(upbeat rock music)
- Oh man, look at that!
It's also a place where I cried on my bike.
But not today, nighty, not today.
And it would be rude not to, really, wouldn't it?
(whoosh)
I am back, riding my bike for "Dan's ADVENTure,"
which is a 1000 kilometers before Christmas,
to fulfill a promise,
but also to raise some money for World Bicycle Relief.
And that means I'm back riding in the New Forest,
which has brought back a lot of memories
of when I grew up riding a bike.
And so I thought it would be nice
to show you around my local training loop
and give you the GPX files in case you're ever
in this neck of the woods.
And I would recommend that you come and visit
because it's a great place to ride a road bike,
or a gravel bike, as you'll see.
The ride starts here at Café Velo in Ringwood,
which is my current hometown.
And it's the perfect venue, really,
to start our bike ride,
because it is located just on the edge
of the New Forest National Park,
where I'll be riding today.
New Forest, in fact, is the newest national park
in the country,
having gained that status back in 2005.
The ride is 85 kilometers, or 53 miles,
including around 12 kilometers of gravel tracks.
There's a link to the GPX route
in the description below,
and also a link to one that avoids the gravel,
if that's not your thing.
Either way, it starts by taking the back route
towards Bransgul, which is where I grew up.
My parents moved there from London when I was four,
and it's where I first started mountain biking
at the age of 13.
Right, I'll just finish my coffee,
and we'll get going.
(quiet upbeat music)
Just over eight Ks in and we're
onto the first climb of the day.
I say climb, it's not exactly a mountain.
I think it's 1.3 Ks, an average of 4%,
but, as a youngster, I did a lot of in-tours up here,
so I spent plenty of time suffering on this road.
And at the top here you reach the dizzy heights
of probably about 100 meters above sea level.
And this, in fact, was the venue
of a mountain bike race back in 1994,
which felt like a really big one.
I think it was only
a Southern Area Mountain Bike Series race,
but there were a few good riders
in the Elite races who I'd seen in the magazines,
so I was loving it!
I was here with my disposable camera
like a pig in...
like a happy pig.
At the top, we hang a left towards Burley
onto the first really open section of road.
There're a lot of these 'round New Forest.
Great when you've got a tailwind,
but not so good if it's a headwind.
I always check the wind direction
before I head out on a ride in the Forest.
And that stretch of road leads us here to Burbush car park,
which is basically the area in which I started
as a mountain biker.
Now New Forest has always been incredibly frustrating
for mountain bikers,
because they've never really made any provisions
in terms of specific areas or single track, et cetera,
which is annoying when all you want to do are a few jumps
and berms and other rad stuff like that.
However, in this modern age of gravel riding,
the New Forest is absolutely perfect,
which is why I've included a few gravel sections
on my ride today.
Now you may have noticed,
I'm actually on my Orbea Orca road bike,
but these sections are pretty tame
and pretty flat.
So as long as it's not too wet,
you should be all right on a road bike.
Just make sure you pack a couple of spare inner tubes.
(upbeat music)
(gravel crunching)
This first part heads along a disused railway track.
The 60 miles stretch opened in 1847
and went all the way to Wimborne.
It was known as the Castleman Corkscrew
because of the way it wound its way through the forest.
It was closed down in 1964,
but some of it is now open to ride down.
(upbeat rock music)
Right, if you continue down this way along the railway track
you'll get to Halsey's Tea Rooms
which is an opportunity for a very early coffee stop.
We're going to head left, up this climb,
and very quickly on to sector number two.
(rock music)
(gravel crunching)
(cow mooing)
So that second sector takes out there, Wilverley Plain,
and back on to the road here.
And actually you might recognize this part coming up
in just a second, 'cause it's where we filmed
our first look at the Factor Vista gravel bike,
a year or so back.
And it is a beautiful vista over the New Forest there.
Especially on a day like today.
(upbeat music)
From here, we take a nice descent in towards Brockenhurst,
another opportunity for a coffee stop, if you so wish,
and not a bad place to do so,
as it's previously been voted
Britain's most beautiful place to live.
It's also a place where you can start the ride
if you want to get the train down.
