[Closed] Does anyone just ride a bike cross country anymore?

Next year Audi release their "get me to a trail centre now" App it is supported by ads from Santa Cruz and orange

Garmin will also release their "fat middle aged bloke down scramble the air ambulance app" to make it less effort to be recued

We don't really do all Mountain because we don't have any mountains, one of those we all got banned from only the ramblers got us to agree to their terms so it doesn't actually look like a ban.

The rest of us mere mortals who are poor just plod around going across Moor and woodland as we always have

I'm an enduroist and I go enduroing on my 160mm gnarpoon enduroist rig. Even when I'm enduroing a nice Sunday enduro loop in the flat local endoroist's countryside with my OS enduro map I'm enduroing it to the max.
What's your beef brah?

Yes of course. I am addicted to maps, dreaming / planning routes. I did two xc rides wih a lot of road a few weeks ago on my enduro/am bike as thats the bike I had with me and the terrain available.

Posting about xc rides isn't that excited and there isn't much media / marketing benefit in showing people riding along a flat bit or going uphill

If you've been away from biking you might have missed that enduro got popular because it reflects how people like to ride the amazing modern bikes we have now.

There's been a lot of marketing around it, but it was a genuinely grassroots thing.

I think more people than ever are now getting a map and heading into the hills on their bikes, it's cooler than riding trail centres anyway.

No I'm not old either I'm 22

mid fifties and I do - are you sure somebody hasn't lied to you about how birthdays work to save money?

xc rides isn't that excited and there isn't much media / marketing benefit in showing people riding along a flat bit or going uphill

But Shirly, you've got to come down some day from up there?

If you've been away from biking you might have missed that enduro got popular because it reflects how people like to ride the amazing modern bikes we have now.

cookeaa - you forgot to mention GoPro, surely a major influence in the perception of what mountain biking is these days. Having sold the world a lifestyle dressed up as a piece of consumer electronics, YouTube is now full of ordinary riders trying to carry off steezy moves for their latest sick edit.

For my sins I own a helmet camera and have indeed recorded unimpressive trailcentre bimbling...

The Key word is of course 'edit' for every 100 hours of riding most mortals do there's probably less than a minute worth reliving, let alone sharing with YouTube trolls. So what you see online is the "best bits" of those that can be arsed to record their riding, maybe 0.1% of the riding that's recorded, which in turn is probably 0.001% of all the MTBing being done, it's a skewed, unrepresentative sample of a much bigger picture.

As for people's unsolicited tails of gnarr and trailcentre adventures, it's not unheard of for people to at least try these places, the comics promote them, they're easy to find and slot in with a busy life, it's general common ground for lots of people who own MTB.

I find when I get talking "cycling" in general with most people, 90% have something different in mind to what I am into, it's no biggy, they're just "Normals"...

Living this side of the Chilterns I've Woburn on my doorstep with varying levels of trail difficulty, plus 15miles to Aston Hill, 15 to Dunstable Downs and Ashridge Park. If I go out and do a 70 km ride through Woburn to Dunstable and back I'd class that as XC as I've done more bridle way than gnarly trails. According to the missus I just went out for a ride on a bike.

Isn't the categories based on competitions and its marketing down to us mortals?

I have some sympathy with the OP. When I started riding off road (in the 80s) it was just about exploring. Then a series of ever more capable bikes meant that it became more about challenging myself to ride ever more technical descents as fast as possible, leading to a few trips to A&E and increasingly longer spells off the bike, as I got older and took longer to heal.

Then this year I got a fat bike. Originally just to use in the winter but it's also helped me rediscover the joy of just exploring. Something about the go-anywhere tyres encourages me to check out those trails that I've looked at in the past and thought "I wonder where that goes". The answer is usually nowhere of course. Yesterday's ride culminated in a hike across a bog and then up the side of a mountain, through waist deep heather with the bike on my shoulders and my own personal swarm of flies for company. Still a great day out though 🙂

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For me (another who started in the 80's) I just ride offroad. Sometimes it simply towpath stuff, other times proper mountains but it's just about being offroad for me.
Again sometimes on my 29er ht and others on my fatbike.

http://labs.strava.com/heatmap/#6/-3.58154/55.23529/blue/bike
and if you take a look at your local area you will be able to see how the local "XC" trails are being ridden

I go exploring all the time, that's never about segments or gnar etc. Just enjoying being out on the bike.

