Dig stoke, who else likes to play in the dirt???

[rip]

I haven't made it down there to ride the bike park since July but I've been enjoying watching what you guys have been doing on IG. I really like the variety of trails in the park.

Maybe I'll have to try and make it down there next weekend.

If you want to scratch your desert itch I'm happy to show you around our new stuff here in Montrose.

Thanks! We're really trying to make it so there's no part of a run where you are like 'ugh I hate this part ' only thing we can't fix is the transfer over to the old park due to giant mansion in the way but it's not too bad.. and I do have a plan to come into that section with more speed in the future.

Hopefully the weather cooperates, we had to keep it closed today due to rain and some snow. Should be a pretty fun closing day next week assuming we can get it open. I've got to head to Michigan as soon as the season ends due to ailing parents so I probably won't be able to ride up there til next spring. I did ride the electric hills trails a bit over memorial day and spring creek is one of my favorite chunks of trail anywhere.

[Dromond]

It's so wild to see machine building pics. I've never built with one. We had a tractor out in one spot, but it didn't cut it for anything more than the wench ha winch to set up a long skinny.

Up in the White mtns cleaning deadfall on some old hike/bike trails near our cabin. Riding old hiking trails is so old school and kind of painful [emoji3], but fun.

White Mtns as in NH? What regions are getting trails developed these days? I’m sort of from there and rode the trails a bit in like 2005.

I love reading all the trail talk. Can’t say I do much building but deeply appreciate the art form.

[raisingarizona13]

Thanks all. Would love to show you around RaisingArizona or anyone else who makes it up this way.

I run the bike trail crew here and was in the 60 cutting about 80% of this trail while also working with the crew building 'la cura' the previous vid, and keeping the hand crew dialed on both new trails, and all the while all of us were maintaining the rest of the trails thru a very wet summer. Needless to say it's been a bit busy.

So glad to have this trail wrapped up as it completes what in my mind is phase one of the park build out. We now offer every type of riding from beginner to expert, flow to tech, cc to DH. There's still tons of room for improvement but this is a big step after 7 seasons of building.

I may very well take you up on that. I really like to visit bike parks/trail systems and ride with principal builders/trail designers to see what they've been up to, tap a little into their process and learn new things. Lift served bike parks and more progressive, modern trail construction are the things that interest me the most right now, especially seeing different approaches to construction and their expected maintenance needs and available resources for maintenance. Besides the nerding out, I love Telluride and your trails look sick!

I lived in the White House in 05/06. I met that crew during the summer of 05 doing gondola laps on Sasquatch, Running With Scissors, PBR etc. Those were good times on old school steep trails with a free lift ride. That was also right when Flagstaff shined as a secret dh spot too. It was an exciting time and a whole lot of fun, we felt like a bunch of outlaws back then but things have definitely changed for the better. Now, instead of hiding in the trees and trying to not get busted because all we wanted to do was ride we can actually get work and be paid for this shit! HA!

[jackstraw]

White Mtns as in NH? What regions are getting trails developed these days? I’m sort of from there and rode the trails a bit in like 2005.

I love reading all the trail talk. Can’t say I do much building but deeply appreciate the art form.

Yeah NH. There are builds going on all over the place. Where I am is a rogue build not on any maps or strava. I don't know the builders, but they clearly want it on the down low.

[jackstraw]

Buffed the entry on this little popper to a concussion today. [emoji3]

[rip]

I may very well take you up on that. I really like to visit bike parks/trail systems and ride with principal builders/trail designers to see what they've been up to, tap a little into their process and learn new things. Lift served bike parks and more progressive, modern trail construction are the things that interest me the most right now, especially seeing different approaches to construction and their expected maintenance needs and available resources for maintenance. Besides the nerding out, I love Telluride and your trails look sick!

I lived in the White House in 05/06. I met that crew during the summer of 05 doing gondola laps on Sasquatch, Running With Scissors, PBR etc. Those were good times on old school steep trails with a free lift ride. That was also right when Flagstaff shined as a secret dh spot too. It was an exciting time and a whole lot of fun, we felt like a bunch of outlaws back then but things have definitely changed for the better. Now, instead of hiding in the trees and trying to not get busted because all we wanted to do was ride we can actually get work and be paid for this shit! HA!

Yeah man let me know, I'll send you a a pm with my info. I got here after those trails all got shut down and I feel ya on one of your previous posts about trail building taking over for your riding. I do more riding in the off-season! I'm not the main designer here but I've been here since we started the new build. Lots of help the first few seasons from great builders from GravityLogic and winter operators turned builders. Now we are doing it on our own and trying to add our own flavor to the trails.

[snowaddict91]

Rip, I made it down to Tride today for closing day, just have to say La Cura is a ripping trail! Especially love the steeps in the top half. I needed to ride it about 5 more times to get the jump section dialed but man that was fun. Really digging the variety there with the old tech trails interspersed with flow.

[jackstraw]

Really digging the variety there with the old tech trails interspersed with flow.

