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Riding there on Saturday for the first time. What can I expect, what are the conditions like (what tires do you all run), what should I look out for and indeed look for? All that good stuff.
Any advice welcomed!
Cheers,
Dan
Pretty rough surface for a trail centre (unless they've repaired it since I was last there. The black descent is fun. Not sure I'd bother going right to the tower at the top - climb goes on forever and the descent is something and nothing really.
Not done the lonesome pine trail.
Kielder is tip top!! Go to the carpark next to the new shop and start off with a couple of laps of the loop just to warm up. Then hit the the red route which climbs up through the trees to the fire road. A section then drops back inot the trees to pop you back up on the fire road again. fire road decent to the bottom then a canny climb up fire road to the next section. We normally just keep on climbing up to the break in trees from here but there is one more section which dips you back in the trees and up and out again, its twisty switchback climbing and is good technical riding...
Carry on climbing up the fire road to where the tree break and the scenery opens up with great views across the valley. Then like Grum says you can either go for the ball breaker climb up to the MOD station at the top which is a hellish fire road climb ( about 20 - 30 mins ) or just hang a right and head back down...
After that section you choose either red or black route, black takes you further up a technical climb then loads of super skinnies at the top but you'd then miss out the best section of kielder, Twist and shout its called, top quality!! Loads of huge berms and nice little jumps and doubles..
All good fun but not very long. I normally do the red route twice in one day!!
Enjoy
Hope the weather stays good and take some midgie spray, they are lethal!!
Yeah I should say actually - think Twist and Shout must be the bit I was on about. Def one of the better sections of trail centre I have ridden, if you like getting wheels off the ground.
I'm off to Kielder on Friday morning.Say hello if you see a P7.
The Deadwater trail is pretty good - Go up to the top if it's a nice day because the views are good. If it's not then I'd maybe swerve it - when I was there it looked like someone had made a stab at trail building on the descent off the top, but it was all washed away - just a very rough fire road.
Struggling to say anything good about the lonesome pine trail - I did it on my cross bike and I was bored. It's one of those blue routes that probably has too much climbing to call it a blue, so it's a red. You could take your missus out round it I guess, but she'd probably get moody with the climbing. There is also a long section of boardwalk at the top that is sort of interesting to ride on - it's spectacularly pointless, but it makes a change from the fire roads.
HAve a look at kielder trail reavers as there's more there than described above.
How fit are you? I'd recommend the lonesome pine/bllody bush combo if you are into XC and reasonably fit. Not particularly trail centre esque as there's a distinct lack of jumps and burms. Ridden fast pedaling hard it's great, if you like that wort of effort.
If you are confident in your fitness you can combine the above with the ride over to Newcastleton. My favourite ride at the moment.
If you do Lonesome pine and Deadwater then do the Lonesome pine first.
I'd echo the comments about going all the way to the top unless you like a hill.
You can repeat the lower section of deadwater so that you climb back up and do both the red and black decents. Which would make it a slightly longer ride.
Cheers Folks! I'm not planning the route so I have directed my mate who is to this thread.
Will it be muddy or is it a typical trail centre surface that drains quite nicely?
Dan
I think we did everything including the climb up to the MOD station which was fine, fun on the way down!. We also managed Dougal's Day Off and Sharron's Stone. We also went up some black ascent with some North Shorey bits and then down some bit with loads of berms (I'd like to do that again but not the climb). All good but I found it hard to read the trail ahead in some sections. Then we went to the North Shore section (not the skills loop) at the bottom near the top off the car park and did all of that a few times.
More challenging that Coed Y Brenin not as much fun as Penmachno. Good riding though!
going up today to do a bit of a kielder 100 recce. doing deadwater, the new blue and the lakeside way. haven't ridden kielder for a year or so, so looking forward to it...