Reading with interest, might do the route next summer.

Cheers Whitestone. I like the idea of having a few key bits of information taped to my bars for pacing and motivation. As for speed, I’m able to keep a decent pace (for me) for up to about 100km but I’m planning on taking it easy and trying to enjoy it.

I’m not planning on taking a stove just cold food and try to get something warm in Glenmore and Braemar if the opportunity presents itself.

Kit list.

– Bivvy bag
– 3/4 mattress
– Lightweight sleeping bag
– Insulated gilet
– Food (about 2000 calories)
– 2 bottles
– Water purifying tablets
– Small first aid kit
– Spot tracker
– Garmin
– Mobile phone with the gpx file and PDFs of the route maps
– Spare pair of socks
– Light weight sleeping base layers
– Buff
– Waterproof jacket
– Merino long sleeve top
– Spare tube
– Sticky patches
– Pump
– Multi tool
– Duct tape
– Tooth brush and tooth paste
– Front and rear lights
– Smidge
– Midge head net
– Loo roll
– Hand sanitiser

Clothes wearing

– Bib shorts
– Jersey
– Waterproof socks
– Full finger gloves
– Helmet
– Shimano SPD shoes
– Sunglasses

Not too different to what I’ll be taking. I won’t bother with water tablets, waterproof socks or a SPOT tracker but I’d add some spare brake pads (my front pads were shot last time). Excluding food but including the various bags and harnesses to hold it in I’ll have about 4kg of kit as a base, might be a bit more depending on the weather.

One point about strategy – no matter what speed you intend to ride at, stopped time is wasted time. I have two pairs of data fields on my GPS: one pair is overall time and stopped time, the other is moving speed and overall speed (includes stops). Trying to keep the moving and overall speeds as close as possible also means keeping stopped time to an absolute minimum.

For much of the route you don’t need to be checking your GPS – navigationally there’s only Rothiemurchus and Nethy forests that are complicated. Once you pick up a track you’ll be following it for two or three hours with little chance of error (unless the ground is covered in snow) since it’s the only track in the glen or across the next pass. For instance at 18km you cross the A9, you are then following the main track in the bottom of the glens over the Gaick and down to Tromish at 50km. Similarly from Nethy Bridge at 86km the next 20km to Bob Scott’s in Glen Derry is just following the one path to and from the Fords of Avon.

It’s worth looking at the track for important turns/junctions and noting down their distance or putting them in as waypoints on your GPS with suitable text. All too easy to be blasting along enjoying the riding only to find you have to back track a couple of km!

stopped time is wasted time

Not if you’ve stopped in the OBI for a pint. 😊

I’m planning on going at a nice easy pace early on then try to maintain it, a mid-ride pint would be very welcome though. 😏

I once was chatting to a guy whilst on a 200km audax and he was explaining about riding at a nice easy pace not stopping idea. Not sure why but it was a bit of a revelation to me and kind of explained why on other audax’s and sportives I’d pass the same people multiple times.

I am however a sucker for an opportunity to eat or drink something nice. Yum!

Spot tracker is for the wife. 🙄

Spot tracker is for the wife.

Where does she go?

Probably off with another man. But whilst she’s there she’ll know where I fell to my death in Glen Tilt.

Someone in the thread above offered to post bit of info about the slightly trickier nav spot. I think it was the glen feshie landslip bit.

Will be up that way this weekend, would be great if you could add the info.

😀

OK.

From the Eidart bridge, and after Colins Howff, there is an obvious wide, muddy quad track. This can be followed but is messy and likely to be very unpleasant. Look for some nice singletrack running parallel. It crosses over a couple of times. Once you get to Ruigh nan Leum, just follow the big gravel track.

You then reach the Feshie. The big track fords it twice. If the water is low enough and you don’t mind getting wet, crack on across it. Otherwise, a few metres before the ford you will see a thin singletrack climbing away to the right. Follow this uphill and across a couple of dodgy landslips. The two tracks then rejoin.