That describes the ideal trail for me personally. I've been trying to build that style whenever I can. Flow is difficult to hand build unless the terrain naturally provides it, but if that's the case you don't have tech. Here I'm building berms in random spots (if that is considered a "flow" feature, idk) but for me I think it is. I've certainly had comments from riders talking about riding tech and then this berm out of the blue shows up as being unusual. Unusually good is how I take it, but I'm biased in my opinion [emoji3]

[raisingarizona13]

That describes the ideal trail for me personally. I've been trying to build that style whenever I can. Flow is difficult to hand build unless the terrain naturally provides it, but if that's the case you don't have tech. Here I'm building berms in random spots (if that is considered a "flow" feature, idk) but for me I think it is. I've certainly had comments from riders talking about riding tech and then this berm out of the blue shows up as being unusual. Unusually good is how I take it, but I'm biased in my opinion [emoji3]

It's physics. Some turns are great flat and some need a berm to keep momentum going. I sure do love some steep gnar into a big ole honking berm.

Here's a steep section into a very tight and snappy rock armored insloped corner. This is from our phase one at East Zion we hand built in the summer of 21 on a trail called Bison Chute.

[raisingarizona13]

[toast2266]

Nice. I love some good rock work.

I also love tech trails with a few berms and flowy features peppered in. Jank with occasional moments of grace.

[jackstraw]

It's physics. Some turns are great flat and some need a berm to keep momentum going.

Well yeah, if I slide out on a turn it needs a berm! Even if it was because of my poor riding skills, it's getting a berm! [emoji23]

Nice rocks RA!

[raisingarizona13]

Well yeah, if I slide out on a turn it needs a berm! Even if it was because of my poor riding skills, it's getting a berm! [emoji23]

Nice rocks RA!

Thanks. The rocks at East Zion are giant limestone pavers and are pretty darn cool to work with.

[rip]

Rip, I made it down to Tride today for closing day, just have to say La Cura is a ripping trail! Especially love the steeps in the top half. I needed to ride it about 5 more times to get the jump section dialed but man that was fun. Really digging the variety there with the old tech trails interspersed with flow.

Thanks for coming out! It was a great weekend and a great end to the season. I'm with ya on la cura, I love the top but I'm getting to old to be sending the jumps on the bottom on the daily. That parts for the kiddos We've got very primitive plans to build more steep tech like the top part of the trail. The terrain around there is just asking for it. A lot of places just got rid of their old steep fall line trails when they brought in a company like GL but we are committed to keeping ours around and have done a lot of work to them over the years... To make it look like we haven't done anything at all.

I know everyone says they love black tech but I've hung out in enough different bike parks to know if I go searching the old school trails it's usually pretty empty and everyone is out riding the flow. Which is fine.. I love the flow as well but I like being able to take out my dh bike and smash rocks all day or take my 140 trail bike and pump rollers and boost jumps.

[grskier]

I will say that Snowmass has been doing a good job of both ends of that. Animal Crackers, Cowboy Coffee etc in the bike park, plus the OG race trails that have been getting way more attention (from riders) lately.
But after they spent what they did for Valhalla from GL, I could see wanting some more budget friendly type rides.

[raisingarizona13]

Thanks for coming out! It was a great weekend and a great end to the season. I'm with ya on la cura, I love the top but I'm getting to old to be sending the jumps on the bottom on the daily. That parts for the kiddos We've got very primitive plans to build more steep tech like the top part of the trail. The terrain around there is just asking for it. A lot of places just got rid of their old steep fall line trails when they brought in a company like GL but we are committed to keeping ours around and have done a lot of work to them over the years... To make it look like we haven't done anything at all.

I know everyone says they love black tech but I've hung out in enough different bike parks to know if I go searching the old school trails it's usually pretty empty and everyone is out riding the flow. Which is fine.. I love the flow as well but I like being able to take out my dh bike and smash rocks all day or take my 140 trail bike and pump rollers and boost jumps.

Flow trails are freaking sweet. I get the fear of everything turning into machine built flow trail and how that would create a sort of McRiding experience everywhere but if you don't have fun on a really well built trail do you really like mountain biking? I mean.....really?

You would have enjoyed the old stuff down the front face before the park was a thing. They were so rowdy and steep.

[raisingarizona13]

I will say that Snowmass has been doing a good job of both ends of that. Animal Crackers, Cowboy Coffee etc in the bike park, plus the OG race trails that have been getting way more attention (from riders) lately.
But after they spent what they did for Valhalla from GL, I could see wanting some more budget friendly type rides.

I've watched a bunch of Snowmass park vids on YouTube and it looks awesome. I wanted to get up there this summer but I was in Utah so much I couldn't make it work. SW Utah ain't too shabby either though so I wasn't crying about that.

[evdog]

Flow trails are freaking sweet. I get the fear of everything turning into machine built flow trail and how that would create a sort of McRiding experience everywhere but if you don't have fun on a really well built trail do you really like mountain biking? I mean.....really?

Well built ones are really fun. But a lot of them are not well built, or are a missed shot and turn out to be total snoozers. And too many of the good ones end up falling apart in a sea of braking bumps because they get no where near enough maintenance vs the traffic they see.

