[beddowsm]

Saturday saw a lot of early risers, especially those that were mad enough to join me for a ride through the Welsh hills. The riders for the National Trail ride were…..

Me (BeddowsM)
Tim (TheTimKirby)
Al (Tendays)
Baz (Bazza)
Chris (Mudwiz)
Nick (EastCoastAdventures)
Aggy
Rolly (RollyTTR)
Colin (Dick Dasterdly)
And a surprise meet with BobOneLeg and his mate Steve.

We left the campsite at 0915 for the short road ride to Capel Curig where Rolly and Colin were already waiting for us.



The first trail was an easy warm up around the back of Capel Curig.



The next trail was the difficult uphill section that I mentioned when I originally posted this rideout. A rocky fairly steep trail that is not easy. After the first few meters Colin managed to fall (and Colin doesn’t fall much…infact before this rideout I’ve only seen him off his bike once!!). Half way up Aggy came off…..where I was perfectly placed with the camera.



After the uphill section it was a nice muddy moorland track. Here we all are waiting for Nick. Its obviously Tim and Aggy explaining that the trail ahead isn’t so bad and that he was holding everyone else up.



A few more trails including a few uphill climbs and lots of water splashes and mud.

Baz coming through a puddle.



And then onto the “Car Wash” at Corwen. After all the rain we had we thought the water level may be too high. The river was flowing and people were apprehensive so they sent me through to test the depth. And I tried keeping the revs up but water got into the exhaust again and the bike died. It would start up but wouldn’t keep going….so Chris and Baz kindly joined me in the middle of the river to help get me out. And then the others followed (well, not all….but to be fair the water would have probably killed the bikes so the right decision was made to go round).



Here’s me showing how not to do it.

And the others that managed it all by themselves. Trust me, this crossing is not easy. The bike jumps about all over the place and getting traction is really difficult.

And then onto the Wayfarer which is one of my favourite North Wales trails. And then we bumped into BobOneLeg and his mate…small world.

Bob coming through a water splash



And followed by Tim



This was as far East as we were going so it was time to start the return leg and a few more trails including a short but very steep, very loose surface trail that had a few of us struggling to get up. Infact the only 3 that managed it unaided were Tim, Rolly and Bob. I managed to bin it on the way up, as did Al. Chris didn’t get a fast enough approach and had to get help pushing up. Baz did really well

Note Als bike down, and mine down a bit further up.



And here’s Al coming off…and doing the splits. Ive done this trail 4 times now and only made it up once. Not easy. The best line is over a horrible slab rock, which is normally wet. And apply the revs too early and this is what can happen.

And here’s some of the other attempts

Arrived back at the campsite at about 18:30 completely knackered. Lots of falls during the day. Only 2 survived the full day with a clean sheet, Chris and Tim…..the rest of us had at least 1 fall….me leading with 4 falls. And I’m suffering today because of it.

Fantastic day out. Thanks all for coming.

 

[thetimkirby]

You're not the only one feeling knackered. I feel like I'm walking on stilts, and Roly is sporting a big graze from Bob's bike falling on him. And from his off: he went over the front, with his helmet cam running: expect a funny clip soon.

I've got a few videos of that hill: I'll post them later this week, got my hands a bit full now.

Thanks again for organising the ride, Mike. As usual, it was a blast. Looking forward to the next one.

 

[Whealie]

Mad, the lot of you. The amount of rain we had there puts this ride into perspective. Well done.

 

[micksylver]

Well done all of you. :thumbup:

Pretty sure I would have taken the falling off total way beyond 4 if I had tried that. Fairly sure I would have won the who's bike is now in the most bits contest as well!

 

[beddowsm]

Forgot to post Al coming through the Car Wash

 

[Paul-S]

Hard stuff

Well done peeps

 

[AckAckFlack]

Really sorry I missed this one- it looked like war rather than a ride.
Well done everyone.

 

[rolyttr]

Mike,

Great day, great company.

Got a few battle scars and plenty of aches. 160 miles on a TTR250 is a bit of a challenge, especially when I binned it on the decking on the wayfayrer and planted my face in the greenery!!

Respect to Aggy for having a go, those trails were super slippery and very challenging......even me and Al fell off....

Will have to try and edit a couple of video clips, sadly I filmed the above mentioned crash, a great close up of some marshy stuff!!

Tim has a good vid of me doing a bit of "bog snorkelling" on the TTR, hopefully he'll get it on here soon. Nice one of you picking your bike up on that hill as well.

Thanks to everyone for making it such a laugh.

Roly

 

[Lulu]

Fantastic stuff (but you're all mad ). Well done :thumbup:. Was fab to meet some of you on Saturday .

 

[Lutin]

You are all completely nuts! Great pics and vids though.



