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Morning All!
Had a ride around GF yesterday, having a look at all the trail building going on there, and, as a rider who's never been enamoured with GF's "Fireroad" red route, I have to say that the trail building going on in there looks awesome! The big stuff looks scary, but rideable, without being "rad" (dude!), and the singletrack forest stuff looks really "flowy".
Has anyone any idea when all trailbuilding is to finish and it officially open? (waiting with anticipation, as its about 15 miles from my front door!)
couple of weeks i think - they have a facebook group if you are on there
Cheers Grumm!
As said above a couple of weeks. There was a volunteer dig day yesterday so they might have finished the tight forest bit (unfortunately I wasn't there as I was at Mountain Mayhem). A couple of us rode the new parts after digging a couple of weeks ago (we shouldn't have but as we were also building we sort of felt justified). You are right, it is awesome. I think Gisburn will get a reputation as berm central, there are a couple that must be 20ft high. Lovely bit of boardwalk, some great technical uphill sections, bit of black play stuff and a great roller coaster section. More berms were going in near the old bit of singletrack through the wooded valley as well.
Best bit is there are future plans as well, they are starting to look for funding for the next bit as well (bit of SingleTrack singletrack maybe? or maybe a Hope hill?, Ride On North Shore 😆
Anyone know how long the singletrack bits will be in total?
Looking forward to it, only about 40 mins from my house. Could even ride over Salter Fell to get there. 😛
At a guess the new singletrack will be about 7km, plus a few km of existing singletrack. Certainly worth the effort of getting there.
someone suggested to me an off road connection to Salter Fell (North Lancashire Bridleway) and the BW onto Dunsop Fell...
Glad to hear this, another good trail centre to add to my locals!
Judging by some of the "black" stuff up near the crags, & the berms & jumps running down to the ruin in the valley, I reckon phase 2 should be sponsored by the "Yorkshire Air Ambulance"!
Booking my ride now! 🙂
sponsored by the "Yorkshire Air Ambulance"!
Oy! Get back over t'border. This is Lancashire.
This is Lancashire.
just. The border runs through Tosside 🙂
Looking forward to it!
sponsored by the "Yorkshire Air Ambulance"!
ON a serious note, all air ambulances are entirely funded by donations, they receive no money from the government as I understand it. They do a great job, so if you ever fancy doing some fundraising for a good cause, keep them in mind
This could be another goodun to add the every increasing places to ride after work list.
Loooking fwd to this
I know there is a facebook group but does anybody know if there will be an 'official' open date announced.
I haven't been to a dig day since the end of April, they were talking about a July opening of one or two sections at that time. Last time I rode up there (a few weeks ago) alot of the new contractor machine built sections were incomplete. The volunteer build section (where the machines couldn't go) was so near to completion that they may have actually finished it yesterday. The volunteer built section rides much better than I initially thought it would (when we were building it), it's going to be very good, but high maintenance IMO, it's very narrow twisty trail thru boggy ground. The contractor build stuff looks excellent. There's loads more to be built when/if they get the funding for 2009/10. I think the plan is to have black grade technical sections off the red route.
The short DH lines were looking good, but a few weeks ago appeared to have been mostly destroyed in recent FC felling work. Something I was suprised about, FC are usually more organised, ie not letting trail building take place in areas they know are about to be cleared by heavy machinery.
I think what's being built at the moment is only a small part of the proposed plan.
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I think they are planning to create somewhere for the air ambulance to land up near the black section by the crag 😯 . I also think they are due to reinstate the DH runs once the clearing has been done. You've got to remeber the DH stuff started off as unofficial and to give the guys credit it's sort of been officially adopted.
I were up there yesterday. Tagged along with my mate tex who was invited up by a few of the diggers to go ride some of the new stuff. Got there a little early so we helped out for a while surfacing some of the new hand dug woodsy single track. (if you're gonna dig, take some midge repellant)
The Hard labour paid dividends though when we got treated to a preview of some of the new trails, A great mix of hand built st, machine built st, little tech berms, bowled out berms, mahoosive bermed out wallrides, rollers, double-able rollers, kickers, rollercoaster g-outs, tabletops, hips, rock gardens, drop offs, all on a variety of trail surfaces, tech, but not intimidating. Unfortunately all these goodies are interspersed with sections of motorway fire road but you gotta earn your treats right?
Definitely worth a visit, pop up on a Sunday morning, help dig for a while then go reap what you've sewn.
The DH course looks like its been part reinstated, with some launch areas packed down & 'concreted', though some of the more 'off-piste' unofficial stuff has been kicked over. The DH course is still too intimidating for me though! The signage is good for an excuse to back out of riding it.... "ahhh...don't have a full face helmet...shame!" 😀
The dig went well yesterday, I have around 40 midge bites!!! little ****ers, the banter was good tho and the stone pitching is coming along nicely. It will take a least another dig session to get this part complete. Still not officially open but it should be very soon. For the most up to date information join the facebook group. I will be taking advantage of being off for uni and riding there tomorrow. Special permission form the head honcho lol for my efforts of pushing big rocks uphill! Again the more people who turn up and help dig the more money is unlocked for the project as a whole. I think the next dig is on the 7th of July, access is via the school lane fire road. at 10am till 14:00, however turn up whenever between these times and leave when you want, remember it's volunteer work lol
See you on the 7th
2Hottie
Yea, you didn't finish it. Should be there for the next dig, we will get it done if it kills me (or possibly somebody else).
Right, update time:
Volunteer bit:- we actually finished the stone pitching today so that's now open (we then promptly plowed into the forest on the other side of the fireroad starting a new section 🙄 ).
Contractor bits:- all finished and rideable. The obstacles blocking the entrances have been removed and some basic grading info is up. Waymarking and maps in the carparks should be done over the next few weeks.
Word from the main man is that the trails are now (unofficially) open for riding.
Sounds like the planning for the next phase is underway as well, they are looking to get toilets and a cafe open, chasing funding for a skills area and deciding what the volunteers will do next, might be some woodwork 😀