Despite having grown up in the Beacons, ridden in the FOD since the late 90's and always been inquisitive about where paths lead I'm still finding new stuff in these places and new ways of linking them up. I also do the trail centres regularly and enjoy a few uplift days though the year but I generally do whatever I feel like doing at the time. Sometimes I'll do a bit of exploring and a trail centre in the same ride, FOD is my current 'Quick lap of the red/blue then go a-wandering' place. Love the way some trails disappear in the summer growth only to be revealed in the winter and others do the opposite. Even found the remains of one of the old DH tracks I used to ride a few weeks ago, purely by getting lost!

South Pennines here; loads of XC, all-year round and always more to find (even after 15 years trying).

Like many who've responded I guess it's not visible on social media - but plenty of folk out (though many fewer in the winter).

Bike improvements have helped of course, but you don't [i]need [/i]the latest gear. (I'd like transmission that isn't worn down by liquid sandstone tho). And I've not seen a fatbike round here yet.

In short, whatever you ride is fine, so much choice now is great. I started long, long ago on heavy steel frame road bike, side-pull brakes, cottered chain set and 5 gears riding around the streets of London. Could not get enough of it, and still can't.

I live right on the Trans Pennine Trail, that's an off road route from Southport to Hornsea. I like dropping onto that but I do a bit of general Google Earth research beforehand too. I enjoy being able to just get on my HT, and go exploring off road. I went up to Winscar Reservoir the other week, ended up being a 52 miler. I do also enjoy the odd trail centre though to be fair and thought Pines was a lot better the other week than I remember it being.
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About enduro and XC, enduro seems like what mtb was in the late 80s and early 90s before XC race was a focus. It's new as a race event but not as a way of riding, all that's changed there is that bikes got more capable and it got re-branded.
If you put less importance on what you call it, I expect most riders are still riding XC in some way.

XC bike still here and XC routes ridden.

Enduro is just for fatties who can't ride up hill. Otherwise it's just XC.

In most other European countries and the US XC is still huge and even wearing baggies is fairly rare.

Enduro is just for fatties who can't ride up hill. Otherwise it's just XC.

Of course! I've just come back from a great solo XC ride, you should have joined me 🙂

vickypea - that is something I should do, go riding/exploring with other real people

mikewsmith - Member 
Enduro is just for fatties who can't ride up hill. Otherwise it's just XC.

Loving the work dragon, you hear all week?

No, he puts his fingers in his ears Tuesday to Thursday.

Aye, often. TBH, it's just not as good as the more technical riding I prefer, but it's still good. Bottle cages, jumpers for goalposts... Getting the fatbike's brought back a lot of the pleasure too as it opens up different sorts of fannying about. Good simple unchallenging fun, it has its place.

But if it was a choice between XC rides or bashing out world class descents at the golfy or thornie or somewhere and then winching back up and doing it again, then XC can piss off. But why would you limit yourself to only one thing?

I do . Lovely cross country powderpuff bimblecore for me.
On a mtb or cx.

XC is the same as 'trail' isn't it?

Me and all my mates do lots of "XC". I hadn't realised it had become unfashionable until I needed to replace my 29 HT xc bike. Basically very little choice between low-end and £5k race rigs.

I have an enduro bike as well, and do go to the odd trail centre,but sometimes on my ht, to be honest it would need to be pretty serious before I'd bother getting the enduro out.

As someone else who started in the late 1980s, it's all just mtbing to me and everything else is just marketing bs

Lovely cross country powderpuff bimblecore for me.

Sounds like my off road riding! More of us about than I realised.

Me...same riding I've always done. Marketing teams have decided to give it all names so they can sell more stuff.

The bike companies have to take a lot of the blame - prospective MTB buyer walks into shop and is confronted by a bewildering array of kit, most of it completely OTT for what most MTBs get used for. They get talked into buying a 35lb full-susser lump when a hardtail would do the job (but they're not 'cool') Ironically, sales of gravel and adventure bikes are booming because they're probably better suited to the majority of XC riding.

Adventure bike?

