Big Smiles, Good Trails & Great Company

[@McTrailRider]

Be sure to give Louise a follow👍 instagram.com/headinthesky_mtb

[@bennysh]

That rock slip gave me a heart attack, I could feel the short panic and the million "what ifs" that come a minute later :)

[@McTrailRider]

I was borderline lucky to get away with it tbh. Came out of nowhere!

[@MTB_Trekker]

Great vid that Andrew, great trails and such a beautiful place too...with the added bonus of the lovely Louise!

[@MindfulTrailBiker]

Trails look properly awesome! Great riding both! its on the list for sure, thank you for the inspiration.

[@tomhoult7725]

The Bell Tower has to be the coolest start to a trail I've ever seen

[@McTrailRider]

Yeah, definitely note worthy anyway.

[@DizRidesMtb]

So cool bro to see Louise ridin wit ya . She's awesome n a class rider too . Great ridin n epic trails there .

[@McTrailRider]

Couldn’t agree more! She’s a great trail companion.

[@JasonChambersPhoto]

Those trails look super nice Andrew. Great video guys. 😊

[@McTrailRider]

Thanks Jason 👍

[@camouflage7897]

Evanton is epic, use to be my local. Next time check out the grouse trail. Goes right from the top tree line. There are also a few DH trails on the other side of the hill from the main monument car park slippery weasel and for fox sake, drops and jumps though. Also those monuments are supposed to represent the gates to an Indian city the land owner captured.

[@McTrailRider]

Thank you for the excellent info, I’ll take notes for next time 👍

[@A_AAA232]

nice trails and riding guys, cheers - do love a Highlander smashing through the woods!

[@McTrailRider]

Can’t beat a Highlander through the woods indeed.

[@gazdavies6215]

Well ridden, and blind too. Those trails look worth another visit when they are dry.

[@McTrailRider]

Will definitely be going back for more at some point.

[@smv9338]

Great vid - interesting start to some of those trails - Louise must be a good rider - not far behind you on that last steep track!

[@McTrailRider]

Yeah, pretty cool trail heads and yes, Louise is a very good rider indeed👍

[@trevorkeay6564]

Your speed on blind trails is pretty impressive

[@chiefsittingstill6061]

Trails there seem really good. It's great when you can find something new to ride and it's a positive discovery (don't recall seeing these places featured on your channel before) 🙂

[@McTrailRider]

It is great to find new, and good, places. I have featured Balblair a couple of times. But this is the first time I’ve featured Evanton.

[@mcyoon77]

Sweet. Another place to ride on the list. 5:32 was a wee 50p:5p moment. And another mtber to follow.

[@outlandishmtb]

Great video. That last trail looked fantastic, very unique start. I'll never see that here in British Columbia!.

[@McTrailRider]

Yeah, not many trails start like that one. Pretty cool👍

[@iain8601]

Well held on the lower red at Bal. Instead time I was up Candy was a bit overgrown but still good. If you cross the river at the far end there are blue trails on the other side.

[@McTrailRider]

I’ll need to look into those other trails 👍

[@iain8601]

Also don't over look Contin the locals have been busy there.@@McTrailRider

[@McTrailRider]

@@iain8601 was there the day before (no video) and could see a good bit of work done. Will be back soon.

[@gavsta825]

I live in Devon but my Dad lived in Bonar Bridge for years so I've ridden Balblair a fair bit. Fully agree on the fitness needed there! Much prefer the Golspie trail, it's awesome. Great video 👍

[@McTrailRider]

Both completely different places to ride really. I’ve ended up doing both a couple of times, which works out quite well.

[@windy_miller_mtb]

Evanton has some really good trails but is definitely hard work getting to them. Another trail was single malt which was good but has been wind felled

[@McTrailRider]

We eventually found the slightly less hard climb 😜 Will be back for some of the other trails that we didn’t manage on this occasion.

[@cb6866]

Thanks Andrew , and Louise..I am sorry , OAF here . No instagram

[@McTrailRider]

Haha, fair do’s

[@stuartmunro1762]

Missed out the last section of the final run. You should've carried on straight over the track. Great vids of my local trail doesn't get the hype is deserves 🔥🔥🔥 🏴󠁧󠁢󠁳󠁣󠁴󠁿🤙

[@McTrailRider]

Didn’t miss it, just cut it from the video. Rode a couple more below that one too.

[@stuartmunro1762]

@@McTrailRider nice one looked like you were lucky with the weather. Great footage really enjoyed it 🤙

[@Alex_4.2]

greetings from germany!

[@McTrailRider]

Greetings received 😊

[@rossjacksonmtb]

That looked proper scary in places!

[@McTrailRider]

I didn’t find it scary really, well, apart from when my front wheel decided to brake traction😜

[@roderickmchardy3650]

hi ,,, what happened to the Mondraker ? ..... trying to find that trail Balblair , only Balblair that i know is in the Black Isle , just afew miles from the Learnie trails , but there are no woods near Balblair . ( from what i remember many , too many , years ago ) the best way to do Evanton is to park in Alness an follow the river up the road and start with the Jubilee trail , takes you right to the top , then goo go go , fantastc rough rocky decent to start ,,, been long time so maybe all change . Rod

[@McTrailRider]

Still got the Mondraker, it’s my e-bike. My regular bikes are Deviates. Balblair is located just outside Bonar Bridge. The Alness way would take in the third monument I would guess.

[@JC_on_a_bike]

I know you are a lover of Trailforks but I’ve noticed in previous videos that you seem to have some kind of navigation app on your Apple Watch. Do you mind me asking which one you use? I’m wanting to ditch my Garmin as it’s completely unreliable 😂

[@McTrailRider]

I get this question quite a lot now🤔 I run two apps on the Apple Watch. The first one is “Workoutdoors” I use it for recording my ride and to view all my metrics. The second one is the “Footpath” app, I use it for navigation. You can easily pre-load a gpx file into it and then convert it into a route to follow.

[@JC_on_a_bike]

@@McTrailRider Thanks for that 👍

[@harisankar1317]

How do you rate yourself as rider ? Are you able to do bunny hops, drops, manuals ?

[@McTrailRider]

Hard to say really. I can do all those things except good manuals. I’m fairly good at really technical and chunky trails, but I’m probably below average for bike park type trails etc.

[@harisankar1317]

@@McTrailRider at what age did you start mountain biking?

[@McTrailRider]

@@harisankar1317 16, but I’ve had several breaks from it in the past as friends stopped biking or moved away etc. Been pretty constant since 2017 though.

[@Awaitingparts]

Out of curiosity, whats the weight difference between your Claymore and Highlander?

[@McTrailRider]

Quite a bit with the way I’ve built them. Highlander is 15.2kg and the Claymore is about 18.2kg with dh tyres tbf.

[@Awaitingparts]

@@McTrailRider Interesting, as my Claymore (Medium) is around 16.5kg with Ohlins coil/38's, carbon wheels and enduro conti tyres. Wheels and tyre choice make a huge difference to how a bike rides.

[@McTrailRider]

@@Awaitingparts that’s impressive tbh 👏

[@eph8334]

Scotland is a shit show with this weather im scunnered with it. Evanton looks good tho

[@McTrailRider]

Depends where you live exactly, it’s actually not been all that bad in mid Argyll where I live. That’s definitely quite unusual though.

[@eph8334]

@@McTrailRider im just back from a month in nz, did 95 mile and used a bike wash twice.

[@camperp195]

Sooperb As usual andrew,some kickin trails there! 🤙

[@McTrailRider]

Great trails and new to me, which is nice.