I’m pretty much the same height and weight as you and love my large X2. I tweaked it with a layback post and a shorter zero rise stem to get my ideal riding position.

Im 14.5 st and use 321s on Hope Xc hubs. i ride them with no finesse over rocky Peak trails and they haven’t compained once in 3 years.

I run 2.4 MKs ‘ghetto’ and have been very pleased with them in all conditions in the Peaks, Welsh trail centres and in dryish conditions on local woodsy singletrack.
They don’t perform well in wet mud but then they are a large volume tyre with fairly small knobs.
As for punctures, I had a few pinch flats before I ran them tubeless and none since.

Thanks for the comments. I really loved Penmachno and will go back.
The group I’m going with want to try Marin – perhaps I’ll point them in the direction of this thread!

yeah, they hardly constitute a classic, but are good fun and close to town.

Enjoy. Let me know what you think.

My pleasure. For Cheddleton Heath, access is from the junction of Basford Lane and Cheddleton Heath Road – so if you are comming from Leek turn left after Leekbrook bridge onto Basford Lane and at the top of the hill you can access the heath just before the right turn onto Cheddleton Heath road. There are plenty of tracks to find (might be tricky in the dark)and with it being very sandy its a pretty good all weather play area.
For St Edwards, turn right into the first entrance if you are comming from Leek and you can get into the woods pretty much straight after the junction, there is a nice little bit of single track on the LH side but the best bits are on the RH side of the road – again losts of shortish trials but you can make up some entertaining loops if you combine it with the Heath and Mollats Wood/ Hollinhay Wood.

I’ve not had any problems with land owner round here although I think you can run into grumpy types anywhere.
The ‘Heath’ bit of Chedd Heath can be alot of fun – some kids have been putting a bit of spade work in there recently and have put a few jumps in – not my scene I just stick to the singletrack.
Might come across you later I will be taking the dog out for a run later – chasing her around St Edwards and Chedd Heath.

Have you found the nice pieces of singletrack in St Edwards and on Cheddleton Heath?
The Bridleways aren’t a patch on those around Buxton but you can make up some pretty good routes.
Where did the bailer twine incident occur?