I haven't been over to Malvern for a few years & thought I might have a pottle up there tomorrow, following one of the old Singletrack mag routes probably. I'm guessing the conditions stay pretty decent around there, despite the recent rain & forecast for tomorrow..? Cheers.

Yeah – there are a mix of trails, but the majority of them are pretty well drained, especially up the top. 🙂

Super, worth a punt then I reckon, cheers.

One thing to think about – Malvern gets horrendously busy at the weekend, especially on Bank Hols so prepare for lots and lots of walkers.

A bell or Hope Hub works wonders 😉

hmm good point. Worth the hassle do you think?

Just go late – if you start at 5 even on a BH weekend it will be pretty quiet. Oh and conditions were super dry when I was up a week ago – deliberately went and rode all the bits which normally get a little bit claggy when the rest of the world is oozing mud (mainly the track just above Cottage in the Wood) and they were bone dry too. We've not actually had that much rain here anyway, so it will still be very dry – you'll probably have to try hard to get mud on your bike.

Aim to go up later on today so can report back if that helps. Agree with aracer though, superb conditions in recent weeks. The current drizzle should keep a few of walkers away with any luck…

Thanks that would be great. Still undecided whether to pop up there or stay local on the Chilterns.

I was riding on the Malverns yesterday morning and even after the rain the night before conditions were perfect. It was getting a bit dusty and loose before that so the rain has actually allowed some sections to pack down and ride even faster now. I'd say go for it.
Chris@CycleActive

Cheers Chris, much appreciated.

Sorry to be bearer of bad tidings- it is p***ing down at the moment and has been for the past hour.

Yeah cheers, forecast is crap but then the Chilterns will be even worse I suspect.

next weekend there's a sponsored walk over the hills,loads of people going from my work, was packed at the same event last time.

Confirm, it is hammering down & has been for several hours with loads more to come.
Only upside would be less walkers. I live local & never go up at weekends, not worth the hassle of comments like "where's your bell", & "cyclists shouldn't be allowed on here"
Mid week totally different, most walkers happy for a chat then.

Yeah cheers, forecast is crap but then the Chilterns will be even worse I suspect.

The Malverns are at least mostly very rideable even after huge amounts of rain – they'll tend to shrug off what we're getting now after it's been so dry.

Oh is it that bad at the weekends? Not sure I fancy wading through packs of hostile walkers all day if I can avoid it 🙁

If you fancy going up the Malverns tomorrow, I'm at a loose end to be fair… Will show you around a little bit if you would like.

Can only make tomorrow from about midday on though, but any time after that is fine by me. And you usually find the walkers get thinner on the ground as the day progresses, but also they don't tend to be out in too much force if the weather isn't ideal. All the better for us!

Email me at mbonnes AT gmail DOT com if you fancy popping up there tomorrow, we'll sort it out.

Cheers mboy, kind offer. I tend to have to start at the crack of dawn due to needing to be home for kids etc later on. Will send you a mail with my number. Can always join up mid ride if you're around later on.

What time are you planning on starting up there?

Could possibly be talked into putting my GF on a train instead of driving her up to Birmingham in the morning! 😉

YGM 🙂

Well, as it turned out, the conditions were fine. There was even some sunshine. 4000ft of climbing on the Malverns is pretty hard work though. Had one of those walker encouragement moments at one point "go on, you can do it" up a particularly stupidly steep climb, which is always nice. I'll definitely be back again sometime soon.

4000ft of climbing on the Malverns is pretty hard work though.

That's pretty good going for a Malverns ride – running the ridge from one end to the other over all the tops (and down into all the passes) isn't quite that much climb.

We were up there for a quick ride early yesterday morning. Perfect conditions and 3,500ft of climbing in 2 hours was plenty for us. Not many walkers at the start (around 8.30am) but certainly was getting busy in the car park when we finished.

We normally do Malvern in more "wintery" conditions as it rides so well in poor weather compared to the local swamps we have to deal with.

Glad you had a good time!

It is good here, especially if you know some of the more techy descents.

It's amazing how quickly the meterage adds up over a short distance too. It's like interval training every time I go out the door!

