The Lecht from Cock Bridge

When I got my first view of the A939 bending upwards onto The Lecht, all I could think was "that's a proper wall". And so it was. There was to be no gradual upping of the gradient, just straight into a mid- teen percent, muscle burner of a climb. My memory is of three distinct steep sections, each with a slight downhill or easing of the gradient at the upper end, and you know it's steep when 12％ feels like sweet relief. Towards the top of the third section the road becomes exposed to the elements, and on the day of my ride I felt the full force of a very stiff westerly coming from my left, which definitely upped the challenge element. As the road curved round and flattened somewhat the cross wind became a cross tail and boosted me up to the ski station whilst enjoying the lovely view out to the west.

I attempted this in September 2021. I was blown backwards by a gust of wind on the third hairpin. Two attempts to get back on the bike ended up on the deck. It was probably beautiful if I could have seen anything through tears of frustration. Ended up walking most of the way to the ski station, leaning at 45 degrees against the bike. Then had to pedal downhill most of the way into Tomintoul to move forward. Don't try this when the wind is gusting to over 100Km/h