The other day I decided to try out the new mountain bike trail and pump track at Hog Hill at the Redbridge cycling centre. I'd heard mixed reviews about this project managed by the CTC's Ian Warby and opened by our major Boris on the 19th of August 2008. So I was keen and pretty psyched to check it out for myself.
So the first thing that strikes you is that we are talking about an URBAN mountain bike centre in London! It's in Redbridge and so is accessible to East and North Londoners alike (which includes me luckily
. This centre is a major step forward for cycling and Redbridge is the first London Borough to benefit from the 2012 Olympic legacy that has made this ambitious project possible. A whopping £4.5 million has been spent via the London Development agency to produce a state of the art cycling centre (covering road trials as well at mtb). As a statement to the latent demand for this type of centre over 2000 people visited it in it's first month of opening.
I keep saying this but examples like this keep reminding me that although there is a way to go there is still to date not a better time to be a cyclist in London and things are looking better and better all the time.
It has been built to host national and international events, be used as a training centre and providing a facility for local residents.
The mountain bike track is about 3.25 km in total and consists of a short flowing singletrack cross country circuit a neat descent section as well as a pump track section.
The Cross Country
The xc section starts of with nice undulating dips and corners that build up speed. It has some neat berms and steady singletrack. It is quite flowing and I could imagine that for training and for racing you could see yourself improving time after time. The end of the xc leads nicely into the start of the descent section on one side or the start of the pump track on the other. This allows you to neatly session one or the other as you wish at that right moment of being warmed up and hungry for more.
The Descent
The descent section is a lot of fun. It starts smooth with a reasonably sized berms setting the tone well.
Soon though it moves into some quite surprisingly large berms that have quite a steep incline and help build speed.
This then moves into section of rollable tabletops and dips all good for developing smooth movement, air and momentum as you are still carrying quite some speed at this point.
The way back to the top is by a twisty turny route that is rideable or as I often observed walked. As mentioned here you can redo the descent or move onto the pump track
The Pump Track
The pump track is really what brings this place alive to me. It really flows well and as the sign says it is built to help you develop your rhythm and flow. It lets you build up speed and confidence at your own pace whilst allowing you to push your boundaries. It is s full of dips, jumps and doubles which are all rollable. Unlike most pump tracks it is not on steady flat terrain but on a decline which is good for speed, fun and thrills and not so good as you lose momentum on the way up and back. Still it offers you somehting each session and you can like all well built sections lose yourself in that age old mtb adage of "just one more time".
I left with a few impressions. Firstly Hog Hill is a great place to train and an amazing place to introduce kids and teens to the never ending thrills of mountain biking. It's 100% gravel make up means like on rainy days like today you don't need to contend with predominantly clay muddy mayhem terrain that is London's biking blight but you have an all year all weather mtb centre to ride.
This is a greenfield site and it is ambitious, new and deserves praise. I believe it has a few areas for improvement. One the gravel make up and the greenfield nature makes it a bit bland in look and feel to a mtber used to woods, roots, trees and mud. Some tree and bush planting would not go amiss to add some mtb character. Also the trails lack technical elements like roots and drops. This is core for real mtb skill development and I see opportunities to build small two route options here in certain sections. Specifically on the cross country section. I also think in time more routes or route options on the descent are needed to give riders variety as well as give them new boundary pushing challenges.
So if you are a mtb'er and ride locally and fancy a good bit bit of fun at the end of an Epping or hanault ride do pop over and kills a couple of hours honing your skills and having some great fun. If you are new to the sport and finding your pedals or want to take or point your kids towards a controlled environment to build up skills, enthusiasm and confidence then this place is great and where I see it really succeeding particularly with schools and the local community. If you are looking to compete in races need a contant training centre then get down there.
This is a great start and a significant step forward in UK mountain biking as it brings our sport to a new large urban youth market which frankly is to be applauded. I look forward to seeing it grow.
Location: Redbridge Cycling Centre, Forest Road, Hainault, Essex, IG6 3HP
Cost: MTB track = £3.50 . MTB track (Junior / Leisure Pass holder) = £2.00
Trail centre: www.vision-rcl.org.uk/redbridge_cycle_centre.html . NB centre has all those facilites you'd expect from the free car park to washing facilites and some grub.
General Opening Times: Monday - Friday:
8.00am - Dusk Friday, Saturday & Sunday: 9am - 5.00pm
Unfortunatley I am a lazy bad person and forgot to ask how you get there by public transport so if anyone knows how to do this journey do please share.
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Although I was riding my mtb with knobblies on, the road track felt really really smooth and I was able to get good speed. I would imagine that in the dry and on a road bike, this would be awesomely quick. However, I went there today to play off-road. There is a green trail, which is the longest and runs outside the road track. It has a couple of more technical pieces but would be great for less able riders too. You will catch some speed on the descent and there are a couple of places to get air but if you really want some off-road thrills, head for the pump track or take on the red section. These lead into each other, so you can loop around them both seemlessly. Plenty of air to be had on both sections! 