stapfam

One of the reasons I enjoy off road riding is NO CARS. Plenty of other things to bother about and the most serious I get is trees suddenly jumping out into the middle of the trail.

But we do have a few problems with idiots. On a fast downhill and I saw the rider in front of me throw his bike down and keep himself as low as possible to the ground. He also screamed out---"Every body Stop". His throw down was at 20mph and it was intentional from behind. Some one had stretched and nailed barbed wire across the trail at just above wheel centre height. The rider had seen it just in time.

We could not get the Staples out so strung branches along it to warn others and then found the Forest Ranger. There had been a spate of this in the last couple of weeks and we were advised to take it carefull on the trails in the forest till they caught the offender. They did catch him but I was wary of fast downhills after that.

But those trees that jump out in front of you. Stuart Has a trick on the Tandem of running through low branches and not warning me. He ducks at the last second and I get it full in the face. Thats when I take the pressure out on the next climb and I have even jumped off the Tandem and run past him up a particularly steep climb and told him I am checking for low branches.