Windhill Bikepark

If you’re into swanky trail centres and expensive coffee, this isn’t for you. If you like things back to basics; portaloos, friendly staff, and a brilliant ride on your doorstep – it definitely is! It’s easily accessed via A-Roads and there’s a nearby services if you’re looking for hot food / accommodation.

You park up a three-minute ride from the kiosk, which is no issue – a bag of spanners and spare tubes is never too far away, and the staff often lend pumps and tools for trailside tweaks. The first thing you’ll see is a big wooden drop in ramp – and it links to every trail in the park, so makes a perfect hub for meeting new riders. Underneath this there’s a cubby hole to store bags etc and the kiosk where you pay. There’s a couple of seats and a load of tree stumps to sit on and have a bite to eat, and the kiosk sells the usual chocolate bars, energy drinks etc that you’d expect.

But the important bit, the trails…

They’re impressive, seriously impressive. There’s a massive amount of variety, from the (quickly becoming) infamous pro line you can see in Pilgrim and Reynolds edits, to a blue trail you could have an absolute blast on whether you’re experienced, or a complete novice

Blue Trail - It’s fast (as fast as you can go!) and flowy with a lot of BMX-type features that you can hone your skills on, finishing up on a nice set of jumps that you can send as hard as you like. Big berms opening up onto a few fast, straight sections give plenty of runoff and the chance for a novice to explore their potential. There’s a nice set of whoops at the start, and this beginning section shoots off into three other red trails, so no deflated egos when you drop in from the main ramp – you really can pick and choose your trails.

The red trails – You’ve got a lot of choice in this department. One trail follows the same ethos as the blue trail; fast, flowy and massively fun! The jumps are bigger, and you require reasonable pace to clear them - a novice could ride it without feeling too intimidated, but there’s a really sweet set of tables at the bottom that require good speed if you’re going to clear them. There’re two other red tracks that are slower (if you ride like me) and a bit more technical – tight corners, muddy roots and uneven ground – nothing like the stony, smooth blue runs. Bigger jumps, drops, and even a little road gap; all designed to keep you on your toes. If you were being picky here, you could argue that there’s nothing super-technical; there’re no big rock gardens or root-strewn ribbons of track threading tightly between trees. It never poses an issue for me though – I was having too much fun on what was there, and its an omission I’ve only really noticed on reflection.

If you’re a dirt jumper, don’t despair – there’s a great set of dirt jumps running off the pro line and no, you don’t HAVE to drop off that Northshore feature to hit them (but massive props if you do!)

So, yeah, it’s an easy day out. A few people might complain about an uplift, but the big positive about the park not being very steep is that it’s an easy 10 minute push up the fire roads – and if you can’t handle that, you need to work on your fitness. The tracks snake down the hillside, really making use of the shallower gradient – I found I wanted trails to last longer because I was having such a good time, not because they were noticeably shorter than I’m used to. As part of the B1KEPARK franchise (that runs Tidworth Freeride and Rogate too) it’s run as efficiently as you’d expect, and £10 a ride seems like a bargain – especially if you’re used to going further afield spending money on fuel, bridge tolls, parking and expensive trail centre food. The only thing worth mentioning is that you need to register beforehand; it’s a two-minute job online and is (as far as I understand) the equivalent of signing the waiver at BPW and most other bike parks. Plus, once its done, they mail you a membership card you can flash each time so you don’t need to take any other ID - if it’s your first time take a pic of the membership number they email you and show them that. Oh, and yearly membership is £125 with discounts for servicemen, youths and students, which works out a bargain when you think that’s 1 visit a month for a year – yet you’ll find most locals out there shredding almost until the sun sets on summer weeknights.