Go to a bloody airshow then, or even better join up. Getting a ride in a chinook is ace. What’s the best/gnarliest descent in the peaks considered to be?

Parkin Clough.

Taken from:
http://singletrackworld.com/forum/topic/i-think-ive-found-the-most-extreme-dh-in-hopepeaks

Aw, come on; that’s called the ‘Roooty tunnel of death’ as a descent or ‘Climb out of Mordor’ as an ascent…

Look pretty tricky. Is that the one that hardly anyone can actually ride? (and is a footpath)

The over familiarity of the Peak is exactly like a trail centre, right down to the silly names…

The Peak district is not prescribed though. I can go out in the peak and ride any combination of trails, and I can go as fast or as slow as I decide is safe. There are easy trails to spin up, and there are technical bastard-hard climbs. On the descents, there’s more than one line choice. And for what it’s worth, some of us cringe and refuse to call it the ‘beast’.

What I don’t understand is why trail centres in the UK have to be so unmitigatingly dull. Whistler is just a trail centre with lifts – why hasn’t anyone tried to build a UK version of A-line or Dirt Merchant? The North Shore in Vancouver has a vast network of trails, people ride up and down on their all mountain bikes, I’d go as far as saying all of the trails there are more technical than anything you’ll find in a UK trail centre.

UK trail centres have hundreds of thousands of pounds ploughed into them – there’s so much potential to build something awesome. And yet we have 20 or so trail centres across the country, each more bland than the last.

At least it keeps a proportion of the idiots out of MY peak district.

‘AM’ bike is probably the best weapon.

House!

Roadhouse!

Look pretty tricky. Is that the one that hardly anyone can actually ride? (and is a footpath)

Yeah it’s fairly steep. There are a few descents like that – where getting down in one piece is the goal. In that respect it’s more like a trials section than a downhill trail. It may be one of the gnarliest bits but it’s not the best IMO. My favourite bits of the Peak are faster than that.

[video]http://vimeo.com/22623802[/video]

I can go as fast or as slow as I decide is safe

No you can’t, because the trails are shared.

…and as for UK not like Whistler shocker 🙄

Your Peak district! LOL, it’s actually not yours, it’s shared, and so give over with the ‘local trails for local people’ cobblers.

I’m trying to point out that attitudes like yours are hilarious; you think that because there are no little signs at the start of trails or features, that some how this makes the area better than a trail centre…and that you are somehow better than others who choose to ride elsewhere.

Hmm, that reminds me of a track down coed-y-brenin, and that’s only a red route! They wouldn’t have black routes for nothing! Its like a warning to all mountain bikers warning not to ride unless you are extremely skilfull bike handler! 🙂

why hasn’t anyone tried to build a UK version of A-line or Dirt Merchant?

This. We need more trails with proper jumps and drops in. The guys who dig and ride at Woburn have the right idea but obviously there’s not enough of a hill to have long runs.

The North shore couldn’t be more different to anything we have here (or ever could have); it’s pretty much in a city where there is a MASSIVE MTB culture, they are large mountains (most are bigger than ben nevis), the trails are hand made for people living where freeride originated.
We are too far behind and have too much H&S/litigation to have trails like this. The fact that your mrs rode MBR 2nd time out and it’s still challenging/fun to skilled riders is just good design (her 1st ride out must have been in the peaks). If you found it dull, you weren’t riding it fast enough.
The UK could never have anything like the north shore. The FC would be getting sued all the time and the less experienced would have nowhere to ride (as there aren’t enough trails/finance to have greens/reds/blues everywhere)
Trail centres aren’t perfect, I find them too crowded in the summer when the fair weather riders come out but they’re brilliant places to ride especially for people who don’t live in the lakes or peaks.

Of course I’m sometimes limited by other trail users but actually it’s not that common to meet other people, and because the peak district isn’t a scalextric track, people can pass each other easily. So yeah I’d say I can go as fast or as slow as I choose.

I’m not pretending to be ‘local’, anyone is welcome to enjoy the peak as much as I do. I just think it’s a good thing that the area isn’t thronging with mountain bikers all the time. In the same way I’m sure the people that ride Llandegla are grateful that it’s not overrun with people.

You’ve got me completely wrong. I’m not ideologically against trail centres as in places built for the sole purpose of riding bikes. In fact I know they can be great (see the Whistler/ Vancouver thing). I’ve just never ridden a UK trail centre I particularly enjoyed.

I’d actually quite like to ride at Woburn. It seems like those guys have got the right idea (if not the right landscape).

