Page 20 - 103RA 2018-20

103 Regiment Royal Artillery
Making sure all students understood the importance of checking the servicea- bility of their bike pre and post ride, once ready the group were taken through ready position, breaking on different surfaces, cornering techniques and
front manual lift to get over
those bumps in the track.
After practice with lots of constructive critique and encouragement the group
headed to the skills training
area. The skills training area
in Coed-y-Brenin is excellent,
with several different routes
at both Blue, Red and Black
levels, everything from bank curves to drop offs and front manual lifts. Having practiced their skills, the group headed off to the Minor Taur, a 12km blue route with plenty of fun features, including stone steps, tabletops and fantastic swoopy berms.
The weather held fine, as the group tackled the 4 loops of the Minor Taur and skills and confidence grew in the group. An advantage of the route is that you are able to back track and retry the sections again, a second or third go at a particular section saw many of the riders improve greatly and take on the obstacles with more confi- dence, speed and sometime finesse. It’s not just about riding the bumps and jumps you have got to look good doing it.
The last section of the ride follows the river passing some fantastic waterfalls and amazing views. The last waterfall is always a good point to stop for lunch especially as it is followed by a thigh busting climb to the highest point on the ride. What goes up must come down and all the riders enjoined the long fast ride down the back leg of loop four back to the valley bottom. Two more fast single-track sections with stone steps, rollers and table-tops, berms and even the occasional (optional) small jump or drop off dependant how you
tackled it followed and were took on with gusto.
The ride back saw a different group to the one that rode out, more confident and chattier, covered in mud and wet from
Day 2 – Walking Snowdon via the Watkins Path
The 2 groups were broken down into 4 equal groups of 6 personnel, this is the maximum that a MLT can take. Capt Graham Stephenson RA was the lead group on both days, the group was loaded with some of the more physically robust personnel across the unit.
The weather on Tue 22 Sep 20 started overcast with visibility out to approxi- mately 400 m. The groups set off from the Llyn Gwynant Campsite, walking the route North of the Lake to join the Watkins Path at GR 626 514, the lake route adds an additional 3 kms in total. The cloud base brought visibility down to about 40m once group 1 reached the disused quarries at GR 613 524. This allowed the nominated map readers in the group to follow a bearing from the Bwlch-y-Saethau feature to the path marker stones at the top of the Rhyd-Ddu-Path and Watkins Path at GR 609 543 (200m SW of the Snowdon trig point). The group then followed another
bearing to the trig point at 1085m at GR 610 544.
Group 2 set off in condi- tions that saw heavy rain initially, with hail stone in the last 500m. The whole mountain cleared, with stunning views over Crib Goch to the North and the Irish Sea out to the West for a 1-hour window after
lunch, as the groups were descending. The short package was enjoyed by all and there are plenty of cracking photo- graphs on the Sub Unit social media sites
to show that.
The Battery Training Cells should look
at future AT qualification nominations, getting some of our regular Reserve attendees onto these AT courses is the key to delivering successful Battery AT packages in the future.
It’s not just about riding the bumps and jumps you have got to look good doing it
puddle splashes but very happy. A quick coffee at the socially distance Café was followed by bike clean down and that all important post ride M check. We needed to see how our bikes had stood up to the day’s activity and check whether I had any servicing and repairs to carry out that night ready for the
next day’s group.
The ride was supposed to be 12km
but with a few back tracks and reruns of the more fun and difficult sections we managed 18km which was a good ride out. The bus ride back to the campsite was filled with reminisces of the day the
ups down and near misses such a fun activity.
that make MTB
18
Day 1 Activity 3 – Local
Beddgelert walk
The 5.5 km walk to the East
of Beddgellert takes about
3 hours, the route allows
groups to start at any point
on the East side of the
circular route. The high-
lights include stunning
views of Llyn Dinas Lake
from the SW. The 3 hrs allows for the MLT Instructors to assess the overall Team’s map reading abilities at all stages, with the majority of the Team being able to take the lead. The route is aimed at Novice level, which is all the more important due to MATT 5 no longer being delivered across the Army Reserve. This is a real shame because this basic skill is being lost (to skill–fade) across many of the junior ranks.
The cloud base brought visibility down to about 40m