Ride report: Sunday 21 September – Ranmore trails
Through the years we have regularly ridden on Sunday mornings. While the faces swap around from family and other life commitments, the schedule is pretty reliable and today was no exception.
This time round I decided I would join the ride.
After returning from the Alps I’ve found my legs need to regain their cycling rhythm. A week of downhill riding is highly recommended but you quickly get out of the habit of just spinning the pedals. Added to which, poor weather, family illness and university drop-offs have conspired to keep me from the trails.
As usual we met up at 8:30 at Bockett’s Farm. Elliot, Will, Tony, Richard and myself were eventually joined by Lloyd – our de facto routemaster – after he finally settled on which bike he would take for today’s fun.
The plan was some Ranmore trails. From Bockett’s that means getting past the Polesdon estate and up to Ranmore.
A perfect autumn morning beckoned with a little bit of chill to start with. This seemed to bring out all the local walkers and runners although it was notable how few mountain bikers we saw today.
Through Bookham Wood and some twisty singletrack we rode Alfred Pennyworth which showed the recent rain has simply damped down the dust as it still felt reasonably grippy. From there, it was up Dearly Beloved to Ranmore chruch, then across to Rip van Winkle.
I felt I was still re-tuning to my regular Bird Aether after a week on a slightly smaller but longer travel Radon Swoop. This resulted in some dubious lines as I understeered in a few places but generally all was fine.
What was a little uncomfortable though were my Rapha knee pads which I had managed to pull up a little tight. This restricted movement and grew uncomfortable over the ride despite my pedaling legs slowly returning.
Back up on Ranmore, we headed along Collarbone, then through Trouble in Paradise which now offers very little trouble as the trees we used to noodle around have been removed!
Next up was Sauvage, a trail I was happy to take a bit slower today. It turned out to be a good idea as there are now two large trees blocking the track. There was much evidence today of high winds recently and this wasn’t the only place with trees down.
The second tree had some poorly placed logs to help a rider over but I advise some caution. They are not a firm setting and there is a big root complex on the other side (which also has some logs placed to fill a depression). I neither trust the entrance or the exit on this one!
Another climb via the sawmill brought us back to the Ranmore ridge again before tackling Big Dave near Combe Bottom. I’m not too familiar with this trail (although I’ve ridden the subsequent climb enough to form an opinion on that at least). Big Dave seems to have multiple lines, routes and a wide variety of trail features that ultimately bring you to the same place, before a long climb back up.
At the top, an excellent cake and coffee at the food van in the Staple Lane car park gave us a chance to catch our breath and replenish the sugar levels for the ride home.
This included Il Duce – running well but with a softish landing on the double step (especially if your line choice is poor). After another climb, we tried Tie Fighter, with Tony choosing to save his energy. Wise move.
The fight seemed strangly lacking on Tie Fighter until we worked out we’d taken a wrong turn and missed out some of the livelier bits. Worth knowing there is an alternative but it was basically a short downhill without the drama. The climb back up included a section of walking for me as my knees were feeling sore.
We traced our steps back to Ranmore car park which proved a long steady pull from Lloyd, the remaining five (5) riders line astern behind him. Once we got back to the car park we headed for On Any Sunday which was running beautifully down toward the Polesdon estate. I even scored a PR.
We now had a choice. All options involved winching up hills. To humour Tony we decided direct was best so we climbed in the direction of Bookham Wood before heading over to the top of Alfred Pennyworth once more and taking the singletrack trail ultimately back to Bocketts Farm.
Along this trail is a fallen tree – a pain going the other way but nice and easy in this direction. Except we must have disturbed something as the back markers encountered some annoyed bees at that point.
Back at home, I recorded 27 miles for the day – plenty for me. My sore knees appreciated the break from kneepads but overall it feels my legs were starting to remember what pedaling actually involves.
Every cyclist loves coffee!
☕Buy Matt a coffeeThere are 2 replies to Matt so far
We really appreciate comments from our readers. If you have something to say, we'd love to hear from you.
Add to the conversation…
()
This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed.
October 20, 2025 at 9:54 am
Harvey Mushman says:
why, oh why do you have to write about riding… I build these trails and maintain them. I am in continual conflict with walkers and so called interested parties. these articles add flame to the fire, I’ve had two ‘discussions’ on the trails with angry people who have read and quoted your reports. You don’t help to maintain or dig, and yet you seem to need to go into detail quoting trail names, locations etc. Please stop it does not help us. I and two buddies spend days working on sensitively creating, protecting, lobbying rangers and landowners, and maintaining. We are pleased that you enjoy them, BUT these reports bring added pressure to an already senditive balance. More pressure we dont need.
, or add a new comment
October 21, 2025 at 11:15 pm
Matt says:
Hi Harvey, thanks for your comment about our ride reports.
I’ve thought pretty hard about this and first of all, I understand your point about publicising local trails. It’s also true that like the majority of riders in the country, we don’t build the trails we ride. I think I can genuinely say from all of us, thanks for your efforts.
Even so, this website has been around for a long time.
That, I think, is our own contribution to the local scene. It takes a lot of time, money and energy to do that and while we don’t have a massive audience, I think people enjoy the site. It’s a surprise to hear anyone quotes anything we write.
In fact, my next post is to celebrate that this month is the 20th anniversary of the website in this form (it actually dates to about 2003).
Not many websites – let alone about mountain biking – have lasted this long; I’m proud of that achievement and it’s been quite the ride (pun!). We want to encourage mountain biking and promote the local area but you can hardly call us influencers.
During those 20+ years we have always written ride reports, and always mentioned the names of trails and no-one has ever suggested we don’t.
If you know the trails, you know them and if you don’t it just adds a bit of colour to avoid saying ‘we went left at a tree’. We don’t actually say where they are.
What’s changed for the trails is apps like Strava, Garmin, Trailforks and others and a less tolerant approach from many people these days in general.
The trails are there to be found by anyone who cares to look and that genie is well and truly out of the bottle. Walkers and landowners can find these things for themselves easily enough too, so it feels a little unfair to say we are somehow a problem.
At the end of the day it’s our content and our site. I’m happy to consider your basic point; I may be a bit more circumspect about the names or refer to them a little more obliquely, but I don’t think it will really make much difference.
, or add a new comment