Here’s a fairly informal series of photos showing what the University of Sheffield got up to…

As with all trips from Uni we started from the arts tower at dark.

Precision packing from Sheff Uni.

Hallam with a slightly different approach..

After arriving at night we set up camp by the car headlights and woke up to find ourselves in a typical Welsh valley, Rheola.

Time to get some bikes involved!

Team Sheffield rocking some serious style.

Mid track walk, first time we realise the event is being sponsored by wine company, alcohol is probably one of the more appropriate prizes to give students at an event depending on your view of things…

Doesn’t take long before minds wander on the track walk.

Afternoon practice, Oliver Lynch from Hallam wiping out at high speed!

After practice its time to recover for racing… eating plain pasta, the food of champions, by torchlight…

… Under the clear night sky.

Race qualifying and Dave’s crowd pleasing!

Andrew Fowles charging down one of the super ruts.

Race runs and a shot of the true BUCS spirit!

Jack Reading’s 4th attempt at taking the win, bad luck had thwarted him previously yet today he lost out to Emyr Davies by a fraction of a second.

Braking steps anyone?

Time for the prize giving and Bangor Uni have turned up in their masses!

Post racing people got mischievous in the extra ordinarily warm Welsh weather.

Retaliation!

On the return journey to sheffield we stopped at the Forest of Dean.

Shredding!

The team waiting to set off from The Arts Tower

Teamwork!

Cycle event

The face says it must be a hillclimb!

Netball

Pre match prep talk.

Looking for options..?

Every point counts

Some know that all too well… Ben Baldwin the sports officer looks on nervously hoping for Sheff Uni’s first overall Varsity win in 7 years.

The nebtall 3s win with hair raising amounts of emotion

Defensive play.

Probably my favourite action shot from the day..

Netball 2s lost their in what was a battle until the final seconds of the clock.

Netball 1s played exceptionally.

Throughout Varsity there’s a huge level of student support

They might have won..

Smiles… and tears all round

Finally a montage of the photos which featured in Forge Press

Here are a few snaps that went out with the press release which you can read in full here.

If you keep an eye on the web you’ve probably seen this corner before with James Swinden coating his hand in loam as he sinks in pedal deep. Here Joe tries some alternate cornering techniques while we tried to decide what to do with the rest of the day. “]

Or you could always go "fully moto"”

Anyhow so as it happens we decided to go to Mam Tor having spotted a bit of snow on the way from mine to Joe’s. Once we got there we were surprised at just how much snow there was… At least 6 inches in some places!

Pushing a downhill bike about in the snow deserves the odd timeout every now and then and it provided time to take in how different everything looked with a dusting of snow.

But its all worth it when you get to carve you way down shale covered in snow for a quite unusual riding experience!

Possibly my favourite photo from the two days; Joe drifting in some powder on the ridgeline from Mam Tor as the cloud base falls beginning to reduce visibility.

The final descent, Joe gets his gomper leg out for an icy corner as the light fades, bringing the day's play to an end!

With fear of sounding  like the miserable student people expect me to be I will now show you what fun I had once I finished my exams; it all started with some cheeky xc photography with Ruari.

Venturing off the beaten track Ruari spied this steep chute with no room to roll in, ideal. After a sighting it up the first attempt proved fruitless!

Second attempt: success!

Maxle took a beating :

Moving on we followed the rock face looking for a photogenic part of the trail, this small “bus stop” like feature fitted the bill. Despite the slow sketchy run in Ruari managed to make it work:

Now it was time for me to get a little close to the edge, looking down from the top of the rock face!

With a few shots on the card we met up with a couple of other riders from the University of Sheffield. It was one of those rides where an appetite for finding new trails led to returning home in the dark, hungry and out of water… Great fun by all accounts!

A quick round up two wheels in 2011.

Dirt #118, MBR Feb 2012, MBR Dec 2011

Here’s the one that was bothering me this morning (its nice to have a bit of colour on the blog for a change)