Cwmcarn

Yeah, I’d never tried before for fear of having an SPD-related-incident…

Can I ask, where is this concrete slope that everyone keeps going on about? I have ridden at Cwmcarn many times and cant ever remember going up a concrete slope?
Can you enlighten me?

Matt

Hmmmm, surely you’d know, it’s about 10 metres of concrete, 90degree left, and deemed unridably steep to the majority.

Oh, that corner, it’s just a 34×34 blast. Whats the fuss about? 😆

Ohh, ok, is that it. I thought when everyone was talking about this unclimbable concrete slope I was missing out on some of the route? Usually glide up that in middle ring!

Matt

Anyone who can do the DH in under 3.5 minutes is similarly blessed.

Arf. Took me 6 minutes last time I tried. Must try harder… Then again that did include me getting off to mince down the drop-in to the second half.

+1 for all those points above btw. It’s worth doing two laps so you can do the complete XC first time then take in either the whole DH course or the bottom half – which is way the best bit imo, if you like to practice safe easy air.

What’s with the jumps on the FR section tho? Those last three bigger tabletops I can’t get more than a few inches off no matter how hard I huck. Something wrong with the profiles I think, they’re all worn down.. I’ve had better results hitting them on one side where they’re not so worn.

Problem with the FR section tho is that the Twrch bit that covers the same ground is also very good. Super fast slalom singletrack.

Tried the Cwmcarn DH trail for the first time on Saturday … Terrifying in places (although it was very wet after heavy rain all night?!?!).

Much preferred the Twrych Trail.

the problem with the FR section jumps is usually the wind

i can clear the first two if i pedal REALLY hard but the third one escapes me, they need to be a bit closer together to pump through them or further apart to get a couple of pedal strokes in.

they aren’t particularly good jumps anyway which is a shame. it’s the Freeride section, the jumps should be a little bit challenging

Paceman everyone has to start somewhere so good on you for even giving it a go. The first time I ever did it a mate and I pushed up (it was long before the uplift service) in order to recce it beforehand. We’d always thought we were pretty handy on the DH sections but pushing up was massively intimidating. That is until we got to the infamous quarry section where we watched some one launch the 25ft blind gap jump at which point we stopped being intimidated and disolved into gibbering wrecks. Only the fear of loosing face got us down.

Does anyone know what’s going on with the Free-ride section? Was there on Saturday and it was closed, with the drops partially dismantled….

Watched Bike Radars Helmet Cam footage of the DH run and looked quite doable on my Five but then I’m aware that things always look easier on Helmet Cam… I think there’s nothing for it but to go on a week day when there’d be less school kids on Kona HTs kicking my ass and laughing at me :-X

Gary I know you were only joking but really it’s not like that. You get a lot of people of very mixed ability on the course and almost everyone else will be feelng as nervous as you. Book on the uplift and get Daryl to talk you through the course on the way up. You’ll feel a ton more confident and you’ll have a blast. Really the course is not too bad as long as you don’t hit anything at Mach 4!

I believe mojo sponsored rider & personal friend anthony oboyle has the quickest lap time of 36mins, 17seconds. a few weeks ago the trail was summer like bone dry & I managed a 44min lap.
I notice a few people have mentioned cwmcarn is only worth 1 lap, then a trip to afan is in order. I’ve ridden cwmcarn & beyond since 1985 & theres a mass of unknown trails in & around the greater area. I take out guided rides for all abilities, contact me if you’re interested 🙂

Michael, you need to get your arse to Brechfa if you like those table top jumps, and there is a section which you can easily go miles on, very good for practicing/scaring yourself.

Scant – not able to go out for a while but I’ve got a whole hoard of Bristol riders who love CwmCarn (40mins burn down the M4 baby and great fun to ride at night!) who’d love to go out and see what else is out there. Will deffo take you up on that offer in the spring or something if that’s ok!

The people I’ll bring would generally have no issue with two laps for the record – most would do 3 if there was a bribe of tea and cake actually…

Sounds good about the DH run, I’ve got some long weekends coming up towards end of March so might well give an uplift day a go on a Friday or something…

I must be one of the blessed ones for the DH, I managed a 3.32 at the last Dragons, with a couple of taped off lines & finish in the car park 😀

The DH is a good introduction to that aspect of riding. Nothing on the track isn’t rollable, the track rides well in all weathers & it only starts to get hard the faster you push.

Gary, no probs, look me up 🙂