You then want to follow the new(ish) estate tracks past Ruigh Aiteachain and avoiding bits where the old path was consumed by the river.

You eventually reach the woods surrounding the Allt Garbhlach. The new track cuts off the old fire road, up a couple of steppy bits and, after a few twists and turns, deposits you at what is now a bit of a gorge. Descend this carefully on your left, cross the river, and find a scramble back up to the new track. OR, avoid the steppy bit by carrying on up the old landie track, following the line on the OS map. This takes you to a much easier ford. Push up the small embankment and keep following the old track until it meets the new one.

At Achlean, the route now goes further away from the house on the right than is shown on the OS map, towards a new radio mast. It’s a big new track so you shouldn’t miss it.

As far as the “official” CL300 route is concerned, the GPX file will be updated in the next couple of weeks.

For the group start, is it still the case that you can choose which order to ride the inner and outer loops? The new website seems to suggest inner then outer. Not sure what I prefer though. Evening food resupply options in Tomintoul then Braemar via the outer first or having fresher legs and mind for the rougher inner loop sections first!

The route is Blair Atholl – Gaick – Glenmore – Fords of Avon – Linn of Dee – Inverdruie – Tomintoul – Braemar – Blair Atholl. In that order. The inner loop is done reasonably early on.

FWIW, we had another fast finisher last week; 20hrs 5mins

20 starters now and a couple more swithering. Anyone thinking about turning up on 12th September should really get their name in now.

There was not an option on the order on the old site either.

Resupply works well at the morlich cafe then I rode through to tomintoul for my next stop at the old fire station….unless it’s changed hands avoid…it was a necessary evil at the time of day. Then braemar for an early lunch

Quite excited. Currently in Laggan and hoping to try the inner loop tomorrow to get an idea just how far beyond me the full thing would be. The comments above seem to suggest the inner loop is more harderer than the outer per km (though obviously much shorterer)

Wish me luck

@balfa – the ITT route has always been inner part first. The 20km from Glenmore at about 80km in is much the hardest part of the route. The Geldie-Feshie watershed is frustrating rather than hard but probably depends on how saturated the ground is.

hoping to try the inner loop tomorrow to get an idea just how far beyond me the full thing would be

The bit between Glenmore and Glen Derry is easily the hardest, most frustrating bit. When you’re doing this bit you’ll be annoyed at how slow you are going. Bare in mind though that you’ll reach here pretty fresh and ahead of your desired average speed as the bit from Blair Atholl to Glenmore is all pretty fast (unless of course you are trying to ford waist-deep rivers 😉  )

So I had a go Easter 2019.
So happy as I left Blair Atholl. Didn’t notice I had pressed navigate to start of route(Aviemore) rather than follow route.
Interesting night spent on the top of the Cairngorms.

Um. So I’ve installed Viewranger and tried to download the gpx from Cairngorm loop.com but whenever I try to download the gpx it asks me for a password token.

Confused

OMG
You people are insane😁. Did the inner loop today from Feshiebridge. Started off lovely and then got betterer all the way to the top of the Bynack More shoulder. Then it just went to shit and stayed that way for a good 20% of the rest of the ride. I thought I was moderately competent on a bike but just got my arse handed to me on a plate. I don’t think I’ve walked do far since I walked the Yorkshire 3 peaks.

Fair enough, I was very nervous about cracking my cheesy carbon rims 500 miles from the nearest bike shop🙄
And a 100mm Anthem was perhaps not the best tool for the job.

But even bearing that in mind I did a phenomenal amount of pushing, and it wasn’t even that wet. Took me over 9 hours to do the route ~95km or so with supposedly 1333m of ascent.

I just can’t begin to understand how y’all do that and twice as much again in the same ride. Serious respect to you.🤩🤗

The bit round Ryovan and Derry lodge was amazing, but there was just too much other bits that I couldn’t do.

