Rochdale Off -road route

Today demonstrates why we always publish our gpx routes after we've put out the course!! Since 10am this morning the route and splits have more or less completely changed with one half of the medium becoming the long and the final long loop is now the medium. What's bought this about? Well that'd be the waist deep snow that Keith waded through along with the sheet ice.

This surprised me somewhat, having ridden the first half of the medium and the long loop without seeing more than a few isolated patches. The new medium route misses out most of the white stuff with just a few sections of unrideable trail. But as this is mainly up hill, it means you get a bit of a breather :-)

We've made the tough bit the new Long loop on the basis that if you're intent on doing 30miles, a bit of snow isn't going to get in your way. That said, we have cut out most of the walking, but on the downside this has meant a bit more road than we'd normally like.

Back to the Medium route. The trails are generally rideable and on hard trails. With the recent weather it's inevitable that there is going to be some mud and puddles, it's January and we're in England, so no surprises there. There are a couple sections that might need a small push for 50-100mtrs but these do give your legs a bit of a rest. So overall, provided we don't have a blizzard overnight, it should be a good, scenic day in the saddle.

GPX ROUTES - IMPORTANT. The Gpx routes have changed from those previously published. The new ones should appear on the right soon marked as version 2.

Ta
Dean