green laning guides

[gray84]

right i know this is becoming a dying sport/hobbie but was wondering wheres best near the midlands and is there anywhere online that gives you guides to where its not frowned upon?
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Road bike - 2002 YAMAHA R6(SOLD) 2008 YAMAHA R1(SOLD) 2007 APRILIA SXV 550(SOLD) 2007 SUZUKI GSXR 600
Dirt bike - 1989 HONDA CR80sw(SOLD) 1996 YAMAHA YZ125(SOLD) 2006 yamaha yz250(SOLD)

[weasley]

First place to start is an Ordnance Survey map - Byways Open to All Traffic (BOATS) are clearly marked on these and are, as the title suggests, open to all traffic. They range from fairly well-made lanes to muddy tracks and can be badly or even wrongly marked by signposts, which can lead to conflict with other users. Your local county council should have the definitive answer on the status of all byways if this does crop up.

Advice is be courteous, ride safely and considerately. Some won't like you using bona fide 'green lanes' but if you're riding a road-legal bike on a designated BOAT there is nothing they can do about it. Remember though that the rules of the road still apply (so wheelies, speeding and the like are still illegal).

[.Bishbash.]

Is there a good place to get these maps? The only place I have found cost £14.
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Current bike - GSX-R1000 k8

[Tonka]

The pink Landranger maps are normally around the £7-8.00 mark and they are adequate for green laning 1:50k. I think the 1:25k Leisure maps may be the more expensive ones. Greater detail obviously but not all the country is covered by them IIRC and you'd have to carry more on your rideout! Alternatives are MemoryMap/Satmap on GPS units or even your iphone!!

As far as finding the legal routes is concerned it's a massive bugbear as everyone in the know seems to think it's all a big secret! There is no easy way, but there are several easier ways;

Your Landranger map will not be up to date in respect of legal byways for greenlaning - none are. Getting into your local County Council offices with your maps and marking up the byways will be one way. Some CC have this information on-line which would save a trip.

Your local Trail Riders Fellowship (TRF) will have access to the legal rights of way. You can pay the £40 annual membership, get along to your local club's monthly meet and then ask for your maps to be marked (you may have to pay extra for this!).

Other than that we have a couple of local splinter groups (broke from the TRF) who ride the lanes and do so legally wherever possible (get the info regarding closed lanes a bit later, so the only grey area). Take a gander online and see if there are any like that in your area.

HTH
____________________
'The core of a man's spirit comes from new experiences'
Suzuki SV650S (Clean); Yamaha XT250 Serow (Dirty)

[Teflon-Mike]

Looking at the Dot on the map, your NW Brum, Wolverhampton-ish perhaps, dont really matter, but you are right on the boarders and have access to a LOT of really great lanes, and pushing a bit further west, the play-ground of the Snowdonia National Park.

Join the TRF..... go from there.

That region is quite badly over-used and abused, particularly into NWales.

OS Maps, Land-Rangers are normally about £7.99, check the OS Web-site, they have been running some three for two type offers recently.

BUT, OS maps are not great on thier own. They are ALWAYS out of date, I think they have a rolling ten year schedule for revising them, and unfortunately we are in the middle of a refresh period thats been knocbbled by the NERC act thats re-classified about a third of the lanes we can ride or drive, & most maps still show obsolete route classification. Added to that, they often only provide classification on about half the unsurfaced trails that have vehicular rights on them. An AWFUL lot of trails in your district and more into Wales will simply be marked on the OS as 'Other Route With Public Access'... lots of these will simply be foot-paths, but many DO have vehicular rights on them.

As said, the long winded way of doing it is to make appointment with the relevent local authority to view thier 'Definative Map' and ammendments, and mark up your OS with trails that do have MV rights on.

But you have to know what to look for in the first place, or you could become a skeleton in the County Records Office before you have a fully marked map!

