Police warn mountain bikers to stay away from London 2012 MTB course

Usual situation where public money is spent promising value for money and legacy to benefit The People. No it won't. When will authorities stop underestimating people and allow them to expand their horizons. The road course is open to the public and readily ridden when mincing it with 60mph traffic on some sections..........Do the authorities deem that too dangerous? No. Then why is this off road course???

I haven't seen the course but the bit in the picture doesn't look that hard.

Wooden barriers eh? They've turned it into a cyclo-cross course for us then! Nice one.

Bunch of Jessies. Who'd have thought the Bizzies were a lot of lily-livered dirt-dodgers.

Shame on you.

I'll have a go on a Barbie bike in a mini skirt. Streamers and all.

I bet it's a good bit more dangerous now they've had wooden barriers dotted around the course, especially as people that sneak in would probably wait until after dark.

The course is said to be physically demanding so the average biker might be quite tired after riding the whole circuit, but it's also relatively open, clean and clinical and purpose built for mountain bikes, so arguably safer than riding your local woods.
I bet the no trespassing stance has a lot to do with not wanting the course damaged before the event by 12 months of heavy use by amateurs, and not wanting to spend the run-up to the games cleaning rude graffiti off the rocks.
Sounds like another missed opportunity to benefit the community that paid for it to be built.

I'm assuming a local bobby had a go on his Smith & Wesson and scared himself stupid.

I live in Canvey and I can almost see that from my window, what we need are similar warning signs near any main road down here, warning any cyclist that several motorists will attempt to kill them rather than give way.

I hadn't thought of going but since the cops have said no mountain bikers should use it I'm half tempted to turn up with my BMX.

I've read that as dont go on with a mountain bike, go for a cyclocross bike its certainly smooth enough to!

Can't really see that it would be more demanding than certain sections of Dalby Forest- open to all- which hosted a round of the MTB World cup at the weekend, and proved too tricky for some of the pros.

It might be fun to be chased round the course by security; you'd feel like you were in a race.

There are not many things (and almost none designed for mountain bikes) that are actively dangerous to someone who has a reasonable grasp of their own limitations on a mountainbike.

Seems slightly over the top.

The official line is that they will "explore what course will be left in place for future use".
http://www.london2012.com/hadleigh-farm
It would be a much better legacy to leave the whole thing, being near to London pleanty of people would want to use it.

Here's some other issues with it
It's in essex, which is mostly flat.
It's not going to be open to MTBers after
They took away the XC routes on the olympic site for all the buildings and parking

They moved the sailing to Portland, the tennis to wimbledon, so why didn't they do the MTB-ing in wales. it's just down the M4 and we'd have had good tracks after.

Some national sporting heritage

Brilliant, world class cycling facility built at huge tax payers expense closed cause of health and safety fears. Make it clear this is a hard route for experienced cyclists on good bikes and build some easier trails for everyone else. Make this into a proper trail centre and let everyone have their fun. This could be a great facility if theyd thought it through.