That Godawful Rudland Rigg.

Mountain Bike Ride

11th February 2016 route

The Bread Lad, The Firemen

Cold and frosty, approaching perfection, blue sky, the merest zephyr barely ruffling the trees around Clay Bank car park. The storms, which have made most rides a little more challenging than usual lately, have taken themselves off to annoy the southerners, which is no less than any race who consider jellied eels a delicacy deserve. Almost a team today, a whole three of us managed to drag ourselves from under the covers and out into the winter sunshine.

After the heinous carry/push/ride up Carr Ridge onto Urra Moor, we continued up to Round Hill, the uninspiring highest point of the North York Moors and onward to Bloworth Crossing ready to attack Rudland Rigg. In some circles Rudland Rigg is considered a good track, a straightforward thoroughfare  cutting directly across the moors, looks brilliant on the map; in reality it’s a gravel-covered monster which defies the usual laws of physics by being uphill regardless of the direction of travel. At one point, after retracing our treads back to Bloworth Crossing, we looked back at the downhill track we had just pedalled the whole way down, despite it being a virtually windless afternoon.

Powering upward, our little team pedalled south on the Rigg, ice-breaking on the large puddles still scattered about the path like droplets in the trough of a giant urinal. Eventually reaching the reason we were putting ourselves through this torture, West Gill Head and it’s associated bridleway, a long and varied descent into the west side of Farndale. Today it was a little muddy in parts but still excellent apart from the wheel stopping bog which engendered an unfortunate testicle/top tube interaction leading to the sort of pain only men can understand. Childbirth - not even close, no epidural or gas and air when traumatised testes are throbbing like kettle drums being beaten by an overenthusiastic but surprisingly rhythmic orang utan.

Reaching the valley otherwise unscathed, we followed the road for a while to Monket House, where a left turn thrust us into a whole new world of pain and verticality as the bridleway heading skyward back to Rudland Rigg had to be ascended. It would be nice to say we powered up it like professional cyclists - obviously not having hidden motors in our bikes we could be nothing like professional cyclists and we all resorted to Shank’s Pony after brave attempts. Back on Rudland Rigg, ascending the track we previously ascended, although we were riding in the opposite direction, the muddy bits had thawed slightly, making it now uphill and draggy. Quite a few miles under our wheels by now and started to feel the pace, which was when my gear cable though it would be a good time to snap, leaving me in the 11 tooth cog for the remainder of the ride.

The most direct route back to Clay Bank meant descending Carr Ridge, the rocky steps we carried our bikes up three hours previously, not often attempted by the Terra Trailblazers, mainly due to our technical inability and lack of testicular fortitude. One less than elegant somersault later, Beth Tweddle has nothing to worry about, I joined the other two at the gate for the last bit of downhill fun before the we returned to the car park.