About

Hi, I’m Andrew Turner I started this blog to share my experiences of Mountain Biking and Road Cycling across the UK in the hope that it will provide a useful resource for all cyclists. I have provided a map and GPX (GPS) files for all the routes to make it as easy as possible for you to go out and ride them yourself.

All the mountain bike rides on this site can be ridden on a hardtail, ideally with some front suspension as some of the routes can be quite rocky in places. All the road routes are rideable on any Road bike with 23mm+ tyres.

Difficulty Ratings

For each route I have awarded a difficulty rating of easy, medium or hard. This takes into account the distance, the terrain and the total amount of climbing.

Climbing Categories

Some of the climbs in the routes are quite challenging so I have graded them accordingly, please see below for more details.

I have used a similar scale as the UCI (world governing body for sports cycling) and Strava to categorize climbs. The length of the climb, measured in metres, is multiplied by its gradient, in percent.

For a climb to be categorized at all, it must:

  • have a gradient of at least 3%; and
  • achieve a score of 8,000 or higher

For example, a 1km climb with a gradient of 8% (1000 x 8 = 8000) would be categorized. If the minimum criteria are met then the following points scale applies:

  • 8,000 or greater: Category 4
  • 16,000 or greater: Category 3
  • 32,000 or greater: Category 2
  • 64,000 or greater: Category 1
  • 80,000 or greater: Hors Catégorie