rabie

suppose "up north" you have the space / less people - our land is small, very near to civilisation, crossed with footpaths, etc, etc - your usages are carefully watched and one lives in fear of the council running the club's land by putting injunctions on it. being a major contributor to the MX forum (adrenalintrip.net) the major issue there is practise tracks and associated problems - mainly planning and noise. trails riders are normally the most responsible in the sport but surely you need staff on site and other stuff for a practise facility. also with the skyhigh cost of public liability insurance make me worry (OK so its very rare for trails ever to cause an incident) interesting to hear how others do thing (especially clubs that own land - we're rare) rabie

its going well considering the tight rope Andy is walking and trying to be fair. admittedly its taken off since the bandwagon was launched on TA, and over time as news appears here and people add the site to their site's link pages (something i still have to do). in the long run the site keeps going if there is news on it / active administration - if that dosen't happen no one looks. while the forum over on TA could survive (elbandio thinks it might) i don't think its the kind of independent forum something like adrenalintrip is for MX or rides for greenlaning ......... Andy says he wants to succeed by reputation not poaching - hence i think a subtle hint about TC on TA is OK IMHO but the less than subtle hints aren't the best thing. anyway well done to Andy and good luck with the site rabie

go streetmap or multimap or OS and search for it http://www.multimap.com/ http://getamap.ordnancesurvey.co.uk/frames.htm rabie

fair cop the problem around here (and for my club's land) is people with bikes - in the main unofficial people, although some official people who can't be a***d to travel the hundreds of miles to an open practise track. anyway these people just go on any land - the "born again" brigade can travel, and do travel - to proper places because they are after something decent, eg toms farm (they go from London to the middle of wales ) on the MX front they travel to *proper* MX tracks that are open....... so to us the problem is the illegals (pikies, youths, yobs, etc - mainly on stolen bikes, etc) on any land (commonly called *wasteland* - ie normally a nature reserve for the lesser spotted amoeba). its gets us bad press, people do get injured and generally not good. maybe trials has it different - knowing the planning process your lucky you haven't been caught by the hippies - you need planning permission for anything more than 14/28 days use and weather trials is 28 or 14 is debatable. admittedly no one can hear a trials bike so they normally don't mind but an open practise area sounds a bit doggy - how do you get insured, keep its safe, etc, etc - an unsupervised area sounds likes its open to abuse. how do you stop overuse of the land? rabie

nah mate first of all i would say MX is not in any sort of cosy position - tracks do not run regular practise days. there is a dire shortage of practise tracks, and those that exist are normally crap. the racing tracks are club run by fewer and fewer volunteers who are burdened with more worries and fewer volunteers. on the legal front the assault on permitted development s(14/28 day rule) was a very scary prospect - basically we all *hide*under the 14/28 day rule and most who have ventured out (eg practise tracks) have such a bad experience of the planning process that its scary (read extinction). Plus we have the ever troublesome insurance to keep up with and legal claims. then there is noise........... to me sure the ramblers are a threat and so are abusers but i think *serious* enduro riders are ridding MX practise tracks or going to places like Tom's farm (see mxtrax.co.uk for more info - its 600 acers of free riding in wales). sure enduro riders use green lanes but I've never herd as practise - I'd say the treat is pikies and *youths* from estates just riding anywhere (as described in TMX). i think the legal bikers illegally practising does happen but they are not the main cause rabie

should be quicker as im further north now but ........... rabie

take a CD / your camera's memory / camera (? i forget which ?) to Boots - i've never bothered my self but recently i got my mum at home to burn the photos to CD and take them to boots - there was a specail offer on, something like 40 for

hello hello hello rabie

haven't herd of them crushing bikes at home (Kent) - sure there is the usual problems but not as bad as hippie country (ridgeway) lots of talk about this on rides.org.uk and other such sites - you have your responsible riders (the TRF types), the proper off roaders (MX, enduro, etc) and then pikies (well.......) - anyway the first do all the work but some of the middle lot and the last lot make it hard for the rest of us. i wouldn't say the born again brigade (who are p****d off with speed cameras and death risks) are the worst - i find the pikie types the worst....... i wouldn't say all MX / enduros riders are bad - in my club (were MX, enduro and trials) we've been encouraged to run a LDT after another local clubs one (they're an enduro and trials club) and we're all having good fun - and were not upsetting anyone and we are doing it legitimately anyway c'est la vie ............. rabie

from my clubs point of view there is no money in trials - we run British MX champs (like 5,000 spectators, etc) and we in MX can't see professionals making money from British champs (well maybe just), a club can just stretch to a UEM, sidecar, etc if its a really good club - but there is little correlation between status and crowd (NB huge extra costs). admittedly we've raised the British champs to be more like a series of internationals due to the large foreign participation, etc so the events are now of a higher status than in the recent past. For enduro i see even less ways of making money - just like trials really - enduros have been debated to death on SW enduro/off road site. So for trials i can't see a way of making money - the clubs can put nationals on for the love of the sport, but i doubt money is there...... BTW as you get bigger (eg like MX) the money seams to end up with the mystical *teams* - the clubs get very little of it. In MX the series sponsors money pays for things for the series - the clubs now pay for the *pleasure* of putting on a round..... rabie