The Struggle (Kirkstone Road)
1280.8 m · net rise 157.2 m · total ascent 159.9 m · overall 12.3% · evidence quality B (good) · Ambleside · Cumbria · share
Shape: sustained — 31% of the climbing sits in a quarter of the distance; longest continuous stretch at 10%+ is 185 m.
Matches: 100 Greatest Cycling Climbs (Simon Warren), British National Hill Climb Championship — Venue 2023.
≈ Overhead cover (tree canopy or structures) spans 12% of this route — detected by comparing the surface model (DSM, treetops and rooftops) against the terrain model (DTM, bare ground). Under cover the bare-ground model is built from fewer laser returns, so metre-scale readings can wobble; maxima whose window sits in a covered zone are marked ≈ below — less certain — the flag does not say whether the true value is higher or lower. Longer windows average over more clean ground and are steadier.
Gradient ladder what do windows mean?
| Window | Maximum | Located at | |
|---|---|---|---|
| 2 m (diagnostic) | ≈39% | 789–791 m | under overhead cover terrain reads 58.8% at 753–755 m across a structure — excluded |
| 3 m (diagnostic) | ≈37% | 789–792 m | under overhead cover terrain reads 46.3% at 752–755 m across a structure — excluded |
| 5 m | ≈26% | 660–665 m | under overhead cover terrain reads 36.6% at 750–755 m across a structure — excluded |
| 10 m | ≈21% | 22–32 m | under overhead cover terrain reads 31.6% at 747–757 m across a structure — excluded |
| 20 m | ≈19.6% | 949–969 m | under overhead cover terrain reads 25.1% at 747–767 m across a structure — excluded |
| 25 m | ≈19.5% | 951–976 m | under overhead cover terrain reads 23.2% at 747–772 m across a structure — excluded |
| 50 m | 19.3% | 943–993 m | |
| 100 m | 18.2% | 904–1004 m |
may start earliermay continue beyond end Extent detection suggests reviewing where this climb starts/ends.
Map
Check this route yourself: Google Maps route via their router · Street View at the base where coverage exists · geojson.io our exact measured line · OpenTopoMap
No aerial layer here: Britain has no open or government source of aerial photography at road scale — the pan-government APGB imagery is licensed to the public sector only, unlike the LiDAR this survey is measured from. Street View, where it exists, is the visual check.
This climb's data: OCL JSON — the full gradient ladder, quality flags and provenance in the OpenClimb Ladder format.
Access: Listed 2026-09-11 (texture re-measure): with the step masked the steepest 25 m reads 19.5 %, below the ranking door — kept as a listed page.
Measured, not vetted. This page records what the laser record shows about the road's shape — nothing more. Nobody has necessarily ridden or inspected this road for the survey, and a page here is not a recommendation and no guarantee that the road is open, surfaced, rideable or safe. Gates, private sections, missing rights of way and hazards do not show up in elevation data. Check access and conditions on the ground and make your own judgment.
Ridden it, or know better? Submit data for this climb no account needed · Share this climb
Route colour = gradient over a 25 m window: <10% 10–20% 20–25% ≥25%
© OpenStreetMap contributors · topo tiles © OpenTopoMap (CC-BY-SA) · vector tiles OpenFreeMap
Profile
The map, profile and gradient chart share one position — move your pointer over them and the marker follows. Colors are the gradient bands; the shaded span is the steepest 25 m. Any 25 m figure is good to about a point either way (why).
Measurement card
| Elevation | Environment Agency — EA LIDAR Composite DTM 1m (2022) |
|---|---|
| Resolution / CRS | 1.0 m grid, EPSG:27700; sampled every 1.0 m, bilinear interpolation |
| Tiles | NY3500.tif, NY3505.tif |
| Road centreline | OpenStreetMap (local PBF extract) |
| Quality status | evidence quality B; caveated windows: canopy or structure, structure excluded, texture excluded |
| Analysis | OCL 0.1.0, analysis 0.1.0, run texture-uk-england-260912, calculated 2026-09-12 |
Provenance
{
"analysis_version": "0.1.0",
"sample_interval_m": 1.0,
"interpolation": "bilinear",
"smoothing": "none",
"gradient_windows_m": [
5.0,
10.0,
20.0,
25.0,
50.0,
100.0
],
"diagnostic_windows_m": [
2.0,
3.0
],
"elevation_crs": "EPSG:27700",
"elevation_resolution_m": 1.0,
"elevation_tiles": [
"data/cache/england/bulk_dtm_1m/NY3500.tif",
"data/cache/england/bulk_dtm_1m/NY3505.tif"
],
"calculated_at": "2026-09-12T01:39:17+00:00",
"road_source": "OpenStreetMap (local PBF extract)",
"road_attribution": "\u00a9 OpenStreetMap contributors, ODbL",
"osm_pbf_path": "output/texture-uk-england/batch-england-rchunk05.pbf",
"osm_snapshot": "",
"run_id": "texture-uk-england-260912",
"elevation_provider": "Environment Agency",
"elevation_dataset": "EA LIDAR Composite DTM 1m (2022)",
"elevation_licence": "Open Government Licence v3 \u2014 \u00a9 Environment Agency",
"elevation_coverage_id": "13787b9a-26a4-4775-8523-806d13af58fc__Lidar_Composite_Elevation_DTM_1m",
"elevation_tile_ids": [
"NY3500.tif",
"NY3505.tif"
],
"climb_origin": "discovered",
"license": "ODbL-1.0",
"license_url": "https://howsteep.org/licensing"
}