A Ride around the Syfyddrin Trail

I’ve just got back from a nice Mountain Bike ride around the Syfyddrin Trail at Nant yr Arian.

After a little ride around Llyn Blaenmelindwr with Morgan and a picnic at Pendam I left Anna and Morgan to go blueberry picking and headed off for a ride in the sunshine. The weather was perfect, warm and sunny without too much wind. I didn’t ever feel fast or even spritely but I plodded around and overall kept up a decent pace.

From Pendam I followed the Pendam Trail around to the Nant yr Arian Visitor Centre and then followed the Summit Trail out over the moorland, down the ‘Mark of Zoro’ and up the ‘Leg Burner’. I then headed off around Llyn Bleanmelindwr and off past Llyn Syfyddrin follwing the Syfyddrin Trail out to Nant y Moch, down the Bont Goch Descent and then back up the Bont Goch Ascent, down the ‘Hippity Hop’ section and back to Pendam.

From here it was downhill all the way to Penrhyncoch, through Bow Street, Llandre and into Dolybont before heading off-road again along the banks of the River Leri and home.

I only saw two other people the whole time I was out. I overtook one cyclist going up the little climb onto the Summit Moorlnad section and I overtook another cyclist going up the little climb from Nant y Moch. Otherwise I had the place to myself until I got back on the road to Penrhyncoch of course.

Overall it was 36.10 miles but I obviously started up in the hills and ended up at sea-level so it was a bit of a cheat in that respect. The Syfyddrin Trail section was 22.16 miles and took me 2 hours 27 minutes. The total ride was 3 hours 3o.

Not a bad way to spend a Sunday afternoon.

Following yesterdays Beekeepers meeting I rode up to Nant yr Arian for a mountain bike ride. I started at Capel Madoc which wasn’t quite as far up the hill as I had thought, so the climb up to Banc y Darren and the top of the ‘Mark of Zoro’ was longer than I thought.

I was feeling tired and slow too so it seemed to drag on. The Mark of Zoro descent made up for it though but I then had a long hard slog up the leg-burner. From here I rode around the trails to the Visitor Centre and then off down the ‘Italian Job’ and around to Pendam and Hippity Hop. I felt a little better now, but still wasn’t fast. The section up over the moorland was pretty wet but from there it was just the descent to the top of Mark of Zoro and then back up to Banc y Darren and a nice tarmac descent to Capel Madoc.

In the end it was just over 17 miles and with an average speed of 10mph wasn’t actually that slow. I did feel a little tired though so will have a rest day today.

Last night was the last MTB ride before the Dyfi Enduro for me. The idea was to meet the usual attendees of the Wednesday evening night ride at Pendam for an easy ride around the Summit Trail.

I found myself there and at a loose end at 5ish, a couple of hours early so rather than wait around for a couple of hours or drive home just to turn around and come back I thought I’d go for a ride on my own instead. I had intended to take it easy, but started off on the Pendam Trail and as usual started pushing a bit harder to see how close I could get to my Personal Best.

Last time I did it a few weeks ago I beat my previous best by almost 30 seconds with a time of 36:55. On that occasion I got to the Visitor Centre at under 15 minutes.

Last night, the trails were as good as they get, dry, dusty and smooth. There were very few people around and the conditions with only a fairly light wind were ideal too. I got to the visitor centre in under 15 minutes again and I was feeling good, so I started pushing hard from there.

I caught someone up on the Italian Job and got held up for a few seconds, but he soon got out of my way and I then went a little faster than I normally would down the rest of the Italian Job. The next few sections felt good, but by the time I reached the final climb I wasn’t sure how my time compared but it seemed as though it was quite a way to go in 5 minutes in order to beat my time.

As it turned out I had plenty of time and actually beat my personal best by over a minute with a time of 35:39. A fairly reassuring performance with the Dyfi Enduro in a few days time. I then headed off for an easier circuit of the bottom section of the Summit Trail -  Mark of Zorro was lovely, leg burner felt OK too and I did it in a slightly higher gear than I normally would.

