Was just wondering if any of you lot are based in the north east of England? Would be good to have some moral support when heading to the skatepark and falling off in front of teenagers much more talented than me.

Second that. Regularly stop in on the road bike, or on the way up to Scotland or Thrunton where I’m definitely not riding.

out of interest which trails/areas are you definitely not riding, I haven’t been up to definitely not ride since Arwen.

Presumably they can still actively choose to make some roads a 30 much like some roads are 40s but I think it makes sense as a default

that was mental.

I’m sorry but that is F—ing ridiculous, who on earth does it harm? I despair of people sometimes.

I’d also add we need proper cycle carrying provision, in Italy last week I noticed a lot of buses had bike racks on the back. cycling, particularly E-bikes have real potential to bridge the gap between where public transport goes and where people want to be.

Ouch, that does look like you were unlucky, I’ve had ones that look much worse and only hurt my pride. seems slightly ironic that it was on one of the techy bits of trail there and not the huge jumps.

Heal up soon!

If it were up to me I’d make all public transport free, bet you’d still see huge traffic jams but it’s the best way of getting people out of their cars. I’d still cycle everywhere in town but that’s cos I have a healthy dislike for other humans

Broke my arm at Dirt Farm last week, if I’d done that at BPW I’d probably hold a grudge but I totally forgive dirt farm, after all I got to ride the tractor back down AND they have baby birds in the office

Story time?

I’ve just brought myself my first skateboard in 12 years think it’s an early midlife crisis as I’ve recently turned 31 still seem to be able to ollie.

I’d throughly recommend a nukepropf scout if one can be found to match the budget. My sister has one and we’ve just come back from a trip in which she road it on all the trails at anturstiniog as well as a big loop round swaledale. But she also uses it for flat waggonway loops round home. Got to be one of the best do it all bikes I’ve seen. Though some of the credit has to go to the rider in this case.

Definitely still nervous this is still England were talking about.

My town bike is single speed mainly because I’m too tight to have a proper drivetrain as anything else. I’d be tempted to build up a mountain bike for local far to flat routes on an evening but I can’t justify another bike right now.

Six feet under and stage 4 are now both signed off graveyards and zig zags as Black trails, haven’t ridden them but rode past them on NYE look very steep but easy to find.

Was there on Saturday but only for a quick one. The whole of the “black” trail is open. Which is the trail centre loop i normally ride minus k-line, transmision etc. I’ve seen on some of h TV e groups that k-line and transmission are clear but nitrous and accelerator are blocked still. Officially that whole are is still closed so proceed with caution.

was up at my local in Northumberland yesterday assumed there’d be a few trees down but nothing could have prepared me for the devastation that greeted me. lots of damage whole areas of trees completely flattened sound not even uprooted just snapped off at about head high. I reckon half the trails there just don’t exist anymore.

I’ve just done a very similar trip Thursday to Monday instead. Rode Cwmcarn on Thursday doing Pwca and Cafell which I thought were excellent probably some of the best trail centre riding I’ve done (it was sunny and I was riding on a weekday so I might be biased). Had a day at Black Mountain Cycle Centre, that was an amazing experience having been to BPW before as well as more DH orintaited uplift places I thought i knew what I was in for but I don’t think I’ve ever been so fast on a mountain bike, rapid doesn’t cut it berms for days and the jumps were fun even for me who isn’t the worlds greatest jumper felt like progressed loads. Had a couple of days riding at Afan saturday and sunday trying to dodge the weather which was fun felt more standard trail centre if a bit oldschool some really good sections and some forgettable ones but good none the less rode Blade on saturday and Blue scar with a bit of Penhydd tacked on on sunday when the rain stopped.

went to the forest of dean on the way home yesterday, rode Free Miners and there wasn’t much sign of love being shown, though we may have given up on it before the extension bit to be fair the rest of the trails round there were looking very good! did the blue which was fun in the way you expect blues to be and some of the DH stuff which was also a lot of fun even if I did bin it on Ski Run. Thought the skills park was really good and would like to see that replicated at other trail centres one of the thing I find frustrating is the lack of places to practice skills on drops and jumps at most trail centres as you rarely have the opportunity to hit features more than once unless you make quite a big effort.

Anyhow in conclusion riding bikes in new places is fun.

I met a guy the other day who works there and I mentioned some of the comments I had heard. He said they wanted it for famillies to ride and therefore didn’t want people riding it “at speed”.

Then build a green trail. A good blue trail should have something for everyone.

This government is utterly ridiculous. Have they not bothered to process why people might not be working as HGV drivers.

Wasn’t someone saying on another thread that there was a work party planned for October?
or did i make that up?

I do wonder if it basically just isn’t finished but they felt that it was better to get it open as it is and build more features/berms over time than keep delaying it opening, not saying this is a good plan but you can see the logic. IIRC there have been steady improvements to top chief over the years. In terms of the surface whenever a new trail is put in or resurfaced there seems to be problems with grip which once the trail beds in become less of an issue.

