
- Lodge Lane
- Length: 0.7 miles
- Avg gradient: 9.3% Peak gradient: 15%
- Difficulty: 4/5
- Likelihood of encountering unpleasant motor-vehicles: 2/5
- Strava
A few miles westward, out of the city, along the fairy nasty A57 Manchester Road you’ll find a couple of cheeky challenging climbs, escalating either side of the Rivelin Valley: Rails Road and Lodge Lane. Rails Road will take you north up to Stannington, and Lodge Lane, south, to the green and pleasant lands of Lodge Moor.

Like many of the roads that climb the Rivelin valley wall (see also: Hagg Hill), unless you’re lucky with oncoming traffic, you’re pretty much going to lose all of your momentum turning 90 degrees onto the hill. Lodge Lane isn’t quite as a brutal start as Hagg Hill but you are straight into a 10% incline and a sharp left corner to begin. The steepness gradually increases as you follow the road round a right-hand bend and are presented with a straight stretch open in front of you.

As you pass the campsite, the incline drops to around 7%, which feels comparatively flat, so use this section to ease off a bit before you prepare to dig in again. As the road heads to the next bend the gradient is back in double figures and although it’s only 0.1 mile I find this part tough because I know what’s around the next corner. Since you’re now well above the valley with some lovely views towards the Peaks, it’s tempting to think you’re almost at the top. You are not.

As the tree line returns and you round the next bend, I always expect to see the top of the hill, when all Lodge Lane offers you is more of the same. In the distance, it’s not the end of the hill you can see but, at 15%, the hardest of the climb’s numerous bends. If you get round that, once you reach the roadside bollards you’ve made it and just need to pant on a few more feet to the end.

Now turn around, drop down at speed, and tackle Rails Road on the other side of the valley.
only stupid people would consider riding this road, not sure to why its even advertised as a bikers climb as its only 100 yards, (bigger potholes to climb out of in Sheffield) but if you chose to please make sure your on an organ donation register.
LikeLike
Well, it’s about x12 longer than 100 yards and it’s a good challenge of a climb. Yes, there are bigger hills in Sheffield but there are also lots of smaller ones too. Getting up this one, especially around the final corner is an achievement. And the only reason to be on on an organ donor register when climbing this road would be from dangerous drivers not showing due care an attention around a cyclist cycling up it.
LikeLike
Corect about the irrisponsible drivers. As we all know theres plenty of them. Do the climb at your own peril but to advocate it makes you just as irresponsible as the drivers.
LikeLike
Can you expand on why it is irresponsible to advocate cycling on a road, especially uphill, where you’re not going to be going very fast and you unlikely to fall off and hurt yourself? How does that makes a cyclist as irresponsible as a dangerous driver?
I am not trying to be antagonistic or start an argument, I genuinely don’t understand why cycling uphill is perilous.
LikeLike
Well Pete. Let me create a picture for you. Little Sebastian up front with daddy right behind him with 3 year old Elsa in the back seat thingimibob and the wife keeping up the rear. You still think its a nice road for a ride?
LikeLike
I think you have fundamentally misunderstood what the point of this website is. I can’t imagine a single one of the hills on this blog being the sort of thing you’d consider cycling up with a three year old and a child on the back of your bike.
There are plenty of other websites dedicated to family bike rides in the Peak District but one called Sheffield Cycle Climbs is not one of them and I don’t think most people would even consider it from the off. It’s a website for people who like cycling up hills, not taking their families out for a day trip. And no, I don’t think it would be a nice road for a family ride, which is why each hill is graded with ‘Difficulty’ and ‘Likelihood of encountering unpleasant motor vehicles’.
Also, the original comment you made appeared to be a complaint that there were bigger potholes in Sheffield, then it was about how you should join an organ donor register and now you have painted a little picture about a family deciding to cycle up a 10% hill. I can only assume you are trolling because the points you have made have not been consistent and if the crux of an arguement is an implausible situation you have created from your head, rather than something real and concrete, it doesn’t stand.
Have you tried to cycle up Lodge Lane with Little Sebastian, Elsa and your wife and found it unpleasant? Is that your issue with this?
I am genuinely confused by your point.
And for the record, I don’t think it is a nice road to ride. It’s steep and a slog but I do think it is an achievement to get up it.
LikeLike