Wheelerman pinged over news about a secret pumptrack he and his mates have been digging recently:

This is beamed to you from somewhere in Greater Manchester, although I won’t say where exactly.

I wouldn’t call the local riding opportunities epic but they’re certainly not Tame (evidenced for me by twice monthly physio sessions for a recovering broken wrist at the moment). There’s plenty of rocks around which is handy if you need them for building, you’ve just got to look out for the Moss.

One thing the local area is lacking though is a pump track – our nearest one’s require a car journey – so something needed to be done.

Now, we don’t have any land, we have a distinct lack of cash (as most of or earnings get spent on booze and bikes) and we certainly don’t have a unit that we can fill with dirt, biscuits and a kettle as they do in Wales (lucky bastards – whoever they are).

So, what must be a couple of years back now the decision was made to get a couple of berms with some decent sized pumps to connect them close by. It worked, the original loop, is just that and takes about 6 seconds to get round in the dry, it’s fast and tight (a bit like a lot of the peeps who helped build it).

As the nights began to draw in and injuries were healing up (around the time clocks went back in fact) we decided to put into action our plans to extend the pumptrack – doubling it’s original size.

Here are some shots from the past two Sundays – spent putting in some spade and rake work.

All hand made – no drawings but plenty of plans in everyones heads that came together pretty well.

The extension is almost there, it just needs another pump and a tweak here and there. Repair work is underway on the old track with options for a couple of crossover lines being discussed. Diggers faces have been obscured in order to protect their identities (somewhat).

Can’t wait for it to get weathered in and hardened up – it’s gonna be mint! We’ll be reaping the rewards come Spring.