TRF have local reps who have 'marked maps' from doing this, and who will share experience with you if you are a member, theres also an online data-base used to share trail status info, which can be useful.

But the main thing is joining the TRF you should find some contacts to 'show you the ropes'.

Basically there AREN'T any definative 'green-lane guides' like there are walking or cycling guides giving routes and stuff, you have to do a bit more work.... some mags DO publish green-lane routes, I think Total Off Road (4x4) magazine as well as Land Rover Owner International, both do regular Laning features and print route guides..... BUT... they often get critasised for them, becouse after publishing the routes they then get over used or chewed up by numpties, and in quite a FEW occassions, & significantly in a 'National Green-Lane Suppliment' given away in one of the mags summer issues.... it was shown that about two thirds of the routes they suggested were actually ILLEGAL!

Basically, if you want to do it legit, you need to be very careful about where you get your route info from. TRF, give some confidence the lane data they offer is 'good'.
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My Webby'Tef's-tQ, loads of stuff about my bikes, my Land-Rovers, and the stuff I do with them!
Current Bikes:'Honda VF1000F' ;'CB750F2N' ;'CB125TD ( 6 3 of em!)'; 'Montesa Cota 248'. Learner FAQ's:= 'U want to Ride a Motorbike! Where Do U start?'

[gray84]

ok ill check the TRF out and see what i find.
i didnt know you needed a road legal bike? thats pretty much me screwed then lol.
____________________
Road bike - 2002 YAMAHA R6(SOLD) 2008 YAMAHA R1(SOLD) 2007 APRILIA SXV 550(SOLD) 2007 SUZUKI GSXR 600
Dirt bike - 1989 HONDA CR80sw(SOLD) 1996 YAMAHA YZ125(SOLD) 2006 yamaha yz250(SOLD)

[Tonka]

If your bikes are not road legal you will need to go to somewhere designated as an off-raod site ie. not on the public highway.

You would probably need to pay to ride (normally not too much for the day) and then you can whizz around a circuit to your hearts content. The circuits are enduro or MX style so offer lots of variety and challenges, the only down side is the number of really fast riders zooming past you!!

Tom's Farm isn't too far from you. However, you would need find out when it's open and also if it is ok for the bikes to be non-legal - it's private land so in theory you should be ok if the landowner hasn't made any restrictions and you ensure that you don't stray off the private land. The guys I know who use it have road legal bikes anyway so it doesn't cause them any concern.

There are quite a few others - G goes to somewhere called EnduroLand which is Adstone, Northamptonshire and they have New Rider days where you can go and 'play.'
____________________
'The core of a man's spirit comes from new experiences'
Suzuki SV650S (Clean); Yamaha XT250 Serow (Dirty)

[gray84]

ive been to toms farm a few times when i was alot younger about 10 years ago.
yeh i just fancy a bit of enduro not just killing it round a track. i dont mind the idea of a set trail on private property aslong as there is distance and not just riding round a field with a few trees lol...
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Road bike - 2002 YAMAHA R6(SOLD) 2008 YAMAHA R1(SOLD) 2007 APRILIA SXV 550(SOLD) 2007 SUZUKI GSXR 600
Dirt bike - 1989 HONDA CR80sw(SOLD) 1996 YAMAHA YZ125(SOLD) 2006 yamaha yz250(SOLD)

[G]

Enduroland moves around the place a bit.
While it's a much longer distance than motocross (enduro tracks tend to range from 4 to 20 miles), there's still a reasonable amount of speed.
You should be fine as a 'noob' on a normal day providing you don't mind faster people flying past you and pull asside when you can* - I did a few laps on a c90 last time I was there .
* I've really found this a problem myself, just accept they generally don't want to crash and know what they're doing more than you .

However it definitely isn't 'trail riding'/'greelaning', which is a different thing. It's what trackdays are to road riding, I'd say.

