100 greatest cycling climbs

[Peter]

Cragg Vale.  Longest continuous gradient in the country.  A beast to climb, but heaven to descend.  Not as brake-grippingly steep as its partner Blackstone Edge.

Strangely, I preferred it the other way around.  It's a great climb, it's never hard and the landscape changes slowly enough for one to appreciate it.

The tarmac, though, is quite bumpy, so descending it was awful, as I couldn't simply let it go.  My wrist was already aching, but it was murder after bouncing down that descent for three or four miles...

I'm with you on this one, Deano.  There are too many parked cars and bad lines of sight to make the descent of Turvin Road (Cragg Vale) towards Mytholmroyd as exhilerating as it should be, even allowing for the surface.  But it's a great climb.  Blackstone Edge is good both ways and it's always satisfying to hear cars behind you grounding as they ignore the warning signs on the descent towards Rochdale.  There's almost a ramp there because of subsidence.

[MSeries]

Cragg Vale.  Longest continuous gradient in the country.  A beast to climb, but heaven to descend.  Not as brake-grippingly steep as its partner Blackstone Edge.

I like the descent from Moscar Top back into Sheffield.

Cragg Vale is a dissappointment from both directions. Blackstone Edge is much nicer, the descent is good, suits a crap descender like me, good visibilty, wide road little need to brake.  It's been a while since I was on it but the descent back to Rippendon from Blackstone Edge resevoir is a good one, I'm going to go home that way a few times this year. My fave in those parts is the climb from Denshaw up to Buckstones which features on my Long Pennine Climbs ride, as does Cragg Vale. In planning that route I had a hard time choosing the climbs and descents, they are all good round there.

[Bendy Bianchi]

Surely it should conclude "go to France instead"?

A road cyclist's guide to Britain's hills by Simon Warren.

Just a heads up if anyone is interested in this book as it is on sale at amazon for £5.  It's small enough to fit into a jersey pocket too   

100 Greatest Cycling Climbs: A Road Cyclist's Guide to Britain's Hills: Amazon.co.uk: Simon Warren: Books

Happy grimping folks!