Peak District hills

[phoenix]

As previously posted I am going to do a Sportive in 2009, I plan to ride the sportive route a few times beforehand in April/May but until then can anyone point me at the best hills to practise on?

In order of preference I am ideally looking for

Very quiet traffic - safer for me to wobble all over the road
Steep - on the principle of the more I practice the better I will get.
Long - although I don't really think we have any in this country.

I guess I could spend a day or two driving around the peaks with a couple of o/s maps but I am sure I would probably miss some real good ones or just spend the time 'enjoying' the roads in the car.

 

[RedBike]

There are loads of hills to choice from so you're almost spoilt for choice.

If I had to name one I would probably go for Winnats Pass. It's relatively short but horrendously steep. There is a lot of tourist traffic in this area so Sunday morning is probably not the best time to attempt it if you want traffic free roads!

If you're after quite roads and loads of hills then you can't go far wrong with planning a route baised on that of the Leg-breaker challange sportive.
http://www.legbreaker.co.uk/rideinfo.htm

With the exception of the road into/ out of Leek nearly all the route is on very quite and very hilly country lanes.

 

[dan_bo]

winnats is an absolute arse. lovely countryside though.

 

[amrushton]

Forget Winnats. It's stupid and full of cars. look at a map of the area. You have the area east of Bamford around Ringinglow, the climb up from Hathersage towards Sheffield. Turn right on the climb and head towards Grindleton. Straight on towards Eyam but left over Calverslough back to Hathersage.Rushop Edge > Edale. The routes round Buxton (Cat, Long Hill), Monyash, Flagg etc

 

[phoenix]

Many thanks for the info.

I have the o/s maps out now to plot a few routes and depending on the weather I may give one a try later this week.

 

[marinyork]

If you want closer to home. Go to near Matlock. There is a village a couple of miles up the road from Matlock called Two Dales. Either side of that valley is a pretty mean hill. It's on the B5057. It's also pretty much traffic free is you compare it to some of the nearby roads. On one side is Syndhope Hill which is upto 20% and on the other side of the valley is more or less 4 miles up hill without it being an insane gradient, but still tough. Two Dales is pretty good as you can combine it with just about any other loop in the area.

 

[phoenix]

That sounds great, it would be a natural extension to my existing route towards Matlock

 

[Hugo15]

If you want closer to home. Go to near Matlock. There is a village a couple of miles up the road from Matlock called Two Dales. Either side of that valley is a pretty mean hill. It's on the B5057. It's also pretty much traffic free is you compare it to some of the nearby roads. On one side is Syndhope Hill which is upto 20% and on the other side of the valley is more or less 4 miles up hill without it being an insane gradient, but still tough. Two Dales is pretty good as you can combine it with just about any other loop in the area.

Stayed at top of Syndhope Hill earlier this year. Unfortunately didn't have my bike with me as I would have liked to have a crack at it. The lower bit was tricky in the car!!

 

[a_n_t]

Just look for the double chevrons on the OS map at multimap.com, thats what I do!

http://www.multimap.com/maps/#map=5...ation&loc=GB:-0.1261:51.509:8||United Kingdom

 

[Noodley]

Have a look at this:

http://www.highergrangefarm.fsnet.co.uk/PeakAudax/permanent.htm

Plenty routes with hills in the Peak District...

 

[phoenix]

Thanks Noodley, that site looks great, some brilliant routes for me to try out.

I guess I should put a sat nav/gps thingy on my christmas list so that I can put the routes in before I start, I hate stopping and having to look at a map to find out where I am.

 

[marinyork]

Yeah thanks for the link noodley. I may do an audax one day.

phoenix from matlock/baslow/hathersage area there are a quite a few 600ft hills around this area so you could clock up massive cumulative climbs by doing varying loops in a small area. I don't think you'd get lost either, it's packed in an area not that far from where you cycle already.