Missed dinner at the hotel so just had a pot noodle.

Really glad I sampled that section before committing to the full route.

Good luck everyone.

It’s been said before, but that bit after the Bynack Mor descent up to around the top of Glen Derry is by far the toughest bit. Most of the rest is on good tracks, gravel roads and tarmac. I’ve told a few folk not to worry too much about the time it takes to do that section as you’d have a good, fast ride to get there and then a good, fast ride afterwards so you do make up lost time.

It took me 9 hours to do the inner loop (albeit with a start and end at Aviemore) last summer.

FWIW, I’d have thought a 100mm Anthem was a pretty good option. Most of the HaB bits aren’t rideable regardless of bike so something light that can be pushed carried works well. (Maybe I shouldn’t also point out that folk have been doing it on “gravel” bikes. 🙂  )

Gravel bikes! Them nutters!

Comment might be angled a bit towards 13thfloormonk as he’s planning on doing the outer loop in a couple of weeks on a Cross bike. But after witnessing his bike skills and lack of fear whilst riding his cross bike, I think he’ll be alright.

On the group start three years ago the inner loop (Feshie Bridge to Feshie Bridge) took me 10hrs on a rigid 29er. It was very wet though – see the Fords of Avon picture on the CL website. Bynack Mor down to the Fords is rough but mostly rideable, from the Fords to the Lairig an Laoigh is basically a push but I think Ian Barrington managed most of it on a fat bike.

The outer loop will be mostly fine, a few bits that I’d walk if on a gravel bike such as Loch an Dun and the head of Glen Tilt but the rest of it would be fast.

If you want to see what a fast ride looks like, check this Strava activity out – https://www.strava.com/activities/2530211870/ About 7h30m for the inner loop. And that time is 2hrs off record pace!

Fitness and general all-round toughness, and kit, aside – it’s the river crossings that scare me. That’s not part of my biking experience down here. What’s the technique? Strip down and go across bare-foot to keep yer socks dry? Or just embrace the wet and plunge in? How do you not drown, and how do you decide when to go for it and when to admit defeat and turn round? Or is this one of those ‘if you have to ask that, stay away’ type questions?

It was this ride that inspired me to get back on the bike but it’s taken me a few years to even get close to the sort of fitness where I’m thinking I might be able to give at least some of the route a shot in a very non-competitive style!

Ten hours for the inner loop sounds like the plan for my attempt. I won’t be breaking any records, slow and steady. That Strava route in the post above is impressive.

Fitness and general all-round toughness, and kit, aside – it’s the river crossings that scare me. That’s not part of my biking experience down here. What’s the technique? Strip down and go across bare-foot to keep yer socks dry? Or just embrace the wet and plunge in? How do you not drown, and how do you decide when to go for it and when to admit defeat and turn round? Or is this one of those ‘if you have to ask that, stay away’ type questions?

be sensible is my advice , dont be a hero , if you get in trouble in fast flowing water up there no one is coming to help you in a hurry.

I had an incident doing a November round on the CL a few years back and i was very lucky that a group were in the bothy and had the fire going , i ended up falling* into the feshie in sub zero temperatures back of 10 pm and the options were stop drop get naked and get in my bag or push on to the bothy and risk the windchill coming down the glen.

By the time i got there i was frozen and practically sat on the fire. – in the morning my clothes had frozen to the floor and i had to use the bothy shovel to get them free/ light the fire and defrost them before i could get back to aviemore. – the train back to Blairathol is pricy on spec and also longer than expected.

Had that been the Avon …. its a long way to anything resembling warm – and even option 1 relies on my dry bags functioning properly after a fair bit of jiggling.

* Wasn’t even high water just an innoculous fall from a misplaced wheel pitching me over.

it’s the river crossings that scare me. That’s not part of my biking experience down here. What’s the technique? Strip down and go across bare-foot to keep yer socks dry? Or just embrace the wet and plunge in? How do you not drown, and how do you decide when to go for it and when to admit defeat and turn round? Or is this one of those ‘if you have to ask that, stay away’ type questions?