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[Boris]

A tip I was given from an expert was to pull the bike from the front in this situation. Pushing it uphill lifts the rear and causes a loss of traction. In really muddy conditions even having someone manually turn the front wheel can make a world of a difference.

 

[beddowsm]

A tip I was given from an expert was to pull the bike from the front in this situation. Pushing it uphill lifts the rear and causes a loss of traction. In really muddy conditions even having someone manually turn the front wheel can make a world of a difference.

Just watched it again and see your point Boris. Al was lifting the rear up as it was being pushed forward. Ive seen tutorial videos in the past and seen people turning the front wheel but it never twigged until now. Will try from the front when we are next in this situation.:thumbup:

 

[boboneleg]

What a piece of luck that was to meet you on the trails, I knew it was your crew as I spotted Al's 'desert camo' riding gear

Glad we could join you for the last few trails especially the ones after Corwen as we haven't done those before. I'll send you a map if I can Mike so you can mark them for me :thumbleft:

My apologies once again Roly for my bike falling on you, the wind was bad that day and the next

Mucho respect to the guys on the big bikes (Mike, Chris and Bazza), it's not easy to ride those bikes on those trails when it's that wet :happy2:

I managed to get a couple of pic's...........

Mike

Roly

Chris

Bazza

It was a shame that we couldn't make it to the national but my mate Paul had planned this weekend for a while and three of his mates had already backed out so I didn't want to do that to him as well, then on saturday he had to head home after he broke his kickstart on the first trail

 

[beddowsm]

I'll send you a map if I can Mike so you can mark them for me :thumbleft:

PM on its way Bob.

 

[Sherwood]

Great ride, great report, thanks for posting.

 

[rolyttr]

What a piece of luck that was to meet you on the trails, I knew it was your crew as I spotted Al's 'desert camo' riding gear

Glad we could join you for the last few trails especially the ones after Corwen as we haven't done those before. I'll send you a map if I can Mike so you can mark them for me :thumbleft:

My apologies once again Roly for my bike falling on you, the wind was bad that day and the next

Mucho respect to the guys on the big bikes (Mike, Chris and Bazza), it's not easy to ride those bikes on those trails when it's that wet :happy2:



No worries Bob, just one of many bruises!! I had already whacked that leg when I binned it about 30 mins before!

Nice to meet you and hope to see you out again sometime. Thanks for the photos.

Roly

 

[bazza]

Thanks Mike for a fab ride and some good trails, you did have me worried a bit with the pics iv seen of you around there, i dont think the chain was best pleased with the car wash cos by the time i got home it was gagging for oil, just so glad i made it through with out dropping it.

Good to meet some more people as daft as us on the big bikes and hopfully do it again some time.

Had a couple of but clinching moments but i did enjoy the first climb we did but my arms felt it at the top as iv not had the bike off raod since last year.
Got some pics and vids that i will post later.

Thanks again to all of you

Bazz

 

[rolyttr]

Here are a couple of short videos.

Sorry about the quality but set up still to be fettled.

Some nice close up views of the marshy grassy stuff unfortunately. Typical that I have the camera running when I crash! But hey, I'm not too proud to show my own demise.

Roly

Water splash North Wales trails - YouTube


Wayfarer Crash edited... - YouTube

 

[tendays]

didn't take a camera but I did take a satnav
here's the route for the record

 

[East Coast]

great write up mike, and some great pictures / vids guys, I caught it some time back and I'm still smiling even now

Only just got round to the more pleasurable things on my computer - like going through the rest of this thread and posting a reply :thumbsup:

A few lessons..
Listen to Mike from the start, don't listen to Bazza or Al (and maybe Chris) after a few drinks....convincing us we will be fine on the little bikes
I need to improve my fitness.

Be prepared to abuse your body, mind and your bike.

Oh and a big thanks to Tim and Aggy for helping me right my bike and coming to the rescue just before I lost the strength to hold it...only now I realise who it was that helped me after looking at the photo of me holding everyone up My mind at the time was with the exhaust burning its way through my trouses..

Despite bailing out early, the bruises, burns and bike damage, I think it's safe to say we're both please we attempted it....(and live to tell the tale )

Thanks also to Chris and Mike for getting Aggy's bike through some of the tricky sections and Tim and Mudwiz for technique advice, would have liked to talk more with Tim afterwards about his techniques but couldn't see him in the barn..it would have been great to talk tactics with you all in fact (and fill Tim in on my standing up icey rocky decent fall on my head at the 2010 Xmas meet - why you probably wondered why I was sitting down for most of the time (ouch).....and on that occasion it was Aggy helping
me get down - don't ask me how she manage it that time without falling off :thumbsup:

Whether it be XRV, ABR or ECA...we will hopefully see some if not all of you again soon!! :thumbright::thumbright::thumbright: