Gravel
An increasingly popular option, our club gravel rides combine the best of the Cotswold gravel tracks, with some quiet road sectors and some occasional single track. Dedicated gravel bikes are ideally suited to this form of riding, however these rides are also well suited to hard tail mountain bikes, or indeed mountain bikes of any type. Cyclocross bikes fitted with wider tyres will also work well depending on the conditions.
Gravel rides
The majority of gravel ride routes used by the club have been developed and evolved by Don Muir. Over time, a notation system has evolved in the route titles. This system identifies the ride type, start location, off-road distance in kms and general surface conditions.
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For example, consider the route with the title G RS Notgrove via U Slaughter (18.5 Firm/good)
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G = gravel ride
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RS indicates this ride begins from behind the Rising Sun on Cleeve Hill. Other starts are TH Tunnel Hill, DB Daisy Bank car park and DBL for Dog Bark Lane. BQ is the B&Q roundabout by Arle Court
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The number in brackets is the distance in km off road.
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The words borrow horse racing terminology to indicate the predominant type of off road. Firm should hold up all year, good should be rideable but likely tough when wet, and soft is only for when ground conditions are either dry or maybe frozen.
Each route is typically capped at around 40 miles. Shorter options would lose almost half the available gravel sections with sub 30 mile routes.
