Video: Autumn in Northern Ireland's Castlewellan

 Mountainbikeni doesn't have any technical trails to show off, the black grade is the same a green trail in the Portes Du Soleil ratings. Even their downhill trails would only rate as a blue..
We do have some of the best natural trails in Tollymore and Donard just a few miles away

 All of the OutdoorNI sites are designed as a starting point for people that aren't active- showing off and introducing people to the groomed and family friendly elements of different sports. MountainbikeNI was never meant to replace trail badger or similar .

 Disagree, I was involved with this over 10 years ago now. It was to provide us with 'world class trails' to host events, attract visitors and stop us building our own trails. What it has produced is basically offroad cycle paths and the 2 worst built and designed downhill trails I've ever ridden. I have been going to the alps since late 90's and ridden the Dh and the big xc passportes. This is the competition we are up against in N.Ireland as a week here costs as much as a week in the alps from England. Here is Les Gets video www.youtube.com/watch?v=Fv53L8RfHeA and heres morzines www.pinkbike.com/video/283359 For a pinkbike audience it doesn't even compare is mickbrett's and others point.

 I don't disagree with the purpose of the trails, I disagree with the purpose of the website.

 The purpose of the website is mainly to attract visitors to N.Irleand in partnership with the tourist board, that's why they are promoting it here. The old tourist board advert with the natural unofficial Donard trail would have a far better effect than this.

 Yep, exactly, to promote the family friendly stuff that has been groomed, all there in the original comment...

 lost me there.. a green trail is meant to be a groomed family trail, not the blues,reds and blacks which are still only at a groomed and technical of a green family trail in the portes du soleil. This is not how the Welsh or Scottish advertise their trails. If you have been riding trails in Wales at one planet adventure, revolution, Antur Stiniog or bike park Wales do not expect to find the same on our red, blacks or DH proline. Our black xc are at best blues and the proline would also be a blue at Bike Park Wales.

 They're all built by completely different authorities, of course there's gonna be a variation in difficulty and grading?

 No a uk proline in rostrevor should be the same as a uk proline in BPW. mountainbikeni where meant to have examined how trails where graded in other regions, including the alps, and apply the same. Well they haven't, either the trails weren't designed and built to the to the specified grade or the trails are graded too high on the UK system.

 A) Castlewellan black has small drop offs which automatically puts it into the category of black by CTC guidelines. B) DH1 at RT was built by a company that normally builds motorways and nobody thought to step in when they started cocking up from day 1, so why do you expect the rest to be any different? Can I point out that while you're marking down every comment and arguing everything, that I agree with you. I was completely underwhelmed the difficulty of black at CW but I think you've missed the original point- that the site is there to promote groomed trails, not natural stuff.

 A 6" drop does not mean its a black trail. Blue trails in Scotland and Wales have them, Kroughtree in Scotland from memory has them too.
The trail centres/parks I mentioned in Wales are all groomed too but they have technical difficulty built into them. Ours simply don't.
People did step in on DH1 and DH2 in rostrevor and still are. They where ignored during and after the build. I believe there is plans to rebuild the 2 DH trails but no date as yet.
Yes the site is there to promote the official trail centres, same as Scotland and Wales promote theirs and therefore should be graded same as them.

 Have to slightly diasgree with your grading. I do think they are overgraded but not to the extent you are saying. I would say a blue in the alps is a red on these trails and a red in the alps is probably a black on these trails a green in the alps is a blue on these etc.

the dh tracks. well i dont really know where to start with them. the more 'technical' one isnt bad for a bit of training and to mix it up after doing a few other runs and with quite a few alterations has been good fun to race on but the 'jumpy' one needs alot of work to fix which i believe is in the pipeline so hopefully it will be sorted soon.

Personally natural riding is where its at and even in the alps alot of trails are very groomed (braking bumps aside) though alot of the trails off the official lines are pretty sweet and technical. The likes of malaga, portugal etc have proper rough natural trails that are just awesome fun to ride.

Revolution bike park is a great example of trails that are well maintained but still very natural in there element. yes there are some nice groomed bits in it too but alot of the trails are nice and rough and are well bedded in natural trails.

 I think the 3 off us are saying same thing, trails are over-graded by how much we can argue but worse is the fact we are all 'completely underwhelmed by the difficulty' of them.

If you've saw these adverts booked and payed a lot of money to come here to ride (when you could have been in Portugal, Spain or Alps) you are going to fell a lot worse than underwhelmed.

You'll go home and you wont be telling your mates how good it is and coming back.

Mountainbikeni is shooting themselves in foot advertising these trails graded as is to a pinkbike audience.

 WELL SAID SIR, purpose built trails are shite and the natural local made trails rock

 hear hear, the natural unofficial trails all over the country are fantastic. I simply can't believe how bad the 2 downhill trails in Rostrevor are.

 Myself and a few other lads are currently looking into getting accredited and we’re starting up a trail building enterprise called Flow Ireland. I’ve been riding bikes and building trails for many years now, along with working with local councils for quite some time. We’ve noticed that there are a lack of facilities in Ireland compared to that in Scotland, Wales and throughout the UK and the standard of them are no were near on the same par. We also realised that there are no accredited trail builders and designers based in Ireland. This raised many issues with having to source someone overseas to carry out work, to sign off projects, which also led to problems with budgets never being met, poor design work and projects being signed off prematurely, etc. So we’re taking it upon ourselves to do something about it now.

 Good work jizard, keep it up

 Count me in bro!

 The main thing Ireland needs is a trail centre that's accessible without a car. There are nice trails in Ireland but if you don't drive, all you can do is ride your bike up and down your street.

 Mary Peters is accessible without a car. I live about 9 miles away and regularly cycled up over the summer.

  Every place is accessible without a car if you live 9 miles away...

 what ireland needs is a ferry that doesn't cost so much to stick a van full of bikes on so uk riders can sample your goods a little more cheaply, last time I checked it was pretty steep.would benefit your economy and tourism quite a bit ,I would imagine. I know its all that's stopping me from chucking it on to a road trip involving both north wales and Ireland.Or maybe you don't want us there ,haha.

 hmm

 UK is full of bikeparks / trail centres, why would you travel to Ireland? I'd visit some of the British bike parks if I had a van (money's not an issue but I'm not going to cycle all the way from the port).

 So what are you complaining about? On yer bike

 @Extremmist your point of Ireland needs a trail centre thats accessible without a car is a bit well pointless as thats all dependent where you live. what your theoretically saying is that there should be a trail centre every so many miles as what is accessible to one it wont be accessible to another. Not many people can ride out there front door and on to a set of trails. Also get out to your local spot and build some trails or move to somewhere thats closer to trails. Problem solved.

 No, that's not I'm saying. I'm saying there should be a functional network of trains or shuttle buses so that everyone can get to a trail centre regardless of where they live. If I fly to Oslo, I can get on a train at the airport and travel all the way to Hafjell bike park without having to cycle or use a car. For myself it's actually easier to get to Hafjell than to get to the nearest Irish trails, that's how bizarre Ireland is.

 @Extremmist I see where you are coming from now. read that all wrong before. that would be really handy actually and would probably encourage more people to get out and use trail centres.

 If your riding the xc trails its all you need to be honest, a cyclocross bike would be fine for it too as people do train on them round it.

 Yeah but what is the point in not having a few xc full sus bikes kicking around for people who want to ride a decent bike. I know I'm spoiled living so close to Glentress but I really was shocked at the lack of choice.

 You are spoiled indeed, its a shame you cant bring bike as there is some magic trails in tollymore forest etc. All on strava and easy enough to find. Get a cheap bike case and bring it with you..