But rather than stopping, I'm going to press on
because, well I've got a few kilometers to ride after all.
That road basically winds back on itself
and down here to Ornamental Drive,
which is really quite stunning.
Apparently a forest worker back in the 1800s
planted a load of Sequoia redwoods,
conifers, azaleas, and rhododendrons.
And these redwoods are now the tallest trees
in the whole of the New Forest.
It's stunning at all times of the year,
and so I always try to include it on my local rides.
The road leads to a junction with the A-35,
which is a busy road, so make sure you cross it with care.
Particularly as there is a cattle grid on either side
to keep the New Forest ponies away from the main traffic.
If you're going to do any road riding in the New Forest
you're going to come across a lot of cattle grids,
so it's important that you know how to ride them.
There's nothing too complicated about it,
but there are a few pointers.
Firstly, make sure that you approach them head-on like this.
Never lean the bike, particularly when its wet,
because they are slippery (beep) in the wet.
And also, try to approach them with enough speed
that you don't have to pedal over them either.
But you should be absolutely fine.
On the other side of that main road,
we're straight on to the Boulderwood climb which,
again, is particularly pretty through the trees.
It starts with steady drag, and then gets gradually steeper,
and steeper, and steeper.
This last part, it goes into double-digit gradient.
And as a full-time rider, I knew I was going well
when I could sprint up this in a 53.
Now today, I've got a 50,
and I'm not even in that,
I'm down on a 34.
Conclusion being, I'm not going very well.
Now again this is not a huge climb,
and nothing like you'd find in other national parks
around the U.K.
That was a bit of a frustration, back in the day,
as a full-time rider
when I wanted longer climbs to train on,
but right now, being slightly less fit,
and wanting to get a 1000 Ks done
as efficiently as possible,
New Forest is perfect.
All right, onwards.
At the top, we're going to fork left,
past the Canadian memorial,
and then have a short bit, fairly quick descent,
that takes us underneath the A-31,
before climbing up the other side.
Again, when I was pinging,
I could sprint all the way up this in the big ring.
But not today, nighty, not today.
Although this man probably could.
This is the first of my mystery guests, for today's ride.
He's literally a mystery guest,
because I can't reveal his true identity.
But his identity on Strava is Bertie Wooster,
and he's a bit of a legend.
Holds over 2,000 Strava KOMs,
including this climb, and the one we've just done.
He's like the Sting of cycling.
(gentle chime music)
I told you it can be quite open
in the New Forest, didn't I?
In fact, rather ironically, there are a lot of parts
of the New Forest where there isn't a lot of forest.
This being one of them.
This is Stonycross, which was opened as an airfield
back in 1942, during World War II,
where it served the Royal Airforce
and also the U.S. Airforce, too.
It's also a place where I cried on my bike
as a 16 year-old.
So I didn't have a road bike at the time,
but I had purchased some road tires
for my mountian bike wheels, which I'd fitted.
And I'd set out on a 30 mile ride,
with the aim of averaging 20 miles per hour,
which was going very well
at the start of this road behind you.
I'd averaged 20.3, and then I hit it into a block head wind,
and by this point it was down to 19.7,
and I couldn't go any harder, so I burst into tears.
It was a bit of a low point,
but looking back it was quite an insight
into the way my brain works
because I like hitting numbers
and I hate it when I don't hit them.
In fact, I'm only just about getting to the point
where I can go out on a ride
and not be obsessed by what I'm seeing on my computer.
At the end of the road, you take a left turn
and then you fork left again,
then cross the main Cadnam to Fordingbridge road
before heading down Nomansland.
You'll be glad you're going down this, rather than up,
because it's a steep one,
and also slightly off camber, for some reason.
So take care when you do descend it.
At the bottom, there's a possible pub stop at The Lamb Inn.
And it would be rude not to, really, wouldn't it?
Particularly rude, actually,
as my second mystery guest is waiting for me inside.
Hello, mate.
- Hey. - Got my pint already?
- Yeah, all ready to go.
- Right, let's go and grab a seat.
Cheers.
This is Roger Hammond,
who holds the grand total of zero Strava KOMs
around the New Forest,
but he is still a bit of a legend because
he's finished both third and fourth at Paris-Roubaix,
and he was a teammate of mine at the Cervélo TestTeam,
which I'm sure he's got an anecdote or two about.
