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Date:
1st June 2008
Riders: Richard, Rob, Dave, Davebus, Lee, Colin, Mat, Neil, Jason, Gary, Ashley, and Sam Big 8 and Box Hill loop combined Weather: 17.0°C 
Another good run out with 12 riders including Sam who has dragged himself out of bed for an early start. I spent part of Saturday afternoon replacing my badly worn middle chain ring which was giving me trouble at Swinley last week and also changed the oil in the Fox Vanilla forks which was black and gritty and coming through the seals and wipers on the stanchions, always a sign that the forks are badly overdue a service. so back to Sunday and we set out from Dead Man's Bench at close to 9-30 a.m. and head up to Walton-on-the-Hill before crossing the many and varied trails on Banstead Heath and then across the B2032 and onto the singletrack alongside Walton Heath golf course. A fast pace at the front is leading to gaps in the group and Ashley and myself suddenly find ourselves stranded at a junction. I follow the normal 'Big 8' left hander but we have lost sight of the rest of the group. Despite a host of mobile phones it still takes us at least half an hour to hook up with the peloton, mainly caused by them waiting on the 'bridge over the M25' and me only knowing two of the bridges that we have ridden in the past and the group waiting on the 3rd bridge that was unknown to me. Back on track and there's a massive tree down on the North Downs Way before we cross over to Headley Heath and the hidden singletrack which is beautiful at the moment with the ferns making it narrow and the surface really smooth under our rubber. From here we make our way across Mickleham Down and then down the Alpine descent before the long climb back up Happy Valley towards the tea hut at the top of Box Hill. Here Sam suffers a mechanical as his crank arm comes loose and he pushes to the top before he limps home along the road with me escorting him after we have all had a lengthy tea break with the roadies out in force today, eating cake and duck-walking around the seating area.
Date:
7th June 2008
Riders: Richard, Chris, Nick, Olivia, James and Ivan Ranmore Common, Leith Hill and Holmbury Hill Weather: 20.0°C 
The group of riders I showed around the trails last month enjoyed it so much they are back for another session, this time with Chris's brother Nick in tow. I just had time before leaving in the morning to fix the broken spoke that I had spotted and then jumped on the 10-28 a.m. train at Epsom to meet the other riders, avoiding the many visitors making their annual pilgrimage to the Epsom Derby. So we follow a familiar route from Dorking statioon, heading appropriately onto Pilgrim's Way where we make a brief stop to fix James's gears and bump into Ivan, a lone rider who is looking for Westcott. We agree that Ivan should join our group and I will show him the fun route via Ranmore Common. It turns out rather unsurprisingly that Ivan is Russian hailing from Siberia via Kazakhstan. We agree to avoid any obvious jokes about cultural learnings and Ivan turns out to be a great hill climber. Once we hit Westcott he decides that he's having such a great ride that he sticks with us for the rest of the day. Even better, Ivan was familiar with DOMTB so that makes him alright in my book. Nick is a pretty confident rider too, just like Chris and needs to be as both of them are competing in the Megavalanche in a few weeks time. Olivia is gaining in confidence and much to our surprise and without any warning attempts a decent size kicker because 'it looks really fun'. Carrying speed into the kicker she pushes down as soon as the front wheel leaves the ground and cartwheels over the front much to our amazement. A few extra bumps, bruises and scratches for her this week. We pick up another couple of riders briefly at Leith Hill Tower. On decent bikes but didn't really know there way around and despite me getting temporariily lost and having an embarrassing off in front of them all, I showed them the parts of 'Chocolate Jesus' I could remember and then the Quarry trails before they turned back for lunch with their girlfriends as we continued on to Holmbury Hill. they agreed I had shown them far better trails than they had found on thier own and we will hook up again for a future ride. We repeat pretty much the same route as last time with a few tweaks thrown in here and there with the far point of the ride being Peaslake Stores after a swift descent down Barry Knows Best. Back up across Leith Hill and then via Deliverance onto Regurgitator, Summer Lightning and down the Rookery before a swift return via the road to make the 5 o'clock train.
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