It varies. If you know it’s the only crossing I’d take socks off and insoles out of my shoes then put shoes back on. If you know there’s more to come I’d leave everything on ’cause they are either wet already or will be soon after. I definitely wouldn’t go barefoot – the water’s cold and you can easily cut a toe on a sharp rock and be bleeding profusely without knowing.

Here’s Ian Fitz in (and I mean “in”) the Fords of Avon three years ago.

The technique here is to keep the bike slightly downstream and in front of you. Keep the front wheel pointing into the current, you probably won’t be able to hold onto the bike if you don’t or if you do it will pull you over, the back of the bike will just move to align with the current. Use the bike as a “third leg”: keep your legs grounded, move the bike forward; press on the bike then move each of your legs in turn. Repeat. If you do get swept off your feet, it was a close run thing in the above conditions, try and face downstream feet first. If you still have hold of your bike then try and use it as a rudder to ferry glide to the bank.

On the above occasion, the whole of the Nethy Bridge to Linn of Dee section was sodden, the main path was under 10cm of water so we were completely soaked anyway by the time we got there. One of the small burns was over waist deep, fortunately not a strong current.

It’s worth getting a copy of Langmuir’s “Mountaincraft and Leadership” it’s the standard text for MLAs and the like.

Too late to edit!

Found this shot as well from the same crossing

ended up falling* into the feshie in sub zero temperatures back of 10

Of course, your first mistake there was fording the Feshie

Yep … I think maybe I need to just accept that I’m a soft middle-aged Southerner, and stick to the South Downs Way. No rivers there 🙂

Of course, your first mistake there was fording the Feshie

this i cannot deny how ever i couldnt find the turn to the high line(having never used it before) in the dark so just took my chances ….. id ridden through it several times when riding through the watershed in the past (in day light) without issue but i just got a bad line this time

What’s the technique? Strip down and go across bare-foot

There’s clearly people on this thread with stacks more experience than me, but I would strongly definitely say “do not go barefoot”
Very difficult to stay upright even in a tiny stream. In the pictures above it would probably kill you

That one was fun. We then hit another, faster, river and turned back, only to find that the water level on this one had risen too. Deep water isn’t too much of an issue. Fast water is.

A couple of other observations;

Fording with fatbikes is even harder.The river catches the big tyres AND they float anyway. You end up having to stop the whole thing floating away from you.

Low-slung luggage will also catch the water. Fork bags and frame bags can be a real liability. Higher slung bags will, of course, also stay drier.

Out of interest, what tyres are you guys using?

I’ve got Maxxis tyres currently on my Scalpel (High roller 2 on the front and Ardent in the rear). Which are great for my local riding in the muddy woods but can’t help thinking that something faster would be more suitable, maybe a pair of Vittoria Mezcal Graphene?

Thoughts?

I ran specialized fast tracks. 2.3

I run with Bonty XR3 front /XR2 rear. There’s not much soft terrain on the CL, the Geldie-Feshie watershed is probably the biggest stretch, so you don’t need a huge amount of tread.

Bontrager XR4s. They were already on the bike and I didn’t see the point in changing them.

Interesting pics of rivers, I’d be tempted to remove luggage and cross with that and then go back for bike. Then again I say that knowing full well I’d just plunge in and hope for the best!
I saw a vid of a tour divide set up the other day on that there ewe tube and this bloke had a carry handle on his top tube, I reckon that could be useful.

I like the carry handle idea. My scalpel top tube just above the shock gets used like a handle, not quite the same though.

Thanks for the info on tyres, it’s definitely given me some food for thought.

I’m not intending on taking my shoes off, I’m going to wear waterproof socks and have a dry pair for sleeping in.

I did a dry run of my packed bike tonight, a pretty setup it is not. I’m just too tight to buy the proper bike packer stuff. 😏