Everyone has a wake up call. Or at least, I’d guess so. Mine was the Kirroughtree Blue route. The clues were there, if I’d looked close enough – someone on Singletrack’s forum mentioned Dalbeattie and Kirroughtree’s Blues were ‘the best’ Blue routes of the 7 Stanes, and I should know well enough by know that what a competent Red route rider deems best is probably not actually a Blue route but a Blue route cunningly disguised as a bit of a Red route without the drop offs and jumps. The other clue should have been the map at the Trailhead, showing as it did that the Blue and Red shared really quite a lot of track – something which is quite unusual down in that there England.
None of this had actually registered in my enthused state of mind. I had a new bike, Glentrool had gone well overall, I had brakes, what was there to worry about?
Not all singletrack is created equal, let me tell you that for a start. Singletrack, until I went to Kirroughtree, was at least 40cm wide, didn’t have sheer drops at the side of it, and no one was evil enough to put boulders on the insides of corners at the crests of hills, waiting to jump out and grab you given half the chance.
Kirroughtree was my wake up call. Specifically, the first descent at Kirroughtree was my wake up call. Sometimes, the uphills all merge into one, but I have a good memory for the descents, because each one so far has been unique in the challenges which it presents. Each trail centre has a character, a sense of itself, and the memories they leave are coloured in some way. Or in this case the nightmares.
I wasn’t expecting it, was the thing. By now, uphills are a pretty regular pattern of my calves and quads burning and cramping for the first 2km, at which point they concede defeat, all goes quiet, my gear selection muscle memory returns and all drifts into a rhythm of hill section, stop and pant for 2 mins, hill section, pant for 2 mins and pretty much rinse and repeat the whole way up. So when the trail disappeared off the fire road with a sign next to it which clearly stated a graphic of a sloped triangle innocuously marked ‘Descent,’ I just didn’t register it.
All I remember is thinking ‘oh my god, I can’t do this’ constantly for 3 minutes. I don’t get scared (yet another story for another day, but the quick version is, I wasn’t born with the fear chip activating in the right place) but the confluence of 20cm singletrack, sweeping curves with drops on the inside and stones littered all over the place when I was in uphill droning lalaland resulted in a serious denting of confidence. I finally caught up with my partner at the other end and darkly muttered something about escape routes.
We carried on, of course. There are two things that are written in my mountain bike rulebook currently. One, thou shalt not walk up any hill ever, no matter how many times you have to stop and pant and die quietly, and two, thou shalt not return to the Trailhead in any other way than by following the little blue arrows, unless a) you’ve got a migraine b) you can’t stand up or c) you can’t see/breathe any more. Being scared is not a valid reason for aborting anything – this applies to no one else and if my other half had ever had enough we’d back at the car park quicker than you could yell ‘eeeep,’ but I used to wuss out way too easily and the rules stop that happening.
Things, as they usually do, came together. Pedal positioning is something I have hitherto been entirely lazy about. If I switch my left pedal down to go around a left cornering berm, the left foot stays down. When a rock is placed on the exit of a berm for the sole reason of throwing you off your bike for your laziness, you quickly learn. It took, I’d say, about 10 minutes for the message to sink in.
Then there was the narrow track. Somewhere along the line, that sunk in as well. By the time we were doing the last bits of descent of the route, I wasn’t even aware of it, and whizzing between tree trunks not so far off the end of my handlebars wasn’t registering either – something I’d been hesitant about when reading of such things. Rocky Road happened somewhere in there too – and I must confess I walked it. I do not understand what on earth it was doing there, I do not understand how you are supposed to be able to ride that on a hybrid, I do not understand where the line between momentum and a very painful impact is, and I do not understand what the hell it was doing on a Blue route with no chicken run next to it. But then, this is Scotland. There are no chickens here, only cows. No frightened mountain bikers here. Only ones made of rubber-coated titanium.
Also in the middle of this, right after Rocky Road, I encountered someone who, frankly, deserves a medal. Whilst landing from the adrenaline rush, along with a few others (breaks in descents on singletrack where it crosses fireroad are guaranteed gathering points for the lesser spotted mountain biker) a racer went by.
Nope, that wasn’t a typo. A man, on a road racing bike, with dropped handlebars and road brakes, no suspension and a bloody big grin went by. Mouths hit floors. The smell of WTF gave the air a certain frisson. The echo of a ‘wahoooooo!’ echoed up from the next bit of singletrack as he descended without a pause for breath. His partner, somewhat apologetically mentioned in a brief pause for breath that ‘he hadn’t got round to hiring a mountain bike’.
Anyone who thinks they’ve got grit? You try it. On road tyres.
After that, any hesitation and fear I felt sort of went out of the window. I mean, I’ve got a bike made for this stuff sitting under me and this bloke has just made me feel really rather an embarrassment. So off we went again. This time, the track looked a little different and my mindset was a little better and things really did start to come together, though I still wasn’t having quite the day at the office I’d hoped for. Car parks were arrived at, sneering bike shop assistants were endured, bikes were washed, coffee was gulped. A brief conversation was had about going around again. It was brief.
As a footnote, I’d like to say thank you to the lovely couple who chatted with me at the top of the very final descent. I’m sorry I didn’t ask where you were from, and indeed didn’t manage to observe any of the social rules of engagement acknowledged amongst mountain bikers. I was absolutely exhausted and I’m very sorry. You were lovely, and disguised your shock at our plans to ride 5 of the 7 Stanes in one week very well :O)
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