Gisburn Blue Route?

[Louisa911]

Hello all

After two years of being a student, I'm pretty unfit and want to get into biking again and do some more trail stuff, so my BF has offered to take me to Gisburn one night this week after work to do the shorter 5 mile blue route (18km red route is a no-no especially after a full day at work!)

What should I expect? I haven't done a trail centre trail before, only common land/ moorland / craggy bridleways etc. so nothing purposely built for biking. Seen lots of the red route on videos and pics, and I know that some of the red route is part of the blue route- but what is the most exciting / challenging types of terrain I would expect to find? Whats the trail like in general?

I'm pretty much expecting it to be some fireroad and some flat, simple singletrack stuff, but feel free to suprise me

Cheers

[snotrag]

Your right, basically.

Less likely to be muddy and boggy than a bridleway, easy to find your way round.


Regarding the Red route - its a funny one at Gisburn. Its VERY slow and technical in places, and IMO too much so. Some parts would be faster ridden on a trials bike.

If your well up for it, and its dry enough, you can really, really hammer some of the sections and its a lot of fun. But theres little flow, especially if its wet and slippy.

for 'fun' I prefer Dalby Red, as it flows well whatever speed your going. If you want a challenge, you just go faster.

Enjoy though, if its local it will certainly be better than riding round a field or a boring bridleway or towpath.

[blackburn]

I ride there regularly. Blue route is 6 miles. There's two longer uphill sections really, both on open fire-road so if you're struggling you don't need to worry about the surface just the pedalling. On the second of the uphills, you can divert onto a 'built' section of fun, bermy singletrack which a novice friend of mine on a cheapy bike coped with at low speed.

I think you'll be absolutely fine - the last section pops out of no-where and is a good finale to the circuit...

[Louisa911]

Well it was good fun, the last part of the uphills started to bring on the sick wobbly leg feeling but I did better than I expected to, considering its the first trail based riding I've done before. Glad I had a hardtail for the uphills haha.

Whats that narrower singletrack bit called, about half way round, maybe a little further, that gets quite technical with lots of bumps, rocks and small steep bermy corners? I don't remember exactly how far in it was, but there were trees to the left, and in a few places was quite open to the right hand side. I wasn't expecting it at all! I think it was part of the main route so wasn't an optional bit. Great fun though.

[Louisa911]

Also- next time I visit and not yet feeling up to the complete red route.... can I go on the "Home Baked" section which branches off the first quarter of blue route, and then rejoin the blue route at the end of that particular red section?

Cheers

[blackburn]

Louisa911 said:

Also- next time I visit and not yet feeling up to the complete red route.... can I go on the "Home Baked" section which branches off the first quarter of blue route, and then rejoin the blue route at the end of that particular red section?

Cheers

Yes.