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A long time ago for sure, probably around '75 or '76. Up to Castle Edge and then over through Brook Bottom and down to Strines. My mate reckoned he knew the way back to New MIlls offroad but he was lying and we ended up in Disley. It wasn't *called* a mountain bike but it looked just like one despite having 700c wheels. A tracker.
Around 1986
Raleigh Mustang
Nothing spectacular, farmtracks along the coast to the next village, pull a few wheelies and jumps en route then return along the same route home, much fun was had.
I used to do a bit of BMX riding in the woods as a kid but my first off road MTB ride was when I worked in the Cairngorms. I only really used the bike as gaining quicker access along tracks to the hills for walking. That's what mountain biking was to me back then and the rough tracks felt very fun to me on a fully rigid bike. When I go back there I'll ride all that single track I never considered before.
1978/9 a tracker type thing I converted a junior Raleigh Flyer racer(24x1 3/8 wheels) flat bars and 5 speed touring gears, 14-30? with a SuntourGT dérailleur (still in the cellar, only bit salvaged). Used to head out along the becks in Middlesbrough and up onto the moors via Gt Ayton or Gt Broughton, and play at the jumps behind the golf club. Didn't call it mountain biking though, it was just riding a bike off the road.
Nice idea for a thread and coincidentally my route was very similar to the OPs!
First proper off road route was me and my mate Waddy riding from 'Our End' in Macc up to Tegg's Nose, Charity Lane, Bottom of the Oven, back down to Langley (on the road, only found the track through the forest later) then home. I had a Giant Hurricane which was actually OK. He had some black & white Townsend abomination.
I can still remember it like yesterday. Was either 1990 or 1991. 20 years ago!!!
Rode many variations on that route for another 10 years, 'till I left town.
I really miss those old local hills . Now in Leeds, which although surprisingly has a more diverse and plentiful variety of trails, doesn't have the elevation.
Thanks OP - you've just sent me on a lovely trip down memory lane 🙂
87, mate's Muddy Fox Courier in a couple of feet of snow in Glasgow Necropolis. I think the second trip was a sponsored charity ride up the WHW over 2 days the following year. Remember the brake blocks on the borrowed bikes wearing out and the shoes shaving metal off the rims by the end...
Round the woods on a kid's bike in the 70s doesn't count - everyone did that!
1988 in the Sidlaws. The start of an unhealthy obsession which continues to this day 😀 Love it, kept me sane at Uni when i was mostly cooped up in comp sci labs but always escaped for rides 4 or 5 times a week, and beer. Met good mates through it and enjoyed the silence and stunning views of many lands since on the seat of my bikes. Never quite get people who don;t see the point, why would you not take the opportunity to get wet, cold, scared and skint all at once !
Not on a proper MTB (but a Raleigh Grifter) - used to get dragged round Glen Tannar in Aberdeenshire. My Mum on her BSA ladys' shopper with 3 speed Sturmey Archer and my stepdad on his 1st-gen Saracen.
In the Summers, it was off to Sutherland. I remember doing the route to Sandwood Bay.
First [s]planned[/s] semi-planned route was South Top, north of Braemar - a three day epic in the snow, fulled by Heinzs' 'All Day Breakfasts' in a can and a spot of whisky. Fractured a few ribs, came back to civilisation and eat my bodyweight in bacon rolls.
Spent most of the rest of my adult life trying to recreate the early days....
EDIT: does that last sentence sum up STW? 🙂
Around 2 years ago at Wharncliffe dh. Bit of a baptism by fire 0_0
Sometime in the mid '80s on my first 20" wheel BMX (got my first BMX for my 5th birthday and that was a lot smaller!) in the woods behind our house. First MTB outing was about June '88 on my new Peugeot 24" wheel MTB (15 speeds non-indexed but it did have alloy rims) with my Dad on his new Emmelle 24" frame (he was 6'3" but even so!) MTB, across the bridleways of Northants. First on more suitable landscape was when we took our bikes to the Lake District, though I can't remember if I had my Muddy Fox by then...
January 2001 (wow, 10 years ago!) in the Surrey Hills on a £99 Giant hybrid with twist grips, slick tyres and panniers (oh yes). It was unbelievably muddy and I could not get that heavy thing to move. I rode it for another 8 months or so every weekend until I could afford a proper bike. Those months left me with a love of mtb'ing and a feral hate of Giants!
1987. Bought a Marin Bear Valley, parked up at Langsett and went up on to Cut Gate, turned round and came back just before the decent to Derwent
it was easter of 93 or 94
i think it was the lakes venture scout trip hired bikes- muddy filth soo much fun
mate had his own bike and bought some rockxshox quadras? we were all so jealous
i think the following year we did what would later become CYB
just a shack in the middle of the woods with some hire bikes
on some hardcore gnarly track i watched a mate in front of me crash into a ditch and then followed him- my first proper OTB and split my helmet
that bit of 'trail' is actually a bit of smooth fireroad on the redbull
September '93 at Great Ayton North Yorkshire. It was part of a summer sports development that the local council were doing. Like a summer club thing six of us were took out in a minibus by two council sports development staff and coached/encouraged us to cycle off road. Unfortunately the programme no longer runs but here i am still mountain biking nearly 20 years on!
