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Greetings
I'm prepping for a Lakeland 200 attempt over the August bank holiday. Looking at the sub-40 hour mark. Taking stuff to bivvy etc. I've read the other forums posts here on it and elsewhere on the web. Any updates on conditions? Anybody ever done it on a cross bike - I have 700x40 tyres?
thanks
bump
It might be better waiting until after this weekend when asking about conditions - it looks like it's going to chuck it down. Depending on how long the bad weather goes on for will have a big bearing on the BH weekend: a day or two and it should dry up again, longer than that and things will start to become soft or even boggy.
Vegetation like bracken will be pretty high at the moment so if any of the route goes through such areas then you'll be slowed down. The high vegetation will also affect ground dampness: a day or two and what water gets through to the ground will be used up by the plants, beyond that it will build up in the soil.
Dunno about CX bikes, maybe an email to Alan Goldsmith will clear that up.
Don't even consider a CX bike, there's enough pushing needed with an MTB. Conditions will be fine, unless the weather in the week before is shit. Eat in Eskdale, as there's not much from there until Keswick.
Did this Monday and Tuesday. DON'T take a cx bike unless you like walking and/or pain. I was on a rigid hardtail and was on the limit of what I could expect to do. Its a tad rocky in places.
Conditions could change but I had beautiful weather and sat here with sunburn but it was quite wet in a lot of places and often was just riding upstream as there had been a fair bit of rain over previous few days.
I did it reading a map with no gps. Meant I took a fair few 'detours' to extend it to 243km and a fair bit more climbing so just sneaked under 40 hours.
Great route! Some really good sections of trails, but some really punishing bits as well.
There is loads of shops en route or just off it, and as it was wet water was plentiful.
bump
What exactly you need to know about conditions? I rode in perfect conditions but it had been raining for a few days before. Probably a bit like the build up to yours on bank hols weekend.
Route is a bit big and massively varied underfoot for a full breakdown of conditions but I suspect the majority of the trails won't change too much bar the amount of puddles en-route. A lot of it is pretty rocky so won't make much difference.
The boggy bits are quite boggy at the moment. I went knee deep on a trudge across towards Wasdale from Boot and that seemed very wet up there. It may dry a bit so less like riding up a river to get to the top but the tops will still be boggy. Stephensons Ground is wet but not as bad as I thought based on reading previous forum posts. The trudge up high street was wet underfoot but not too bad. The Old Coach Road round Clough head had a fair few puddles but the road is knackered due to rain and floods so can't imagine them changing.
I never had properly dry feet all weekend.
Will see you there mjason. I'm also attempting a sub 40 hour over the BH weekend. 🙂
thanks ajf!
see you there 0608