What is the the longest descent in the UK?
Official MTB singletrack descent - Golspie as far as I know (and it's amazing)
No idea but I would guess top of Siddaw to Keswick is longest in England.
Duh... top of Ben Nevis to the sea.
Oh no, wait... that would be most vertical height lost. Duh indeed!
May be the greatest height loss messiah but not necessarily the [i]longest[/i] descent. (probably is though 😉 )
Aha, nice edit 😆
I thought these two descents I did last year were rather long...
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Snowdon?
Probably the same as the longest ascent but done in reverse. Isn't that somewhere in West Scotland (or am I thinking of longest continuous road climb/descent)
I guess you're thinking of the Bealach na Ba in Applecross, it's the longest road climb / ascent in the UK, 650m odd.
Torridon.
Can I Put a caveat on this:
Longest unbroken descent in distance - ie no gates, no pedaling. no tarmac... ?
Isn't Cragg Vale the longest continuous road ascent/descent?
Right to roam, careful contouring and a cliff free hill and the limit approaches infinity.
More helpfully it's probably something fairly rubbish from a mountain biking perspective like 50km continuously descending railway path somewhere.
I thought it was doethie valley.
Cragg Vale the longest continuous [b]road[/b] ascent/desent in England,968 feet over 5.5 miles.
Hartside to Melmerby is a fairly long road descent.
Golspie still claims the longest trail centre descent, though there is a little pedalling. Other than crossing the forest roads it's uninterrupted singletrack for 7km.
@ lemonysam,
I cycled the towpath from kings Sutton to lower Heyford. 10 miles in distance with an ascent of 8 meters... 😀
[i]Longest unbroken descent in distance - ie no gates, no pedaling. no tarmac... ?[/i]
Top of the Devils Staircase into Kinlochleven is a good one - about 5 miles and 1800ft drop.
How are you doing the final descent there, ciaran path? Doesn't quite qualify as "no pedalling" that one! Ace, but rather climby for a descent.
I reckon with a couple of gate mokeys you could coast from Consett to Sunderland with a decent tailwind.
Drum Mountain 770m above Conwy down to the sea and yes you can see it from the top.
Carn Ban Mor is a pretty decent descent, 5km long and 800m odd of descent. It does have a 2.5 mile long, steep fireroad climb beforehand. But it's bloody worth it.
Even though it's been sanitized.
Also, the Descent from the Ben Damfh ride in Torridon, that is far better than the Golspie descent, and seems a lot longer too...
beeftubs from moffat has 6.4 mile descent one way and ( 3 slight rises and 1 about 800m long) 11.7 mile descent the other way from top of pass. Road descent though although it runs in the hills with plenty of farm paths running beside it so maybe a long descent beside it
Loch Einich to Coylumbridge must have about 8km of constant descent? There are loads of others in that sort of category.
http://app.strava.com/activities/49837348
One of our Tassie ones 16.2km with only 200m up over the length of it 🙂
I thought the Climach-X trail claimed to be the longest trail centre descent? Maybe it was longest in Wales.
I made a segment from Loch Einich on sunday, Colin. It's not quite finishing up at Coylumbridge and it shows 10.8km (Arctic Char Chase)
Still quite a bit of flat here and there through the ride with the odd bit of climbing.
[quote=martinxyz ]I made a segment from Loch Einich on sunday, Colin. It's not quite finishing up at Coylumbridge and it shows 10.8km (Arctic Char Chase)
Still quite a bit of flat here and there through the ride with the odd bit of climbing.
Cool. I know there's a climb right away out of the loch but I wasn't remembering much after that. You obviously survived danger corner 🙂
Macdui>Derry Lodge c. 12k
Macdui>Linn O' Dee c. 18k (might be the odd metre of climbing here and there after Derry Lodge)
Devils Staircase, "Torridon," Carn Ban More etc are nowhere near this.
Quite a few in Scotland in the high teens.
[quote=theblackmount ]
Macdui>Linn O' Dee c. 18k (might be the odd metre of climbing here and there after Derry Lodge)
There's actually a fair bit of climbing back to Linn o' Dee.
Yeah... all of 26m over 5km 😉
Agreed though it's not technically all descent from Derry
Consett to Sunderland isn't a bad shout though I'm sure I remember a few climbs on it. Alternatively how about the reverse of this, 36.6 km of almost entirely continuous descent. Almost all of it offroad.
http://app.strava.com/segments/4227883
Going back over Strava...
Got a 6km in the lakes with under 50m of up in **********
and another that will be about 8km I reckon with under 30m on it off ******
🙂
By the power of Strava... one of my favourites is 2200ft (670m) of vertical height loss in 2.9 miles which takes about 20 mins, and another recent big one was 1700ft (520m) in 1.7 miles which was over in 12 mins.
OT I know but the last thing I rode in my big was 2000M>Sea in 2 hours down a winding road off Gunung Batur in Bali.
Sadly my Ex didn't want to go over 20mph down it, but it was rather relaxing!
Depends how fast you ride it doesn't it?
Drum mountain or high cup nick dh?
I may be imagining it but wasn't there an article in the mag a while back about a route in the Cambrians which was supposed to include one of the longest singletrack descents in England & Wales?
>36.6 km of almost entirely continuous descent. Almost all of it offroad.<
That's two "almosts" in there. Two strikes and you're out 😉
High street is a long descent towards Pooley Bridge, not saying its the longest.
BTW Cragg Vale isnt the longest road climb in England.
I've heard people say Cross Fell is the longest. It certainly is long.
I think Great Dunn Fell is the longest road climb - comes in at just over 600m vertical if I remember. Next to Cross fell, you can ride up the road and down the bridleway.
Climachx has the longest purpose built singletrack descent in Wales I think.
BTW Cragg Vale isnt the longest road climb in England.
It's the longest [i]continuous[/i] road climb in England.
Also, some people seem to be confusing longest with most vertical metres of descent.
Grum I think you will find you are wrong,
Looking down the longest
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Looking up, dont be fooled that is not a dip
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Where's that then? And that might not be a dip but it looks pretty flat so not continuously ascending. 😉
There's a sign at the bottom of Cragg Vale making the claim I believe.
I can't really see Consett to Sunderland counting. Unless we'e introducing kite biking
Unless the sign at the bottom of Cragg Vale and all the blurb on the internet is wrong, Cragg Vale is the longest (not highest) continuous road ascent/descent in England.
Grum technical I suppose that as a road climb Cragg vale is the longest as the one to the top of Cross Fell is a Bridleway which has been tarmacked to allow access to the air traffic control stuff on the top.
Cross Fell is probably the only Cat 1 climb in the UK.
Edit:- great Dun Fell 😳
The road to the radar station on Great Dun Fell [edit - not Cross Fell Dales rider] is the biggest vertical drop on tarmac IIRC, it's not a public road but is a bridleway, and there are longer descents with less vertical drop. A good climb, but Cat1? I dunno about that.