August 89 on an 88' Emmelle Dolomite, full deore LX. Lovely. Rode up Rivi from Heath Charnock.
1993 I had a £99 Halfords Emmelle Cheetah rigid which I'd inherited after my brother bought an Orange. I went out in my "lycra" shorts (I thought they were lycra at the time but they were cotton gym shorts) and a white school made t-shirt with "Power" stamped across the front although with a Tuff Top helmet (which I would regularly hide in a bush on my way out)!!! Went out over Castell Coch, Caerphilly, Rydry, Machen, Beddwas it was an aweomse day out, we went out super early and I remember getting home about 8pm and it was getting dark. Then I got shouted at by my folks as I got home after dark and didn't have any lights!!! Ace life changing day that was!
summer 1990 on my new multi coloured Peugeot Adventurer that my mum went halves with me with on for my 21st birthday. Flogged it round some local trails and remembered the fun I had as a kid when we used to scramble our bikes through the woods until they fell apart.
Kev
this is a great read.. 🙂
mine was 1986 or 87, a cheap 21" framed Raleigh ATB with a BMX stem and big cowhorn bars, down peckforton gap over the rocks and stuff that made me cautious when i rode it again a few years ago.. the bravado of being 11 combined with inexperience! got to a speed where i wasn't able to slow down, held on, stayed on just, slowed up at the road and laughed as how much fun it was. BMX over, MTB begun.
About '92/'93 our lecturer from Preston College had to do something outside of normal college life with us and dragged us mountain biking on what I now know to be be "Blencathra/back 'o skiddaw". We were on hired fully rigid Scotts in jeans/boots and plastic waterproofs! I was instantly hooked.
That was my 1st proper ride but spent the '70s and '80s off roading on everything from Raliegh Arenas with MX bars and knobbly tyres through to Grifters and BMXing.
Love all those old pics BTW!
mine was 1986 or 87, a cheap 21" framed Raleigh ATB
I'll see your 21" Raleigh and raise you a 24" Raleigh (I was 5ft 9in though).
Also around '86 or '87, just riding round the singletrack in the undergrowth of a local park whiel wearing a ski jacket - but it was "off-road" to me.
Probably 1980 ish Raleigh Grifter, then graduated to a Raleigh Equipe road bike, all on Baildon Moor/Ilkley Moor, Bradford.
I cant recall exactly when I got my first proper mtb. It was either a Diamond Back, and then I think an orange coloured Rockhopper Comp, one of the best handling bikes I've ever had...
Sometime around '87 or '88. It would have been the North Downs starting from the then bike hire shop in Westcott.
87 (i think) Marin Muirwoods, Cherhill downs, Wiltshire.
about 1978 - I'd fitted 'cow-horn' handlebars to my racer (one step up from rotating the bars so they were upside down).
can't remember much of the route but it took in several local building sites plus the available bridleways.
My mate crushed a testicle on his top tube which brought events to a close as we had to help him hop home.
This was my playground when it was previously a farm in the early 60s 😳
[url= http://www.wwt.org.uk/caerlaverock ]biking playground[/url]
Being a country boy I cycled farm tracks/land and the Solway merse until starting work and getting my driving licence. Then work, cars, rallying,badminton,bowls, drink,darts, dominos, women, house purchase, squash took over before I got another bike when my son was born 30yrs ago.
I was at Uni, and went on a sailing trip to the lakes (I was a goth so that was pretty weird to start with as the rest of the people were more you're stereotypical sailing set). We had no wind though for the whole weekend, so ended up hiring a bike and doing a loop around Coniston. it was a total blast, especially liked the downhill bits, even the fireroad climbs were OK. That was back in early 90's.
Wasn't until I got to Bristol in the late 90's that I remember what a good time I had and bought my first "mountain bike" and then it was mostly riding in Ashton Court and Leigh Woods.
First proper MTB ride was on a mid 80's Specialized Stumpjumper in 1987. It had a sloping top tube (higher at the seat tube than headtube) and looking at the pictures appears to be about 20 sizes to big.
From Keswick around the side of Blencathra to Skiddaw House, around the side of Skiddaw and back down Latrigg (still one of my favourite rides when I visit the parents). I got absolutely shit up and loved it.
Late starter here (if you discount messing around on BMX's as a child) - 1998 on a friends borrowed Rockhopper (I think...) round the back of durham university, ended in a crash for me and a full on face plant for my mate on his new cannondale.
First that I remember... Long summer day, over the back of the moors with my dad on his 1940s tourer* on one of his trips to see a man about a dog. A hand-me-down from my sister was definitely better down than up- maybe my only ever dh-oriented rig. A pretty sick rig in any case. A quick detour into the next village to the club, bumped into one of his mates was followed (later) by what seemed like an incredibly long ride back. I can remember the pain in my arse even now.
*No, that doesn't sound like mtb'ing, but since the 90's its been published in various mags as a “killer”, “classic” or “epic” loop. And tourer doesn't really do the bike justice- they don't make them like that any more...
Mine was probably 1990 on an Apollo Kosciusko - some quality Aussie steel. Just roaming around the hills from my childhood home on Razorback, NSW. There was a grass skiing slope not far away, that was quite crazy...
Bike was a lot like this but bright yellow and had a u-brake, it's still in my parents' shed at home.
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