nothing extensive though, and there were a couple of little water runs round there too, but I couldn't find anything which made it evident as to why 4 tubes had gone in rapid succession?

I'd agree - The Beast with shortcuts as described.

There are a couple of shortcuts on the Tawr to cut out quite alot of the fireroad guff, but they're not as well known as the shortcuts on the beast (Marin as was).

toby1 - so that's where I dropped that box of drawing pins!

Dammit chaka, you were supposed to keep them and the gaffa tape together! 😛

does anyone know what the problem with the magic bit of Gomez is i.e. how to avoid puncturing on it?

We had the same problem, i think 1/2 of our group had a puncture there one weekend (2 runs each)

There must be a sharp rock on the landing of a jump or drop off, never worked out where it was happening

I'd go and do the Beast, loved it, best thing we did in Wales... One of the best things I've done anywhere actually. Tarw was very good too, I think it might be beyond me to do both in a day without having to take it very easy, which would spoil it a bit.

You can do the very start and finish of the Beast as a short loop, which works really well IMO, you still miss an awful lot of good stuff but you get quite a few of the highlights. So when we went back to do Tarw we did another quick lap of that just to lengthen the day, lovely.

I think it might be beyond me to do both in a day without having to take it very easy, which would spoil it a bit

This is a good point - we spank the crap out of ourselves on all the good stuff on the beast and then cruise everything that doesn't go down on the Tawr.

Depends how fit you are. I'd do the beast.
But I took my lad and he thought MBR was enough for him and a few more casual riders at the bunkhouse agreed