[gray84]

im linking the look of this enduroland.
G how many people are there on the norm? is it worth it there? i dont mind faster people aslong as their not abusive if i have got in their way at some point ect?
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Road bike - 2002 YAMAHA R6(SOLD) 2008 YAMAHA R1(SOLD) 2007 APRILIA SXV 550(SOLD) 2007 SUZUKI GSXR 600
Dirt bike - 1989 HONDA CR80sw(SOLD) 1996 YAMAHA YZ125(SOLD) 2006 yamaha yz250(SOLD)

[G]

Dunno about numbers specifically, and does depend on the event/venue.

Never found anyone to be arsey. I always try and move aside, but generally people aren't worried either way.

Definitely worth it to my mind - get a lot more 'play time' than greenlaning and plenty of fun obstacles to play with generally (note the harder stuff does usually have an 'easy' route to skip it too.)

Only time I've ever found anyone to be slightly arsey was after dropping my bike at a timecard enduro (part of souther championship, so fairly serious) and having just picked it up I was blocking the middle of the only useful line and got a muttered expletive. Was the number 2 rider.
While waiting for my burger after heard someone discussing what sounded like my incident and say "must have sounded like a right arse"; was going to ask, but then my burger was ready, which took precedence .

[gray84]

lol ill avoid the time trial/competitions just want a nice free ride/play

im on the hunt for pref a yamaha 250f or 450f not sure the pros and cons of either...250 or 450? i used to have a yamaha yz125 and a kawasaki kx 250...
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Road bike - 2002 YAMAHA R6(SOLD) 2008 YAMAHA R1(SOLD) 2007 APRILIA SXV 550(SOLD) 2007 SUZUKI GSXR 600
Dirt bike - 1989 HONDA CR80sw(SOLD) 1996 YAMAHA YZ125(SOLD) 2006 yamaha yz250(SOLD)

[G]

250 is lighter, but needs a lot more work (less of an issue for enduro than trail riding), 450 is heavier but plenty of grunt, which can actually make it a bit harder work if you're trying to really get the best out of the bike - just as a litre bike on a road trackday can go fast, but much harder to go fast for what it is .

Personally, I prefer 2 strokes - they can be quite different to motocross 2 strokes, with a lot of low down/midrange as well as plenty of pep on top.

You're welcome to have a play on any in my current fleet (KTM 144,200,300) if you're at somewhere I'm at .

At the moment undecided whether to do enduroland or a KTM try out day next weekend.

[gray84]

cheers for the help and the offer mate. where abouts are you?
im not going to use all the power of a 250 on a enduro track/ mx track am i? think id go for the 250 orless a 450 comes up cheap i dont mind either way i surpose..
____________________
Road bike - 2002 YAMAHA R6(SOLD) 2008 YAMAHA R1(SOLD) 2007 APRILIA SXV 550(SOLD) 2007 SUZUKI GSXR 600
Dirt bike - 1989 HONDA CR80sw(SOLD) 1996 YAMAHA YZ125(SOLD) 2006 yamaha yz250(SOLD)

[gray84]

cheers for the help and the offer mate. where abouts are you?
im not going to use all the power of a 250 on a enduro track/ mx track am i? think id go for the 250 orless a 450 comes up cheap i dont mind either way i surpose..
____________________
Road bike - 2002 YAMAHA R6(SOLD) 2008 YAMAHA R1(SOLD) 2007 APRILIA SXV 550(SOLD) 2007 SUZUKI GSXR 600
Dirt bike - 1989 HONDA CR80sw(SOLD) 1996 YAMAHA YZ125(SOLD) 2006 yamaha yz250(SOLD)

[G]

I'm in Reading, but do try and make it to Enduroland etc occasionally.

I haven't ridden a 250f decently around an enduro track, but my 200 2 stroke when I'm 'on it' I can certainly use all the power available. Not as well as many, but am using it.
Prefer my 144 though, seriously light and the power isn't quite as motocrossy (it's actually a motocross bike, but been converted to enduro professionally.)

