Can anyone roughly advise on current under-tyre / over-head conditions at Laggan; heading up early tomorrow and want to have the right gear – at the moment, just taking everything; forecast says dry but cold. Thanks,
Rob.

Was there a fortnight ago, trails were in great condition, dry and fast. Some minor work going on on the red route (the one with the big slab) but no diversion in place. Doubt there’s been that much bad weather since.

Forecast is good for this weekend!

It’s all rocky there so apart from the unlikely event of ice you’ll be fine. If you’ve never ridden it before I would take as much protection(knee pads etc) you can muster for the double black route. I’d even consider a full-face helmet to be honest – the black’s pretty hardcore as trail centres go although the red is less so.

That seems a bit extreme. There’s some steep rocky bits on the black but you can always not ride them if you’re worried. Most, if not all of it’s perfectly rideable on hardtail as long as you take it sensibly.

As to conditions, it was bone dry last weekend so I imagine it’ll be much the same this weekend unless it rains in the meantime.

cronnie at laggan yesterday….

its not that bad, as stru said take it easy and you’ll be awreet.

laggan is all fun apart from the new upper red section which is too pedally and a bit of a yawn.

Laggan is a true ‘all weather’ trail. Only ice and snow affect its rideability.
It’s been chilly, dry and sunny this week. However, it’s Scotland so for the weather, expect the unexpected.

Thanks guys, I’m only going up from Edinburgh so expecting usual mixed bag of conditions anyway; have read there’s reasonably rocky sections so elbow, knee + sphincter pads on as necessary. Easy familiarisation lap, then 1 or 2 at normal (i.e. extremely cautious DH) pace. Hoping to do red-including-black on all laps, is that a knackering distance? I’m a reasonable roadie, 50+ miles standard @ 17mph or so, + haven’t found a lap of Inners then GT red too taxing. Plenty fuel on-board anyway, + I hear the cafe’s pretty good – mmmmmm… caaaaaake (drool).

It’s dry as a bone. You can do new red/old red on a lap or black/old red on a lap, with or without the orange tagged on at the end. Or just the old or new red. If that makes sense. I can comfortably manage the climb 4 times in a visit with a nice grub stop and I’m techically obese.

Edit: Forgot to get my customary gloat in about how dry our trails are just now. Been riding on dust for 3 weeks 😛

Laggan’s small in size – the difficulty is technical, rather than distance.

You’ll have no worries, I cleared just about everything the other week on a hardtail, no pads or wimmins stuff like that! Depends how fast you want to take it I guess. You can ride the whole lot at a laidback pace in a couple of hours.

Only scary moment I had was hammering down the rocky switchbacky bit of the deforested red (don’t know if that’s the upper or the lower) to encounter two women walking a dog down it. They saw me coming and moved to the side, but just left the dog to jump out in front of me. Nobody got hurt, so no big deal, just interrupted my ‘flow’ a bit. Guess this land access business goes both ways.

Alright may be a full-facer is a bit extreme but my point is you’ll feel more comfortable with protection. Why wear no ‘wimmin’s stuff’ and ride a hardtail and end up walking down when you can wear a bit of padding and ride everything? Okay it’s not a full-on DH run but there are black bits classified as double black for a reason.

tongue in cheek, cronnie!

Of all the trail centres I’ve ridden, its probably the only one where padding (on the black) isn’t necessarily overkill. Not done mabie darkside, so wouldn’t comment on that one.

oi, i walked nothing!

They saw me coming and moved to the side, but just left the dog to jump out in front of me. Nobody got hurt, so no big deal, just interrupted my ‘flow’ a bit. Guess this land access business goes both ways.

They shouldn’t have been there and were not acting responsibly. That’s in breach of the land access laws IMHO. Idiots. People go flying down that trail. It’s a good job there is good visibility. I’d have given them a mouthful

If you want to wear your full facer for the black, go for it. You get all the climbing done at the start on easy trails, then its downhill all the way so you won’t have to do any strenuous pedalling with armour on.