[raisingarizona13]

Well built ones are really fun. But a lot of them are not well built, or are a missed shot and turn out to be total snoozers. And too many of the good ones end up falling apart in a sea of braking bumps because they get no where near enough maintenance vs the traffic they see.

Totally. Dark Hollow is getting pretty gnarly already.

[east or bust]

Well built ones are really fun. But a lot of them are not well built, or are a missed shot and turn out to be total snoozers. And too many of the good ones end up falling apart in a sea of braking bumps because they get no where near enough maintenance vs the traffic they see.

See: Deepest Darkest at Jackson Hole

[evdog]

I rode the new flow/jump trail Fifty Six Twenty at Revelstoke Mtn in August, so named because it drops 5,620ft. The gondola doesn't go all the way to the top, you have to climb 4 mi / 1700ft to get there. Once you hit the part of the trail that can be accessed direct from the gondola the braking bumps were brutal. I didn't even make it down that far before I was completely over it. Spent the rest of the day trying to ride anything but the flow trails.

[toast2266]

They're not brake bumps. They're millions of little doubles.

[Clownshoe]

Its a bit of a broad generalization, but in my opinion braking bumps on excavated flow trails are usually the result of:

1. Trail is too steep. It's a common trap. Excavating is expensive, the way to make it cheaper is to make the trail shorter. If the trail is shorter, the trail is steeper. These problems start to show themselves more as the trail gets more popular. Beyond a certain point, it's impossible for the trail crew to keep up and the trail becomes a sea of braking bumps. Fix the braking bumps on Monday, and they're back by Friday. In less busy trail networks you can get away with it because there isn't enough traffic to really make this problem show itself. This is especially true on blue trails in bike parks. These are almost always the busiest trails in the trail network, and can turn into brake bump factories. The money saved by making the trail cheaper (shorter) is completely offset by the amount of maintenance required. And the riding experience is terrible. No one likes a trail that is and endless procession of braking bumps.

2. No grade reversal into the corner. If people have to grab a handful of brake to slow down just before the corner, you get braking bumps. Of course some people hate grade reversals, and prefer diving corners. Fair enough. But properly designed grade reversals can pretty much eliminate braking bumps into excavated corners. You remove just enough speed that people can ride the corner more or less brakeless, or if the braking zone is slightly uphill, the amount of braking bumps are greatly decreased. Of course if you ruin the flow or slow the trail down too much, you create a completely different problem, and the trail isn't fun.

These are broad generalizations of course, and I'm talking specifically about excavated trails. A super flat trail that you have to pedal into the corners will never have braking bumps but it's also boring to ride. Also, the realities of the terrain available for the trail to be built means that sometimes the trail or the corners get forced into less than ideal locations. Sometimes the best possible alignment means you have one or two corners that are less than ideal. I find that extra time spent in the design is critical. Spend the extra time to really find the best alignment before the excavators show up. Use an inclinometer.

This needs to be balanced out in the overall trail network with singletracks and hybrid trails where you can mostly throw the above rules out and build some diving corners and (much) steeper trails. But the same concept applies. Steep diving corners will eventually get blown up and develop braking bumps. But that can be cool in advanced/expert singletracks. Also, if you're building a private trail that is just for a small number of people, you can excavate way steeper and ditch the grade reversals entirely because the trails won't get the traffic to create braking bumps. Finally, if there isn't enough budget set aside for maintenance, the trails will get wrecked. A lot of places fall down in this respect because they don't appreciate the amount of maintenance that goes into having an excavated trail.

[Boissal]

2. No grade reversal into the corner. If people have to grab a handful of brake to slow down just before the corner, you get braking bumps. Of course some people hate grade reversals, and prefer diving corners. Fair enough. But properly designed grade reversals can pretty much eliminate braking bumps into excavated corners. You remove just enough speed that people can ride the corner more or less brakeless, or if the braking zone is slightly uphill, the amount of braking bumps are greatly decreased. Of course if you ruin the flow or slow the trail down too much, you create a completely different problem, and the trail isn't fun.

I just rode a brand new flow trail in UT where the grade reversals were located on the exit of every single corner instead of the entrance. The berms were also pretty short and ended about 3/4 into the turn. And to tie it all together the trail was incredibly soft (freshly built, no rain in a month, shouldn't have been opened until after the winter IMO). It made for interesting riding as you could haul ass into a corner then run out of support halfway through because of softness or berm disappearance. If you managed to make it out of the corner upright you'd have to hammer on the pedals to crest a little hump and get back into the flow. About 1.5 miles and 20 corners worth of that shit. Can't imagine how well it's going to age...

[evdog]

Its a bit of a broad generalization, but in my opinion braking bumps on excavated flow trails are usually the result of:

Agree with all of that. The few flow trails I've ridden where braking bumps weren't an issue were less steep and had places to bleed off speed naturally before corners so brake use was minimal. And what do you know, if the trail is well laid out you can still carry plenty of speed even with a more gradual grade.

Did some quick math on Mt Revelstoke.... 5,620ft loss over 8 miles is over 13% grade on average. For me it was a brake dragger from top to bottom. Judging from the braking bumps I'm not the only one....