I need to find myself a particularly long ride (not too technical) somewhere around the Beacons next weekend. Ideally I'm thinking something in the realm of 40 miles with a decent amount of climbing.

My current plan is to do MBWales's Talybont Forest and The Gap rides... though there's a little overlap there so it might not be ideal. I also have about 5 different versions of The Gap and I have absolutely no idea which might be the best one.

Any suggestions would be appreciated. I know there's a few people here with a good understanding of the area (some of whom have KOM on sections I ride reasonably regularly!).

PM Ian

He lives in Brecon and may have done one or two long rides

Will do, cheers.

This seems to cover most of it: https://www.strava.com/activities/168526869

Wow. Maybe not that one. lol

I did a decent ride from Talybont, up onto Allt-yr-esgair down then past the transmitter. Back roads up to Mynydd Troed then singletrack Bw that traverses along the bottom of Mynydd Llangorse, climb up through the woods and the descend the ridge S into Bwlch, then a quick blast down the road to Llangynidr. Take the canal path back to Talybont then up the Taff trail to the Gap. Drop down into Pencelli to pick up the canal back to Talybont.

65km and 1500m climbing so fits your criteria pretty well I'd have thought. 1st loop has really nice singletrack, the 2nd is a rocky option.

Pretty.

I can email the Gpx if you want.

Thanks.

Went on a slightly modified version of this one (connected it to a Sennybridge ride I had done previously): https://www.strava.com/activities/245195131

Such variety on the terrain, really enjoyed in, in spite of the rain. Very rocky (bouldery?) Sarn Helen descent was a bit much for the nephew though, and I had to walk a couple of bits for fear of doing further damage to my knee. Looking at some of Ian's PRs though, I suspect he's not entirely human.

Richard G wrote:Looking at some of Ian's PRs though, I suspect he's not entirely human.

No, it's just that my pain threshold is inversely proportional to the number of gears on my bike