Weekly Round-up: 24 May 2026
All the latest news, events, and results for NFCC Members from the previous week of two-wheeled adventures…
Gravel’n’GroggAnother perfect evening to be out playing on bikes on the track and trails the New Forest. Just four riders this week, and it seemed if your name wasn’t Matthew or Phill, you weren’t invited! The east west route rotation led to this weeks ride being on the Old Railway Route, which proved to be a firm favourite last time out. The route takes riders away from Brockenhurst on the old railway towards Burley, before looping back through the bottom of Boldrewood and returning to Lyndhurst. A totally trouble-free ride under a clear sky and golden light – perfection! |
Saturday Club RideWith all the red top newspapers proclaiming “Phew What A Scorcher” from their front pages it was a day for slapping on the factor 50 and the lightest possible summer kit. Unless your name is Rupert who turned up in arm warmers on a day that started at 21C and ended up in the 30’s. To be fair to the senior rider in the group he did see the forecast of 32 degrees and being unaware that the weather forecast changed from Fahrenheit to Celsius in 1970 thought it was going to be freezing! The barrel always honours new and innovative fails so congratulations Rupert. |
 It was another strong turnout this week for a planned 125Km ride to the north in a hope of avoiding New Forest roads that were going to be very busy. We welcomed some newbies to the Saturday ride and also some we haven’t seen for a while. We headed out towards Bolderwood in two good sized but manageable pelotons and soon picked up Smithy at Milkham.Coffee stop was planned just before the midway point at Broughton at the always welcoming Community Shop. Unfortunately, some riders heard about the risk of Group One clearing the café out of cakes with recent history of two and in some cases three portions so were in an unholy hurry to get there. Prior to the village there is a steep gravelly hill with a dead stop at the bottom and Matt C’s method of stopping was an unplanned visit to the hedgerow. Fortunately, his bike was unscathed and apart from a small graze on his knee, so was he. |
 The café was splendid as usual and there was cake for all. As ever it was hard to motivate everyone to get going for the second half of the ride as they were enjoying the sun trap and comestibles. There was a little bit of rider transfer between the groups and we all set off for the second half of the ride which included an ascent of Dean Hill. The hapless ride leader was not having a good day with his ride plotting. At Mottisfont he directed the group up a gavel Bridleway rather than Benger’s Lane. Then repeated the felony in Whiteparish. To complete the hat-trick he had also repeated the plan to use Upper Street near Braemore which was reported as barely rideable last week. Sorry everyone, will try harder and do more QA on the route next week. |
 By this time the riders were getting hot and parched so there was an easy decision to drop into the Moody Cow for ice cream and bottle fills. We then headed back towards Moyles Court and noticed a lot of traffic heading down from Red Shoot. As we headed back towards Milkham the traffic got worse and worse as drivers were getting off the A31 and taking a route across the forest. With the narrow roads and pinch points this was a fool’s errand and was creating a mighty gridlock. Tom, Matthew K, and Phill B decided that the route needed some extras and rounded up to mighty centuries. Extra kudos to them.– Barry. |
Sunday Club RideA lovely sunny morning and gentle breeze ensured a great turnout of 20 riders including a debut for Bryce, welcome to the club. Quite a few of the Goldilocks regulars were away so we settled into just two large-ish groups for a new southern loop of the forest in an attempt to avoid the bank holiday crowds. Conditions really didn’t disappoint and progress seemed easy as we headed first westwards and then South to Lymington. As planned, we managed to miss the worst of the holiday traffic but group one did receive the usual, totally unnecessary punishment pass whilst group two had the pleasure of being passed by an angry, horn blasting motorist who had been delayed by at least a micro-second, before speeding off past us to wait at the level crossing in Lymington for 5 minutes. We resisted the temptation of letting him know what we thought about his petulance. Group one made excellent progress and appears to have been pretty well behaved this week, summiting most of the routes hills at approximately the same time. Jacob L may have been exerting a little authority on the final hills as his name was showing top of the daily leaderboards. Group two was also galloping along at an unusually frisky pace. Ultimately averaging 27.5 kph at the cafe.Fun as always, hopefully everyone made it home through the traffic without incident. |
Get Involved:If you find yourself out and about representing NFCC, don’t forget to jot down a few words, snap a few photos and send them over to press@newforestcc.co.uk. |