If I do this KTM try out day, definitely going to get a go on a 250f to compare.

[Tonka]

This is just an observation and as I know very little about the mechanical side of dirt bikes it could do with someone like G to verify. However, my experience of folk riding on the 250 and the 450 is that those with the bigger bikes seem to spend more time off the dirt saving up to get their bikes fixed/maintained.

It really depends on what you want to do and how savvy you are at fixing stuff yourself, but I have to say that the smaller bikes are just as much fun if all you want to do is get out and put some miles/hours in. If you really need to trick and compete then the requirements are different obviously. I find it quite sad the number of our guys who spend weeks off because the bike needs work and they either can't afford it or haven't got the time to mend them. Lots of them seem to be a bit mugged IMHO as they have gone for the bike their mates have or have gone for the big engine and found one cheap (often for a good reason!) and then can't keep it running.

Just my from what I've witnessed over the past year or so!
____________________
'The core of a man's spirit comes from new experiences'
Suzuki SV650S (Clean); Yamaha XT250 Serow (Dirty)

[G]

Tonka - are you comparing a competition enduro 250 with a competition enduro 450, or was it a trail 250 with an enduro 450?
All the enduro 4 strokes tend to be a bit high maintenance (one of the reasons I like the 2 strokes!) However, the Yamaha don't have too bad a reputation, but do tend to be a bit heavier.
I'd say often the 250s are worse when it's both enduro bikes - as like with the 125s (the glass they run with), they tend to be designed for maximum peak power, rather than being more about mid range grunt for usability.

[Tonka]

Simply comparing the WR250 and WR450 F spec - the 250 seems lots cheaper and easier to maintain. As I said only an observation from the 'cheap seats'!!
____________________
'The core of a man's spirit comes from new experiences'
Suzuki SV650S (Clean); Yamaha XT250 Serow (Dirty)

[G]

You're not comparing the WR250R with the WR450F are you?

Pretty sure the WR250F has fairly nasty service intervals - think 6 hours is mentioned for valve clearances,

Oddly enough the 'R' is a heavy/slow trail bike, while the 'F' is the light/fast enduro bike (as opposed to road bikes, where F tends to signify a less extreme model than the racier 'R'.)

[Tonka]

Nope definitely the F - none of the guys has the R several of the fellas use the F and very few issues with it. 450 seems to be very high maintenance in comparison - tyres, chain and sprockets as well as general TLC!
____________________
'The core of a man's spirit comes from new experiences'
Suzuki SV650S (Clean); Yamaha XT250 Serow (Dirty)

[G]

Ah, those are going to be worse if you abuse the throttle on a bigger bike, yes.
But it's engine work I'd worry about, which tends to be worse on the smaller ones.
Get to needing a big rebuild and it can cost more than the bike's worth!

Thus my like of 2 strokes .

[Tonka]

OK - dumb question coming up

Are 2 strokes always kickers?
____________________
'The core of a man's spirit comes from new experiences'
Suzuki SV650S (Clean); Yamaha XT250 Serow (Dirty)

[G]

The latest KTM 250s and 300s (300s since 07) come with an electric boot.
However, 2 strokes tend to be a lot easier to get going than 4 strokes - while it'd be nice, never really felt the need for an electric boot.
Ok, my 300 was being a mardy mare at the start of Weston and ended up needing a two-person bump start; but after that it was fine; a single no-effort kick to restart after being literally upside down; which probably wouldn't be the case for a 4 stroke!

Same offer to others; if you'd like to have a play on one of my current bikes while I've got them, feel free.
Plan to do a weekday at Four marks some time in the next couple of weeks; you're welcome to come for a play.

[eddclarke]

I fancy going to something like enduroland but its a bit far from me (I'm in Leeds). Do any of you know of somewhere closer to me?

Cheers
Ed
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Honda XR125L 06 ----> Yamaha FZ6 05 + ex SAS XR250 --> VFR800 + XR250r