![]() This is where the gravel bit of the ride gets a bit mountain bikey, and to be fair we’d been warned by someone that had pre-ridden the course to pack the fattest gravel tyres we had.Īs I’m of a certain age I can clearly remember this kind of riding across big landscape and big sky country as the bread and butter of mountain biking back in the day, when it was more about the mountain and a little less about the bike. The nice warm-up for the ride is over when a dead-end farm road turns to aggregate, as we head north into a long off-road section and skirt around Colva Hill, then around Castel Hill to drop into the halfway feed station. The descent is an in-the-drops whoop as we fall off the hill on whooomfy grass, before skittering down hardpacked rocky double track back onto tarmac again for another few easy kilometres. We follow a wide grass bridleway through the bracken along and over Hergest Ridge (both a hill and a Mike Oldfield album) which gives us an impressive 360º view of the England/Wales borderlands. The road turns left and starts a committed climb, before the tarmac peters out to become rough gravel, which then suddenly opens out into a broad hillside on the other side of a gate. We skip round Kington after about 20kms and skip the chance to nip off route for a leg-boosting coffee. This 75km looks like it’s going to be easy. ![]() Every so often there’s a bit of trickier terrain through sunken holloways, and maybe a bit of a walk up a greasy rocky track away from a ford, but it’s pleasant enough going. The first part of our Wild Wales day is on empty country roads, grass up the middle lanes and bridleways of the overgrown and field edge kind. Also, because it had a food and water stop about halfway round, which is handy. We opt for the 75km ride with its 1,500m of climbing as the perfect mix of fun to distance to sufficiently challenging ratio. One of the domes is set up with full cooking, seating and washing up facilities, so we join other riders in preparing our dinners, exchanging stories and spare bunches of salad on the communal tables while sipping Stohk beers that had been expertly chilled in the stream. The bag itself is a large tote made by Lowe Alpine from material offcuts, that would prove handy for carrying stuff around for the weekend and then shoving smelly cycling kit in for the way home. Supported by Rab, Stohk, komoot, Muc-Off and Outdoor Provisions, the sign-on bag is filled with actually useful goodies. There's also covered seating and fire pits for later in the evening when weather apps predict it might clear up. The Wild Wales basecamp for the weekend is a pair of large geodomes hidden at the bottom of a secret hobbitty valley, that’s also home to some capacious bell tents for those that fancy a bit of posh camping, toilets, post-ride showers and a bike wash. ![]() Thankfully we’re directed to park the van under the comfy and dry shelter of a barn before we tip toe down the damp steep grassy hill to sign on. > Taking on the epic Seven Serpents unsupported gravel rideīecause we’d just crossed the border into Wales, we arrive under a blanket of drizzle. The Wild Wales Gravel Festival is a bit of all of what gravel might be, and somehow manages to navigate an absolutely perfect course through the middle of it and make everybody happy. For some it’s a 250km smashfest only stopping for sponsored Instagram posts and a gel, and for a few it’s an extreme yomp against the clock over several fells that doesn’t really count unless you have to push your bike for a bit. For some, it’s a pleasant trundle over some nice genteel tracks and pleasant bridleways with a stop for cake somewhere (and some plaid involved), while for others it’s making tame mountainbike-able trails a bit more interesting. On top of that, everyone’s interpretation of what a gravel ride is varies wildly. Everyone knows what it means when you say you’ve got that genus of bike, although that doesn’t stop menontheinternet whining that gravel bikes are pointless because they’re never used on actual gravel, but I digress. ![]() You could apply the same to mountain bikes that are never ridden on mountains, or road race bikes that aren’t ever raced.
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |
AuthorWrite something about yourself. No need to be fancy, just an overview. ArchivesCategories |