Returning by popular demand the 10th Hope Valley Mountain Bike Challenge takes place on Saturday 25th September 2010. For those brave enough to take up the challenge it offers a choice of two very demanding off-road routes of approx 20 and 38 miles around the Hope Valley.

It is definitely not a race, we ask that riders come along, enjoy themselves (hopefully without falling off!) and take up the challenge to complete the route – of course there is also the challenge to consume more calories than you actually burn off by eating the delicious cake provided at checkpoints along the way! Hot soup and a roll awaits riders at the finish. Advance registration is necessary. Check-in and car parking takes place at Hope Valley College.

Entry Form – www.hvmbc.co.uk

The route is the same as last year: OS Map Route

Round 5 of the Pearce Cycles 2010 race series was at Hopton in Shropshire this weekend just gone. The pictures and video are now up.

If you see a pic of yourself and want a high resolution copy (free for personal use), email the image number (DSCF####.JPG, that’s under the image) to .

Day 1 Saturday Pictures (24th)

Day 2 Sunday Pictures (25th)

“To support the launch of the August Edition of Red Bulletin in the UK, out on Sunday August 1st, Red Bull have given us this brand new clip of Red Bull Rampage, Launched in 2001 and held annually through 2004, Red Bull Rampage brings the creative, unrestricted ethos of freeride mountain biking to the contest arena while staying true to the sport’s core ideals. Poised on a sandstone ridge in the brutal landscape near Virgin, Utah, riders were free to choose whatever line they dared between an established start gate and the finish line 1,500 vertical feet below. Exactly what happened between those two points has become legendary.

Check out more insane, life threatening stunts, only in the Red Bulletin. You can read it and find out how to pick up a copy at www.redbulletin.com – plus watch this video as part of an awesome augmented reality montage taking the magazine to Print 2.0!”

So guys got a few of us coming down so see you there. The weather Doesn’t look great but improving  but there is always the pub + were going to do some maintenance see you there.

Shane

A year and a half ago we unveiled a little OS map showing tracks for the Tracks page, now we bring you a Beta version of our route designer for mountain biking in the Peak District – with a twist!

Basically the idea behind it is that there are, relatively speaking, few places people would ride in the Peak District (compared to walking or driving), therefore instead of people constantly having to redraw routes and parts of routes, all the bridleways and joining road could pre-programmed into the map. This makes it possible to draw a very accurate route in a matter of minutes, that might take half an hour by the conventional method. To my knowledge no one else has done this for mountain biking routes.

So far most of the Hope Valley and north has been entered, the west of Sheffield and White Peak needs a lot of work. It works in Firefox and should would in Internet Explorer 7 & 8. This is a Beta version, so it doesn’t look very pretty and is by no means finished, please try it out and leave feedback as a comment below. It is currently separate from the main OS map, but once further developed they can hopefully be merged.

To add a pre-drawn track line (shown in semi-transparent grey) to a new route, simply click on it, a thin red line will appear down its length. The same goes for Tracks, shown in purple. Its ID or name will appear in the box in the sidebar, with the newest section at the top. To remove a section; click on its ID/name and then click the Remove Selection Line button.
To draw your own section; move the cursor to your first point, then (briefly) press the CTRL key, an orange cross will appear (this can be dragged around), repeat this to draw a section, once done click the ‘Lock Line into Route’ button.
Once you have your complete route, click ‘Generate Route URL’ then click the ‘Route Link’, this will display your route on the public version of the map (in another tab or window), to share this route select the URL from the new tab and copy & paste to where you want to share it.

Here’s one I made earlier