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I recently went mountain biking near the lakes, and forgot how much fun biking once was in my life.

Previous experiences was when I use to live in New Zealand I went to a highly competitive school where the guys use to do some crazy jumps. I was never able to come out of my shell and ask for help on how to tackle a jump.
I just want to get back into the adrenaline feel of riding again.

I would love to get back into biking as well as becoming a massive passion in my life.
I'm 25 years old, work in the army, live in Chelmsford and would love to find people in my area that I can learn from.
Would love to find some people around me to be friends with as well as biking.
The only thing is I don't have a bike and don't have a clue what to get. My budget isn't very high.
I would like to get into downhill mountain biking but I don't know where to begin.

Welcome along, plenty of places to ride in Essex if you where to look. What is your budget as it might be better to look second hand (epically at 26" wheeled bikes as they are cheap as chips).

I don't really know to be honest. Probably max £1500. I rode last year in Grisedale forest and 26 inch was pretty bad. Not too sure if it was because they also had v brakes which were pure crap and dangerous going into the tricky sections of the forest. Would you know any good brands to look out for? I might pop into a second hand bike store when I can.

O right, when people say i've a small budget it is normally acouple of hundred quid, £1500 is lots for a starter bike (mine was £900! many moons ago). That would be the brakes, not the wheel size that would of made a crap dangerous ride.

My top picks for that sort of price would be if you could stretch to roughly £1,775 for YT capra al2 (160mm enduro machine), canyon Spectral AL 5.0 (£1600), or Vitus Bikes Escarpe VR at £1530 from chainreaction. All are direct buy bikes and perfect for a spot of trail/all mountain riding. Go second hand and there will be a bigger selection of bikes to to choose.

Unfortunately the more you spend the better the bike will be

Or look at bird bikes as well

Hi Gates

I done Grisedale forest on hide bike can't remember what it was. V brakes SOD that.
£1500 budget get something decent with that amount of cash

Cheers for the comments. I have been pretty busy and lazy to respond. Sorry for that. I will do some research into the 3 bikes that Mattvanders suggested. I just can't wait to get more into mountain biking. The misus and I are going to Wales for Easter so we are going to try and find a place to hire out bikes and just get a feel into riding. Hopefully she likes it and we can do more often.

What part of wales?

Gates, plenty of us live in chelmo and surroundings, when you get a bike we have a good local loop to get you into the biking feel again, even some steps to play on too, get the feel of obstacles. Also Danbury common is a short cycle away or drive... Has loads to play on up there

I will look further into mountain biking guides over the next few days