Hard to completely shut up shop if they still only need 3 an over or so especially if Roots still in if the fields on the boundary singles should be easy to come by.

I reckon England should be able to chase this down. I also reckon that they won’t.

Yeah, I built up a medium one recently and I’m 172cm if anything it feels a bit short, can fit a 125mm dropper with about 50mm to spare ( I have short legs too). As it happens I’ve also fitted 100mm forks pending being able to afford something longer, it runs fine managed to ride some reasonably rough and steep terrain well as much as you’re likely to try on a 100mm hartail.

Snap, or should I say pop. Although I know what I did to mine, I dislocated my kneecap out hill walking, had to get my girlfriend to help me relocate it so we could get down, I’m going to stick to riding bikes in future much safer.

This is the third time I’ve done this to myself the other two times it’s relocated itself and I’ve not been entirely sure whats caused it, I’m not sure you can rule out tendon damage from an X-ray mind but if you can then this could be what’s happened to you.

For me the first time it was about 6 weeks recovery, the second was over 3 months, this time I hope it’ll be nearer 6 weeks as I’m already more mobile than last time.

I was really disappointed last time we rode NanBield – a few interesting turns down from the top but the long long run out through the valley seemed to have lost all it’s flow and be swampy even when it was dry. My memory of it it from before was that it was fun all the way.

Did this a few weeks ago and that wasn’t my experience at all, would almost say the lower section was better than the switch backs, was bone dry mind.

I tend to use Bing maps to flick between the OS maps and aerial view and I reckon if I can’t spot signs of a path on there then it probably doesn’t exist.

https://www.unparallelsports.com/product/dust-up/

I’ve just got a pair of these, the company have reportedly taken over the manufacturing facilities that 5:10 had in the US and allegedly took a lot of the people who worked for 5:10 too.
Can’t comment of durability yet (their rock climbing shoe’s are as good as you can get while having sticky rubber not sure it translates to biking shoes though) but the design seems good and the rubber sticky. The outer seems reasonable water resistant and there are the bits on the side of the tongue to keep the water out.

Hard to find stock in the UK but worth seeking out IMHO

Haha yeah there’s a lot of scope for it. Different grades depending on suspension and wheel size, with ‘Purists’ insisting on doing everything on a rigid 26er with canti brakes. ‘Onsight’ vs redpoint if you had a few goes, or worked if you practice bits separately etc.

well obviously you can’t tick it if you dabbed ;)

All this was ridden before tubeless tyres young’un

All interesting what i had been considering was Scarth Gap to ennerdale, Blacksail > Wasdale, Blacksail > ennerdale, back by floutern tarn thus avoiding ending up on the wrong side of Honnister at the end of a long day.

Blacksail to ennerdale – never ridden and unlikely to do so – its a waste of your altitude

Is that because its boring or unrideable just wondering about it as a there and back appraicaite that the “correct” way to do it is as part of the 4 passes.

You see the lakes is one of the places that I feel that my Mega is really at home. I mean clearly you can get way with a shorter travel bike but given the nature of slog up and bomb down fairly chunky descents I have no problem dragging the bigger bike up the hill.

I’ve added a few descents I’m curious about to the bottom of the provisional list in the hope that someone who knows what they’re taking about.
If we’re adding to the main list can we stick them where we think they fit on the list otherwise its gonna get confusing fast.

If I was you I’d be after a Transition Spur, I’ll likely never have 5K to spend on a bike so I can’t see myself owning one. I say this as the very happy owner of a Nukeproof Mega, but A) I live in a completely different part of the country to you and have access to both the lakes and tweed valley for day trips and reasonably steep woody trails for evening short day rides, B) I brought it with the intention of using it on uplift days at DH tracks which it does beautifully, C) I’ve kept a hard tail for more mellow rides.

I’ve only been to BPW once but I don’t think you really need a long travel bike, just make sure you have the right geo rather than the right travel.

That moment when the stubborn chainring bolt finally gives way and you realise you forgot to position the allen key with your knuckles pointing away from the chainring…

I did exactly that a couple of weeks ago, it’s only just about healed up now

Apologies – I thought that was a bridleway, though didn’t actually check.

That’s what I say when I get called out for riding on a footpath by an Irate rambler ;)

Agree lets keep it too significant BW descents, if they’re ridges etc that’s fine, if we want to have a best cheeky descent thread as well that’s fine by me but might upset some of the locals.

Edit: when I say BW I don’t mean to exculde BOATs and restricted byways either obvs.

seems sensible so long as we don’t end up listing every bit of cheeky woods action in the area hahaha

The issue being that its more or less still winter up there now, I was ice climbing on ben nevis last week, it’s been quoted earlier on this thread as being end of June early july, reckon they’ll bust a gut to have it open for the Scottish school holidays.

I remember a few sections near the top and near the bottom that looked fairly spicy, I was mainly thinking of the rock slabs at the bottom though.