My HTs are cool 😛

I have no idea what gravel bikes and adventure bikes are (cyclocross bikes with racks for panniers?)

I just like getting out on the bike & exploring,I don't think they've found a marketing niche for that type of stuff.
Most of my 'Off Roading' is around Rivi with 100mmm of travel,same trails as I've been riding since the 90's.
I'm on a weeks holiday this week so I'll go for a couple of days at trail centres.Llandeglla & Antur Stiniog,but I've not been to Degla for a couple of years & I've only once before been to Stini.
Last years holiday was a week in Les Arcs but next time I'm in that part of the world I want to do some of those WWI Italian military roads.
Not very Rad or Gnar,just enjoying exploring places on the map..

Salsa Cuthroat is one example, but WTF with the suspension corrected fork - gimme a rigid fork of the right length and geo, not some MTB hatchet job!

XC ride, 170mm bike, cos it's a great all-rounder. Full face because I broke my face on the same ride 10 weeks ago.

Riding evolves, bikes evolve, kit evolves - it's still riding cross country though...

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Along with most of the respondents on here, non trail centre riding is basically all I do. I went to the Forest of Dean last weekend, the first time I've been to a trail centre for a year, could be another year before I go to another TC.

We were talking about trail centres today, occasioned by a chat with someone who'd nipped round the North Face in Grizedale Forest, they've evolved along with MTBs. TNF was suited to the bikes of the time but is now more suitable for an XC race, things have moved on. (He was on an HT as it happens - if you are called Andy, were on a Bfe and are on here it was us you were talking to by the shop)

Trail centres are to biking as climbing walls are to climbing: going to the Lakes and going the climbing wall is missing the point!

All the time, 90%+ of the riding I do. Incidentally outside of marathon xc endure is the most "going for a bike ridest" format of competitive mtb going really

hadn't realised it had become unfashionable until I needed to replace my 29 HT xc bike. Basically very little choice between low-end and £5k race rigs.

@olddog - where have you been looking. Dozens of short travel xc fs bikes for £2k. Cotic will do you a tasty British xc 29, 275+ HT for £2.5k

@ jambalaya ... I needed one at short notice so limited to what was in stock or could be ordered in less than a week, at the local shops. Wanted HT and I think that was the main limiting factor. Got a Trek superbly 9.7 in the end, since added dropper post, proper tyres and will fit some SLX brakes I've got in the shed when I get around to it. I have a feeling with more time to think I may have gone full suss.

[quote=mikewsmith ]

View this post on Instagram

(can we get and instagram pic linky thing please as this makes the next one liner lame if you have to click a link...
Do you even xc man?

try this.

http://myword.jeffreykishner.com/users/kishner/essays/013.html

Dozens of short travel xc fs bikes for £2k. Cotic will do you a tasty British xc 29, 275+ HT for £2.5k

Bird have that one featured on the main STW page coming out soon.

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It's a big world, and even in this country there's a lot of riding. Don't worry about what type it is - do what you enjoy.

I like lots of different kinds of riding.

XC is the same as 'trail' isn't it?

sort of? in navigating this terminology when I started riding more seriously it seemed XC is more about actual racing, as a more performance focused variant of Trail/AM. That's why its looked down on. (lycra)

I'd say most people are now Trail or AM riders. Depends how gnar you go, anything more gnar is Freeride or DH

I ride up hills, don't use uplifts, I go down hills, tracks, and trails, singletrack. I consider myself mostly a wilderness trail rider, and don't hit much man made stuff, but I like going fast down hill, but not downhill 😉

oh and I have little idea wtf enduro is.. like DH racing culture applied to trails?

[quote="canopy"]I'd say most people are now Trail or AM riders. Depends how gnar you go, anything more gnar is Freeride or DHI think they THINK they are Trail/AM riders, but really, it's still just XC, but on bigger bikes.

[quote="Vickypea"]cyclocross bikes with racks for panniers?More like touring bikes with knobbly tyres. Putting racks/panniers on a CX bike would a little difficult, and uncomfortable.....

oh and I have little idea wtf enduro is

It's a race format, that's all. Quite specific.

oh and I have little idea wtf enduro is

its an xc race with the climbs neutralised to give us fat biffers a chance..