Nant yr Arian MTB Trails

The last time I did a timed circuit of the Pendam Trail at Nant yr Arian was about a month ago and it took me 41 minutes and 5 seconds. I was pretty disappointed with this as it was very slow compard to my personal best of 37:22.

I’ve been feeling a bit slow on my mountain bike lately so on Saturday I changed the tyres on it to make it a little faster and easier rolling ready for the Dyfi Enduro. I went from a 2.4″ Mountain King on the rear and a 2.35″ Maxxis High Roller on the front to 2.2″ Mountain Kings front and back. Still not the fastest rolling tyres around but hopefully a nice compromise between easy rolling and grip.

Whilst at it I cleaned my bike in the sunshine and found that the seatpost was half full of solid mud. I cleaned this out then thought to myself if the seatpost is like that then maybe the seat tube is as well. It was, so I cleaned that out too. I’d been carrying around extra weight in the form of mud inside my frame for a while!

Yesterday the conditions were perfect for a MTB ride so I headed off up to Nant yr Arian and starting from the Pendam car park rode around the Pendam Trail to the visitor centre. I wasn’t pushing hard and hadn’t intended on doing a timed circuit but depsite getting a little held up on ‘High as a Kite’ I got to the visitor centre in under 15 minutes which I thought could be good for a record. I therefore upped the pace a little and decided to do a full circuit of the Pendam Trail before heading off elsewhere.

After the Italian Job I was chasing another guy in front of me who was going along at a fair lick. I later found out that it was David, but having him in front of me and catching him slowly made me push just that little bit harder. He missed out the singletrack section at ‘Spaghetti Junction’ so once again I was chasing him down along the tarmac around Llyn Blaenmelindwr. He then took the shortcut to Hippity Hop whilst I went round the back and pushed hard on the final climb, overtaking a couple of other people before hurtling down Hippity Hop to finish in a time of 36:55, a new personal best and 27 seconds faster than my previous best. I was happy with that.

I then stopped and had a chat with David who came down Hippity Hop just behind me and we headed off for a circuit of the Summit Trail as well. Not a bad day out in the hills.

Topo & Heart Rate

With the Mawddach Goldrush looming on Sunday I’m now taking it easy for the second half of this week so that I’m fresh for it. I did however have to do some bike maintenance earlier this week and whilst at it did a wiper seal service on my forks and a rear shock air can service too.

So, yesterday I felt that the bike needed a bit of a shake down before Sunday so went for a ride around the Pendam Trail at Nant yr Arian. All felt fine with the bike, but I’m not getting any faster. Last time I did the Pendam Trail it took me 40 minutes and 42 seconds, which was pretty slow in comparison to my best ever of 37:22. Yesterday I was slower still at 41:05.

It was pretty windy out there which may not have helped, and I did go to circuits and swimfit the night before so wasn’t well rested. However, it doesn’t look like I will be breaking any records at the Mawddach Goldrush on Sunday!

Pendam Trail - March 3rd

After the first lap of the Pendam Trail I then went around the lake again and did some geocache maintenance on one of my Watery Wales 1 series of gecoaches before fiddling with the suspension settings on my bike and doing the Hippity Hop section again. A nice afternoon out in the hills, but I’m not as fast as I should be!

The trouble with trying ti get fit is that it can become a little more than a habit and become an obsession. You end up trying to do more in order to improve, but in the end just do too much. Resting is very much an important part of any training schedule and after last night MTB ride I think today and tomorrow will be rest days for me.

I felt tired from the start and I guess that isn’t surprising. The day before I did a turbo trainer session in the afternoon, followed by a circuit training session and a swimfit session. Then, on top of all that I didn’t sleep very well, only managing to fall asleep for an hour or so on Tuesday night. I then met Dave in Penrhyncoch for a long ride last night. We started off with a long ride up the Bont Goch climb and it wasn’t long before I realised that my legs weren’t up to it. I was soon lagging behind Dave who seemed to be more spritely than usual!

I made it to the top where we met Dan and we headed off through the mist and fog around the Summit Trail. Dan isn’t quite up to speed at the moment either, so at least I had someone behind me on the leg-burner climb, but Dan headed off home after that leaving me trying to keep up with Dave again.

