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Sunday 11th June 2006 saw the MidAirCrisis trio of Jason, John and Terry team up with Suzanne, Derek, Mick and Tom of the Reivers for a blast around the Seven Stanes trails at Kirroughtree just outside Newton Stewart. This is the furthest Stanes centre from us so we decided to leave early for once, and a good drive through on relatively clear roads got us there at 9.30am after leaving Jason's just after 7. The sky was overcast with the threat of rain looming all the way to midday when things changed a little,  the temperature  a reasonable but humid 15 degrees as we started the ride. For a time it looked as though the MAC men were to be the only riders, but Derek and Tom rolled up around 9.45. We were ready to start at about 10.10 and may well have done, had it not been for Jason needing to fill his Camelbak at the facilities. As he was doing so, Mick's car appeared and with him Suzanne. As he was the Ride Leader it was just as well Jay delayed things. As it transpired, even if he hadn't we would have been caught!

So we set off around 10.30 on the Red Route, climbing away from the car park steadily on Terry's favourite circuit. That proclamation took on new meaning a few hours later. The beauty of Kirroughtree is that for a lot of its length it deceives you into thinking you're descending while in fact, cleverly, the singletracks are carrying you up the hillsides. The plentiful downward dips create this illusion, or seem to, but it could simply be that you're enjoying the trail too much to notice the overall rise in altitude. Of course that's not to say there aren't any climbs, because nothing could be further from the truth. And, on this particular occasion, for some reason the climbs got to the old Gollum's lower limbs and the final hour or so was sheer purgatory.

We started in two obvious groups, with Suzanne belting off in front dragging the other three Reivers with her, while we three, led by Jason, did our usual plod up the initial climbs. Both John and Terry were wearing their body and leg armour, while Jay carried his leg guards as far as the first singletrack drop. It was very warm inside this stuff and we were glad to have a cool breeze available whenever we got up to decent speed.

Mick, Tom and Derek were hardtail-mounted but it hardly showed as they were able to tackle most of the tricky bits without too much hassle. I spent a few minutes behind Derek on one Black section and his speed was not a problem to anyone following sanely. For someone with his spine in such a state and major surgery looming shortly he can certainly monster a pushbike around. That was just after Jason and the Gollum had sailed straight over a 4 foot drop-off that had forced Suzanne and Derek to dismount and carry down. I think Jay got away with a somewhat crumpled landing trying to miss the lady while Derek reached out and grabbed me in midair, lowering the ReCoil and it's Gollum pilot down almost intact to the level below.

Soon after this Terry suffered his first puncture on the Kona since getting it, although it's only done about 150 miles before today. A thorn was suspected here but we couldn't find a hole in the tube, so popped a new one straight in. Derek had returned to see what was keeping us while the others waited further on. We were now on the gradual haul up to McMoab. When the two groups reached it, Terry rode straight on to get some shots of the others on their way across the marbles leading to Big Mac itself. That was enjoyable, although it looked painful for some, and certainly I think I caught John on video stacking it bigtime into the rocks on the approach. He stayed down a while to ensure nothing was broken before remounting, although for him, Tom and Derek it was push as much as ride. Mick and Suzanne took the sensible route by fireroad after a short attempt at the hard stuff. Meanwhile I'd got a handful of pictures and was ready to join the group waiting on the bridge below. As I was already up there with only the main spine of the big whale to complete, that's what I did. All was fine, although tricky in the very strong wind, until I began descending from the peak. Then it was Gollums Away! as I splattered myself all over the unforgiving granite landscape to provide some choice Monday morning bruises on both legs, right shoulder and both wrists. Ayeeea!

I managed to get down to the bridge under my own steam after first joining Jason for the rock drop to the fireroad with Derek lying on his back below snapping away merrily with camera aimed vertically up the slope. Must see what develops from his snaps! We settled down at the bridge for a well deserved lunch stop when I noticed no Jason. He was still at the drop, and he'd got yet another flatty! He already had the wheel off so I assisted with the tube replacement - this one was ripped by the impact of his landing at the foot of the drop. Back to the bridge again to share my nosh with Jay who hadn't brought any food at all! John chipped in a cereal bar or three as we revived our bodies for the coming onslaught of Heartbreak Hill which was lurking just around the bend as our next challenge.

Half an hour later we were tackling it, in two distinct groups again as the Reivers were galloping up the thing, ignoring completely my stark warnings of it's sheer steepness. Good luck to 'em, I pushed up all the way, joined later by Jason then John who got half way up on his wheels. A day or two later we caught up the front runners and it was back to more sweet singletrack on the homeward leg of the trail. They've put quite a bit more juicy stuff in here since our last trip and it is now even better than before. I'd already decided it was Numero Uno but now it was Number One aswell. Although for the last hour I pushed up every little incline as there was simply nowt left in the old tank. The only reason I can think of for this apparent weakness was the fact that I'd given Jay my bag of crisps, so I was missing some normal salt intake this trip. It was also our first hot ride of the year in full armour, so I do have a couple of semi-valid excuses.

Anyway, the run in to home was excellent and even the learner skills loop at the finish added to the amount and variety of good riding at Kirroughtree. If it keeps on improving like this we can expect a much busier car park than it was today. Back at the car my computer read 23 miles, 3 hours and 38 minutes moving time and a max speed of a fairly lowly 21.7mph. However, the times I managed to glance at the thing on some of the singletrack berms, we fairly belted down those at around 15mph on the tighter ones. Yet again, Kirroughtree had produced the goods and it remains as my top pick of the Seven Stanes. I hope the new stuff promised for my local forest, Kielder, can get somewhere near this for entertainment value.

Keep watching here for pix and vidz coming soon...

Here's Tom of the Reivers take on the ride:-

"Those of you who couldn't make it on Sunday missed a bloody good ride. Well worth
the 280 mile round trip. Not as technical or stamina sapping as Glentress but the
downhill single tracks are much better, longer and much more fun, the climbs aren't
as tiring and there's plenty of space in the car park, what more could you want. If
you haven't been to Kirroughtree before, you need to get up there soon and give
it a try, YOU'LL LOVE IT. Nice to see Sue out, still as fit as ever.
Sue, Mick, Derek, Terry, Jason, Thingamebob and Tom a grand day was had by all. Cheers."

Ed- "Thingamebob" is our John, and I think Tom used this term of endearment as partial revenge for Johnny riding in his bumbag on the tricky bits at Kirroughtree!

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