Cadair Idris

Hi All,

After going through the laborious process of attending university open days, writing a personal statement and applying to universities, I find myself in student accommodation at Aberystwyth University. I am studying Internet Computing with Systems Administration. The reason why I chose Aberystwyth was because it seemed to have a friendly atmosphere and it isn't in a big city. I don't think I could live in that type of environment. The Computing department seems up to date and well facilitated. The less important factor (at least, that's what my parents think) was the landscape and ultimately, would it cater for my style of riding? That is why I chose Aberystwyth.

The AberMTB Mountain Biking Club are great. They seem to follow a very chilled out approach to organising rides which suits me. On my third weekend at uni, a suggested ride was posted. The plan was to catch the train from Aberystwyth to Machynlleth then ride up Cadair Idris. I was up for this. I love these big mountain rides even if they do involve a bit of pushing.

We set out early on a chilly Sunday morning. I started the day as usual, hopped out of bed and into the shower, sat down at the table and tucked into my supermarket own brand fruit and fibre (I am a student). The ride down Penglais hill made things even colder. I freewheeled almost all the way from my flat to the train station where I would meet two fellow riders.

At the other end in Machynlleth I knew we had lots of road riding to do. It was not so bad for the other riders who were pedaling hardtails, but it was a different story for me on my Reign. The roads were fairly hilly which made things worse. We eventually got to the bridleway which we were going to take which marked the end of riding on tarmac. I was pleased by this. Early on, while riding up the shale double track I suffered a pretty horrific puncture. A dagger shaped piece of shale had pierced my worn out High Roller. I wasn't surprised really. The tyre had pretty much reached the end of it's life.

Dagger shaped shale

The rest of the climb up was fairly steady and rideable with no real technical terrain apart from the last section to the top which had some loose scree and rock gardens. There was also a very technical line near the top which I wasn't to sure about riding.

At the summit!

On the way down I had a few goes at the technical section as described above. On the first couple of goes I couldn't keep balance in the tight groove and so my front wheel kept on slipping but on the third go I nailed it and felt proud. I led the way down the rest of the top section, drifting on the scree and getting loose across the rock gardens.

I have to be honest, having ridden Snowdon and Helvellyn, this wasn't as much of a fun descent. The top section was fun and very challenging but the rest just felt like we were loosing all of our altitude on double track which is not the kind of riding I find fun. The thing is, sometimes it's not all about the ridding. It can be about the self achievement of riding a mountain like that. And even though the majority of the descent was double track, it was still worth the ride up to have a stab at that technical top section.