I love the Malverns. Was back there on holiday (visiting my folks) a few weeks ago, great time, riding pretty much every day, early starts (7am) meant that the hills were pretty much deserted, apart from the like minded bikers 🙂

Got my climbing legs back on.

I've just come back in from a quickie and while last night's deluge has moved a lot of the loose stuff around it felt very, very quick (for me).

North Hill, SugarLoaf, Beacon to St Anne's was all firm, Wyche to Little Malvern was v quick and the quagmire above Cottage in the Wood is barely moist and completely free of ruts.

I ran with NN on the back and FastFred on the front and finished with a big grin .. had the place to myself too, just a couple of dog walkers 😀

I reckon some people have dodgy altimeters.

Nope, I did 19miles and 4,700ft the week before last…

Indeed, I've found tracklogs is generally pretty accurate on altitude gain/loss. Have to admit though, the third time I reached virtually the base of the hills, I had pretty much had enough of this climbing malarkey. Got bitten by a dog too, but that's another thread.

Not suggesting you can't do 4000ft (or 4700ft) up there – more that 3500ft in 2 hours is unlikely (particularly in a group with all the discontinuity that involves).

Not suggesting you can't do 4000ft (or 4700ft) up there – more that 3500ft in 2 hours is unlikely (particularly in a group with all the discontinuity that involves).

Errrr…the Etrex said it was 1056m (3464ft) in 2 hours 08m (1 hour 56 riding time, 12 mins stopped.) Apologies if the slight inaccuracy of my above post offended your sensibilties but I was contributing to a thread on the positives of the Malverns riding conditions not trying to impress(??!) anyone with my climbing prowess (of which I have little).

The group you refer to was only my brother and I on a trail we know reasonably well with the benefit of added GPS; so the "discontinuity" you speak of didn't apply.

HTH

Not meaning to be insulting, but if that was from a basic Etrex (as opposed to an Etrex Summit or whatever other ones have a baro altimeter), then my first comment was correct. GPS altitude just isn't that reliable. Was dubious because I have been known to be able to climb reasonably well, yet never manage that amount of climb up there in 2 hours.

I use tracklogs (having failed to keep up with technology), but my riding mate does use it. When we do our after-ride post-mortem we are rarely more than 50-100ft out on the stats.
We're not climbing gods, both in our 40s and definitely not 'lean', typical ride (twice a week)…10-12 miles, 2500-2900ft…between 1h20 and 1h45 depending on whether solo, tight on time or chatting.

Can't doubt the OPs claims at all…

Well you're all clearly better than me as it took me the best part of four hours yesterday. In case anyone saw me, I was the chap on the carbon blur with a pink bell (borrowed from my daughter :-). Got a few comments on that. Incidentally, I found the walkers to be quite friendly, although I was going out of my way to be slow and polite.

It's a Legend HCX but I transfer the data to Tracklogs which is where I got the climbing stats from. I'm not training for a UCI World cup so don't need the stats to be 100% accurate, but I assume it's there or thereabouts which is good enough for me…

I'm not really interested in arguing the fact though (but I seem to be anyway!) It felt like a lot of climbing for a short distance ride and the dodgy technology we use to track these things seemed to back it up. We were pushing it because we needed to get back home for lunchtime and my legs felt it a bit yesterday when I was playing squash if that helps.

Grtdad seems to be doing similar levels of climbing too….perhaps we're all wrong?

I think littlegirlbunny has it right…I felt like I was doing intervals for four hours up there. In a good way.

I don't care much for accuracy, climbing prowess or whether someone has done slightly more or less than what their watches claim…..but just thought I'd add that my Garmin regularly gives readings of between 800 and 900 meters of elevation gain for rides around 13 miles.

I've also seen people finish one of our tours feeling and looking like they have done double the mileage we actually covered.

So whether altimeters are dodgy or not, it sure can be hard (but very fun and rewarding) work 🙂

EDIT: we tend to take the easy route up if there is one! So if you are climbing the steepest options everytime I can easily see 4000 ft of climbing adding up in a very short time.