- Uh, no not really.
But we can talk about my third in Paris-Roubaix,
if you want to.
- Nah, it's all right.
- Oh, cheers.
- Cheers.
Just after The Lamb Inn, you take a left hand turn,
which goes over a cattle grid,
and then another left at the end of the road
which leads you eventually to Lover.
Now apparently, the post office at Lover used to be
inundated with people on the lead up to Valentine's Day
who wanted to have the Lover post stamp on the envelope
that they sent to their valentine.
How romantic.
I say "apparently" because I never received one
with the Lover stamp on,
or without, actually, if you want me to admit it.
Cue some violin music here, if you want.
(slow violin music)
At the end of the road in Redlynch,
we turn left and then fork off right
to a narrow descent into Woodgreen
and then another left toward Sandyballs.
Yes, you heard that correctly, Sandyballs.
A campsite and another full mountian bike race venue.
The terrain is really quite rolling
on this part of the ride.
We've hardly any flat.
But the worse is yet to come,
unfortunately.
Now this is a dead straight road,
and in front of you, you can already see it now,
is what can only be described as a wall.
Now, if you're very fit
you can utilize this small descent before it
to build some speed up and sprint all the way up the wall.
On the other hand, if you're like me,
you can grind up the 25% gradient of Blissford Hill
on your granny gear.
Oh man, look at that.
(intense rhythmic music)
(heavy breathing)
Now if you would rather avoid that pain
toward the end of your ride,
there is an alternative road that's only slightly longer,
but far less severe in terms of gradient.
But you want the challenge, don't you?
The next section of road takes you back toward Ringwood,
where we started, and past another possible pub stop,
The Royal Oak, although I am going to resist this time.
Instead, I'm heading on to meet my final special guest.
Sorry I'm late.
Final special guest of the day, this is Jude.
Jude Lloyd, my son,
who once upon a time wanted to be the next Daniel Lloyd,
but now appears to want to be the next Mathieu van der Poel
which I guess is quite understandable, isn't it?
Do you want to do the last part of the ride with me?
- Yeah.
- Right, let's go.
Remember who I used to ride for, Jude?
- [Jude] The Cervélo TestTeam.
- [Dan] That's right, yeah.
Have you told your mates about it?
- [Jude] No.
- You're still on the front?
I'm just going to sit on your wheel, all right?
We are effectively headed back into the New Forest now,
past the Red Shoot pub, lovely roast at the weekends
and another possible pub stop,
and then up a small but deceptively hard climb.
Then it's effectively the home run
and the final gravel sector.
(gravel crunching)
And this is basically the final climb of this route.
Quite a tough one, Jude, isn't it?
- Yeah. - This gravel one.
But from there on it's downhill
almost all the way back to Ringwood.
Keep going, keep going, keep going.
Over the top.
From Linford we are back onto tarmac,
albeit on a small road,
and a descent down towards Poulner,
and finally back over the A-31
and into Ringwood, where we started.
And we're back, after around about 87.5 kilometers.
Did you enjoy that, Jude?
- Yeah.
- It was good, wasn't it?
And if you would like to go around that same route,
you can find a link to the GPX in the description down below
and there's also, as I mentioned earlier,
a link to one which is entirely on the road,
if gravel isn't your thing.
Also in the description is a link to my JustGiving page.
I'm doing "Dan's ADVENTure,"
which is a 1000 kilometers before Christmas
to try and raise as much money as I can
for World Bicycle Relief.
They are getting children on to bikes
for a very different reason.
Not necessarily to become the next Mathieu van der Poel,
but so they can get to their school a lot quicker.
Many of them are having to currently walk two hours,
or even more, each way to get there.
Which means that often, they quit their education
before they've finished it.
Any donations that you can make will make a huge difference
and would also be very much appreciated.
All right, if you've enjoyed this ride
around the New Forest,
and you'd like to see other presenters do rides
around their neck of the woods,
let us know in the comments section down below.
And if you'd like to watch another video,
and your kid's about to get on a balance bike,
you can find out how to do that, with Jude,
just down here.