We came back down from Nant yr Arian via Cymsymlog which although a descent does have quite a bit of pedalling along the flats and little rises so even that was hard work but at least I managed to put it in a big gear and keep up. The battery on my lights then died so I had to stick with Dave’s wheel for the last half mile or so in order to see where I was going.

As you can see, it was a fairly hilly 20 miles.

Last nights ride

A good ride, but I’m not sure how useful it was as I was just plodding around doing my best to keep going. Time for a rest day today and maybe some yoga in preparation for a nice long steady ride over the weekend.

It was a silly idea in the first place, but we hadn’t been out on our mountain bikes for a while so Dan, Dave, Martyn and myself met up at Nant yr Arian last night for a ride in the snow.

To be honest it wasn’t that much of a ride as we only covered 5.4 miles in close to 2 hours, but it was good fun and lovely up there with the snow all around and not a soul in sight. The scenery from our headlights was really nice and the riding was fun if not exhilarating. We all fell off quite a lot but the landings into deep drifts of snow were at least soft.

I forgot to take my camera, but Dan took a couple of shots whilst there, such as this one:

which you can see on his flickr photostream.

We’ve just got back from a nice little walk up at Nant yr Arian. There’s loads of snowy scenes up there and some cool ice crystals on top of the snow.

Winter Textures

We had Morgan with us so I didn’t really have time to sit there and play with my camera but there were plenty of photographic opportunities. It’s surprising how a covering of snow can really open your eyes to the world around you.

At last, I finally got the whole family out for a mountain bike ride, and I think they enjoyed it.

Unfortunately there isn’t a proper, family-friendly trail at Nant yr Arian. The easiest trail there has a few bits in it that aren’t really suitable for complete beginners or 4 year olds, and there is a bit of a climb out of the centre that would be too much for Morgan. So, we started from the car park at Pendam and simply went along the road, which is a very quiet road, and then down along the ‘Spine’ and around Llyn Blaenmelindwr.

It didn’t start too well as Anna managed to fall off her bike in the car park – before she even got on it! but no harm was done and it gave us all a bit of a laugh. Morgan was a little tentative to start with, but he hadn’t been on his bike for at least 3 months so it took a while for him to get going. Anna was the same really and didn’t seem to enjoy the Spine to start with.Morgan did well getting up the little hills on the far side of the lake though and had a huge smile on his face when he did. He soon got tired though so after a quick circuit of the lake (about 2 miles) we headed back to the car.

I then sent Anna off on another circuit of the lake and told her to include the ‘Diggers End’ section as well. By the time she got back she looked much happier and seemed to have enjoyed it. I then had a quick spin around the lake and down the Hippity Hop section as well.

All in all a successful little ride and something I’ll have to force everyone to do more often so that they can improve and start to enjoy it more.

The clocks have gone back, the evenings are darker and it feels as though Winter is properly on its way. A depressing time for many, but I really like it.

It isn’t very cold at the moment but there’s nothing nicer than snuggling up indoors in front of the fire whilst it’s cold and miserable outside. There are also lots of parties and celebrations to look forward to. There always seems to be lots of things happening at this time of year and Christmas isn’t far off too.

This weekend we have the annual Ynyslas Bonfire party to attend at Dave and Sarah’s house. Its a nice community get together with a bonfire, fireworks and of course lots of delicious food to devour. Then Saturday evening is the annual lantern procession and light display in Machynlleth. We went last year and had a good time, so shall be there again this year. Morgan wants to make a lantern too, so we might have to actually join in with the parade this time. Apparently if you have a lantern you get free admission to the light show after the parade which will be a bonus.

If that doesn’t take your fancy then you could brave a night in the woods with eerie sights and sounds and ghostly goings on at Nant yr Arian. Then head back to the visitor centre and indulge in some supernatural snacks.

There is also a firework display in Aberystwyth on Bonfire Night itself.

Don’t let the short days and dark nights get you down, get out there and enjpy them.