I understand why we probably won’t have anything like the North Shore of Vancouver in this country because of land ownership problems, access rights etc. However I’m sure Whistler and all the other big resorts know about the risks of litigation, and they clearly manage that risk. From what I can tell, Canada’s liability laws are quite similar to the UK’s. C’mon, even the USA (the Land of the Lawsuit) has bike parks.

If you found it dull, you weren’t riding it fast enough.

Yeah, I’ve heard that point before. But see my above point about speed limitations in trail centres by design. They simply wouldn’t work if people could chose their own speed on the descents – and as such there are a lot of engineered speed restrictions like tight switchbacks and short segment downhills interspersed with uphill bursts.

I’ve just never ridden a UK trail centre I particularly enjoyed.

…and that’s fine.

I’m just gently poking fun at those who assume that the trails they ride are superior because they aren’t in a trail centre; it’s all riding, and if half the features at Llandegla where available on a route in the Peak, it wouldn’t make them ‘better’. The mentality is just the same; drive to point A, go round trail XX, go to cafe, drive home.

Mountain biking, for better or for worse, has developed a dependency on the car and trail centres are an extension of that.

Look pretty tricky. Is that the one that hardly anyone can actually ride? (and is a footpath)

correct.

it’s very steep, and techy, i wouldn’t ride it.

but if you’re into cheeky, there are better descents all over the place.

What do I like about the Peaks ‘trail centre’?

You can ride early morning and not meet another soul. You could wander across across a few hills and only see two other riders mid morning and 99.9% of the walkers are friendly. Nay on Cavedale/Beast/Cheeky they even GRIN.

Give me that any day.

I understand why we probably won’t have anything like the North Shore of Vancouver in this country because of land ownership problems, access rights etc.

And lack of mountains. The lowest peak in the north shore is nearly double that of the highest in the peaks and there are 18 of them. In Vancouver. Nowhere in the UK has the mountains to match that.
Looking at ladybower, it does seem quite straight and wide. I can see why you wouldn’t like trail centres if that’s your thing. I ride allsorts; natural, trail centres, DH. I like all of it.

superficial – have you ever been to any of the scottish trail centres? they are not all bland.

FWIW I find riding the eroded messes that pass for trails in the peaks rather dull. One eroded cart track after another.

…lack of mountains…

who needs mountains?

the main lift at Whistler has a vertical wotsit of about 300m.

the main lift at Chatel bike park? – about 300m.

you just need a hill.

you don’t even need a chairlift: the chatel bike park lift takes about 10mins (assuming no queue…), and rewards you with a 10min descent – if you ride very slowly.

i can show you rides with better climbing/descending ratios than that from my back door.

mountain bikers are easily pleased imho; give us a scrappy bit of wooded hillside and we’ll have hours years of fun.

TandemJeremy – Member
superficial – have you ever been to any of the scottish trail centres? they are not all bland.

FWIW I find riding the eroded messes that pass for trails in the peaks rather dull. One eroded cart track after another.

TJ – i will open the invite again – come down and ride – i will show you teh good areas that are not balnd. How many trails have you ridden here/how many times?

200km of lift-serviced descending mountain bike trails.

Gondola to shuttle bikers to around midstation, at 1,200 m

Got this from your door?

Mountain biking, for better or for worse, has developed a dependency on the car and trail centres are an extension of that.

Well, yes, sort of. I’m very lucky though – most of my riding recently has been from my front door.

superficial – have you ever been to any of the scottish trail centres? they are not all bland.

Yeah, I’ve ridden most of them over the years (Never been as far as Laggan though). I quite liked Innerleithen as I recall. I rarely ride any eroded cart tracks these days.

And lack of mountains. The lowest peak in the north shore is nearly double that of the highest in the peaks and there are 18 of them. In Vancouver. Nowhere in the UK has the mountains to match that.

As ahwiles says – the vertical elevation in use isn’t actually that impressive. The top-to-bottom of the trails on Fromme in Vancouver is only 300m. There are plenty of hillsides with that sort of elevation + gradient across the UK.

And what hora said.

A tiny percentage of my riding is trail centres but I’ve enjoyed every one I’ve been to. They are what they are. If you can’t have fun at one I suspect you’d be best off quitting riding bikes and just stick to posting online…

Yep, I’ll do that.

I’m not saying I can’t enjoy riding my bike at a trail centre, but I will say I much prefer to ride it somewhere more natural. My point is more about my frustration that trails centres are so much more boring than they could / should be.

If you can’t have fun at one I suspect you’d be best off quitting riding bikes and just stick to posting online…

Its driving to one, the time spent in transit to get there that makes me expect something ‘good’.

Then you get the cafe like at CYB where the staff need to learn the importance of how fast lightning moves (or at least try moving fasting that a sloth).

