THE CRANKS DESCEND ON THE FOREST 22 Feb 15
Well let me start this by saying I’m a complete
Mountain Bike (MTB) novice and prior to our trip to the Forest of Dean, I had 2
days experience in the past 20 years. I’m a firm roadie but after listening to
story’s of epic day out from the like’s of Craig, Ronnie, Steve and Tony, I
thought there must be something in this MTB lark, so I made the decision to
attend the first official Cranks MTB away day, and what a great decision it
turned out to be.
It was 0600am on a cold icy February’s
morning when my alarm went off and I thought what am I doing? I’m a roadie
getting up early to go mountain biking at the Forest of Dean, however I picked
Mick Carter up and we headed down to Cranks HQ to meet the other guys, 20 or so
in all, we set off in convoy on what turned out to be a very quick transit of
about an hour. When we arrived at the Peddle A Bike Away café our previous
worries about parking were allayed and we lined up the Cranks convoy, slowly we
teased ourselves out of the warm and toastie cars to prep the bikes and kit.
We decided to do one loop of the Verderers
trail socially as one big group, herding cats was the phase I used in my
Facebook post at the end of the day and it was so true, some Cranks set off,
some stayed in the car park, they then set off whilst the others double back,
and so it continued until we eventually met up on the trail.
The first part of Verderers is quite hilly
and the switchbacks took some getting used to, but as a novice it was more than
ride able and quite a good work out, the first thing I noticed was that you
have to concentrate all the time on the trails and this gives another dimension
to riding in relation to the road, but as it turns out it makes the riding
challenging but fun. The second half of the trail is where the real fun began,
whizzing through trees and bombing (not in my case) down the hills. We had
great banter on the way round, mostly people shouting ‘off the brakes Murphy’
and alike, all good fun. There is something primal about riding off-road with a
gang of mates that is quite special, don’t get me wrong, you get this on the
road too, but this was slightly different, you will have to have a go to
understand what I mean.
When we got back to the café, some Cranks went
for coffee, the hardcore went to smash the red run and the others rode
Verderers again, Nic B, had the best tale of the day, he had set off with the
intention of riding the relaxed trail at speed, but unfortunately he got lost
and found himself unexpectedly on the technical red route, and off course he
then smashed it achieving some big air in the process. The whole day was all
very relaxed and we had a fantastic time, unfortunately rain stopped play in
the end and we headed home to tell our respective partners exaggerated tales of
how we conquered the Forest.
The next trip is planned for the 19th
of April, come and join the fun and #crankitup
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