Frostbite Run 2022

Frostbite Run 2022 Sunday November 6th

John Earp has sent this report and thanks to everyone that sent photographs. (There were a lot of photographs and it took a lot of time to sort as I will not just slap them into the page but crop, correct, resize and frame each picture.) Eddy.

It’s over two months since my new left knee operation so (against the advice from my wife) I arrived at Tutbury car park to join those already assembled for the Frostbite run, the last run of the Burton season, led by Andy Roberts and Mick Leach as the back man.

It was good to see members from the Notts and Derby and North Staffs sections and Rob on his 500cc Ariel twin on his first run with the Burton section. Also, a quick mention of the couple (sorry I didn’t get their names) on their silver Suzuki GSX1400 who came just to see the 19 bikes assembled in the car park before the run.

After Andy had a briefly checked that we all understood the ‘drop off system’ he told us the run would be approximately 30 miles each way and just after 10.00 am Andy led us out of the car park through Hatton to Sudbury, past Sudbury Hall and on to Doveridge taking minor back roads to Rocester, Denstone and down through Alton where we took a left turn along the Churnet Valley.

We continued and Oakamoor, Moneystone, Whiston and Froghall came and went so that we soon found ourselves stuck in traffic in Cheadle and it was now raining.

A quick check on my speedo told me that we must surely be near our halfway point. I’d only had a few bran flakes for breakfast but the two cups of tea were beginning to make themselves known!

Sure enough after negotiating a few more back roads we turned left into Blake’s Fisheries our stopover.

Last time we were here the driveway was deep in loose gravel but thankfully this had now gone and we were soon parked up and ordering our breakfast which incidentally was very good.

At 12.16, I know this because I sent my wife my location, we set off from the Fisheries on our return journey. I was expecting it to rain and I wasn’t disappointed.

Our return route took us via Blythe Bridge, Hilderstone, Bramshall and Marchington where we picked up the obligatory horse box with a top speed of 30mph! I was praying for Andy to take the short cut missing out Draycott and he did, bringing us out by the Roebuck pub where we turned left. At the roundabout we went right to pick up the Tutbury road to Fauld and the car park in Tutbury where we all said our goodbyes before setting off for home.

Thanks to Andy for leading and keeping the speed relevant to the road conditions and Mick as back man. It was a great way to end the Burton Section year and thanks to all the riders who took part in the run. John.

I particularly liked this Ariel 500cc twin photograph. Ariel eventually used BSA 650 A10 engines but this does not have, as you might think have BSA 500 A7 engine, it has Ariel's own designed 500. It had two camshafts with the pushrods running one up each corner of the barrel casting. I think that this is quite an uncommon model. My brother had one years ago that I think was probably very rare as it had an all alloy engine. Eddy.