The top-to-bottom of the trails on Fromme in Vancouver is only 300m. There are plenty of hillsides with that sort of elevation + gradient across the UK.

What about the other 17?

Dunno, is there riding to be had on all 18? As far as I know, all of the original and well-known stuff is at Fromme, Seymour and Cypress. You might imagine that there’s riding everywhere but it’s such a dense rainforest that it requires a lot of perseverance to build anything. Canada doesn’t really ‘do’ bridleways like we do.

All this just because I fed the troll a couple of pages back. 😕

hora – Member

You can ride early morning and not meet another soul. You could wander across across a few hills and only see two other riders mid morning and 99.9% of the walkers are friendly.

Sounds like most trail centres, except with more walkers.

TJ – read your **** invite

Bored now…..make it stop.

It’s definitely the apostrophe abuse that gets me.

cruzheckler

TJ – i will open the invite again – come down and ride – i will show you teh good areas that are not balnd. How many trails have you ridden here/how many times?

I will take you up on that next time I am down that way ta muchly.

I have ridden a few trails around there but not a lot. I have also seen a few on videos. including trails people rave about.

However I just do not particularly like riding eroded cart tracks which a lot of the riding in that area appears to be. One persons rocky technical challenge is another eroded cart track

What I do like about trail centres is the guaranteed ridability. I’ve lost count of the number of times I’ve gone to a new area and what looked great on the map is a bogfest of walking or technically too challenging or the weather conditions on that day make it impassable or its just plain dull. Of course finding new stuff can be a blast and it feels like it’s “yours” (even though thousands have probably been before you) but for the time poor they definately have their place. Also, as I suspect not one of the most technially competant of the cycling community, I like the fact that the obstacles put in front of me have been deemed possible by someone better than I – so if I can’t do it I know I should be able to and can challenge myself to do it again (and again, and again, and again).

What I don’t understand is why trail centres in the UK have to be so unmitigatingly dull.

There are hard technical section dotted around trail centres that proves it’s not an H and S issue. Airs rock is really daunting to a moderately skilled rider, and it’s an optional line on a red trail.

Consider who commissions trails. The remit is often to make trails that are accessible to novices – a fine principle. Clever design can make them fun for both novices at low-speed, and more skilled riders at high-speed. But everyone needs a challenge so I would like to see more proper black-graded optional sections on UK’s built trails.

The Parkin Clough trail looks really great – loads of bits that would make me sheet my pants!

The usual Peaks what everyone knows can be alot of cart tracks,which i cant be arse with.Years ago(was the norm) i used to ride it until i found better trails there.

But for those who know the area **** shit loads of nice tech,but no not BW’s.

But everyone needs a challenge so I would like to see more proper black-graded optional sections on UK’s built trails.

We’re kind of arguing the same point. I’m all for providing a nice environment where people new to the sport can try it out and go for coffee/ cake afterwards, that’s great. And when those people progress a bit, they can try the other bits they struggled with previously.

But then what? You can either go all Jeyboy and try and do faster laps, but for people wanting more of a technical challenge there aren’t many options in trail centres – riders are forced to find / build DH tracks elsewhere.

In my mind trail centres are just bike parks without a chairlift – They’re a place you drive to, to ride your bike on purpose-built trails, then come home. So why can’t we have riding that’s as technically challenging as some of the stuff at E.g. Chatel bike park / Whistler etc?

hora – Member
If you can’t have fun at one I suspect you’d be best off quitting riding bikes and just stick to posting online…
Its driving to one, the time spent in transit to get there that makes me expect something ‘good’.

Then you get the cafe like at CYB where the staff need to learn the importance of how fast lightning moves (or at least try moving fasting that a sloth).

You could always take your own lunch, that certainly would expedite things and leave you more time for riding.

I went to Brenin yesterday and had a blast. I took a friend who rented a FS and we rode some trails. The fact you can go somewhere and rent a very decent bike (fuel ex8) and ride is brilliant. It makes it fun and accessible for people who want to get back in to riding.

In my mind trail centres are just bike parks without a chairlift – They’re a place you drive to, to ride your bike on purpose-built trails, then come home. So why can’t we have riding that’s as technically challenging as some of the stuff at E.g. Chatel bike park / Whistler etc?

Isn’t this just a matter of time, I’m sure most centres have pland for expansion as well as skills areas/pump tracks we could start petitions for more advanced trails.bsince we are their customer base, I’m sure they would listen.

So why can’t we have riding that’s as technically challenging as some of the stuff at E.g. Chatel bike park / Whistler etc

cos the UK is health n safey mad?