mickc
Cauldwell Dam Downhill
Mountain Biking Down Cauldwell Dam
There is nothing like bursting through one of your favourite trails to clear the cobwebs away. Some trails can be exhilarating, some can be challenging but most favourite trails provide a great feeling at the end, be it achievement or pure adrenaline. There are loads of great short bursting trails in and around robin hood country that I use to link rides
One of my favourite short routes is in a little bit of wood between Derby Road and Cauldwell Dam , near Mansfield. It joins a number of local routes between Newstead Abbey, Hucknall, Sherwood Forest, Kirkby and Sherwood Pines.
Here’s one of my favourite videos, capturing the trail in all its glory.
The trail entrance into the wood is from Derby Road at the top end, near West Notts college. As the trail forks, take the left and start the cracking snaking downhill single track between the trees on the edge of the wood. The trail follows the edge of the woods most of the way. It snakes left and right until you reach a slight incline to take you over a little hump and then a straight trail still with the edge of the wood to the left. At the bottom it is a short steep incline going over a rooty hump and then to the steepest downhill of the trail, which is tricky in the wet as it has a slight left hand plain with plenty of roots sticking out. At the bottom the trail swings right before you hit the water and follows the stream on a level bumpy section. Beware as there are two parts of the trail that sloop into the stream and if you don’t keep your focus can take you with it. However, a little push right and you can navigate both easily. The end of this section comes with a sharp right onto a ten-metre sharp incline that takes you away from the stream and into the wood. Once conquered it’s a quick shimmy through the wood to a final short sharp downhill and onto the main firewood which takes you back to the top.
This small route features in a number of articles on the website. Three other articles focus just on Cauldwell dam. One is the short full loop of the wood, the second is a very different video of the full loop of the wood and the third is the straight fast downhill that runs in parallel to this trail. Then this section is captured a lot in the loops around Newstead Abbey, Thieves wood and Harlow wood. My favourite is the article describing the amazing autumn morning ride I had which passed through Thieves wood finishing on this trail.
Over the years the land scape of these woods and the cauldwell dam routes has changed a number of times due to local forestry work, but this section always turns out well. It's fast, winding and rooty. Love it!!!
To be a bit repetitive, as I say, there is nothing like bursting through one of your favourite trails. I have loads of favourite short and long trails I like to add into my routes. Do you? if you do let me know where and I’ll look them up.