Some may think it is overkill. I wish I was that confident.

Cool, feeling that tinge of excitement already. Look forward to posting a celebratory, if brief, report, presuming typing is still an option afterwards… Should be there around 8 a.m. with a Pitch Pro, + blue helmet (you know it’s gonna be cold). If anyone’s going, say hello!

wish i was going, but gotta go to glasgow this weekend – it’s brill – enjoy the rock 🙂

as others have said, its all weather. not too long either. me and a mate were there last weekend, we did (old red), black, orange. lunch. loop on other side of the valley (natural, absolutely cracking, parts more difficult than the black), then black, orange. home.

one of the best days out for a while (well, save taking a tandem round GT red).

black, imo, is more of a head **** then anything else. there is one step which i just can’t get my head around, near the start, but the rest is fine. i prefer to follow someone down, as i’d be a bit mroe tentative if i was at the front (having said this, i’ve not done the black all that many times). we were both on 130mm HTs with nothing more than helmets and gloves.
take it easy and look at the difficult bits before you go down them, and you’ll be fine.

Devs:

They shouldn’t have been there and were not acting responsibly. That’s in breach of the land access laws IMHO. Idiots. People go flying down that trail. It’s a good job there is good visibility. I’d have given them a mouthful

I think you’ll find that this is at least a bit of a grey area. They probably were not “responsible” if their dog was in the way, but if you can argue that MTB trails are specifically closed to cyclists you have to expect Walking only, and horse only trails to emerge which would be bad for everyone. e.g. Footpath signs are being phased out – as they suggest we are not welcome. The walkers could just as easily have been a fallen rider so actually pose no real risk that you wouldn’t expect on an MTB trail. IMHO abusing anyone on the trail, even if they are doing something niave is not exercising your rights to access responsibly.

To those who posted, and everyone else, Laggan yesterday was great – as a first timer, went for the black route first and learned what ‘Technical’ means; managed everything no problems until faced with ‘devils chessboard’:

Sorry to say this was the first feature I’ve not been able to do on the FC type trails – had a good look, walk through, went for it & something-not-of-my-conscious made my hands clamp the brakes and foot off the spd. The last 2 thirds are fine but the first third… nope, no way. So, does one approach at reasonable speed to clear the first couple of steps? (I know the photo doesn’t look too bad, but try standing at the top, middle or end!) Wether was also terrific, after a cool start.

P.S. to anyone heading up the A9, roadworks at Bankfoot, 5 miles north of Perth, causing horrendous tailbacks – ‘kin hour I was stuck! Turn off just past Dunkeld for Crieff instead.

Going tomorrow. Devil’s Chessboard has never posed a problem to me unlike 1 or 2 of the other obstacles. Speed does tend to be your friend through it but there is a slow line through it too. There is only really one step that should cause problems. The rest is in the head.

Think the roadworks are off for the weekend. You should ok anyway if you are leaving early

I come in from the north! 🙂

Yep – just back down the road myself (not from Laggan sadly) but can confirm no roadworks for the holiday weekend.

Enjoy !

Ace place -it was icy when I was there but the biggest hazard was the frozen boardwalk outside the bike shop!

No really, I bottled Ayers Rock – probably would now too.

Devil’s Chessboard? Easy (when shown ‘the’ line! – Cheers Devs). First couple of sections at the top of the Black got into my head though – the rest seemed OK.

As for pads etc? Not really needed if you’re just trundling down. The bloke who did Air’s rock + air (landed half way down then unclipped one foot) did use his pads on the landing. Quality stack.

As for pads etc? Not really needed if you’re just trundling down. The bloke who did Air’s rock + air (landed half way down then unclipped one foot) did use his pads on the landing. Quality stack.

Did he die?

No but if it wasn’t for his 661 knee pad thingies he would have left his patella on the trail. Strange wipeout. He landed over half way down and then at the end of the run out his bike just seemed to fold under him. Bit too much front brake and loss of concentration I think. He’d done the hard work after all.