2008 IMBA World Summit will be in Park City

Park City, Utah will be the location of the next world summit. This sounds like a great place to ride and host a summit.

When I was at the National Bike Summit in Washington, DC I saw a great presentation by the Park City Mountain Trails Foundation about the economic benefits of a trail system. The presentation was inspiring and showed how a community could come together around a common goal of building and promoting trails to bring in tourists during the off-ski season. The organization seemed to have built a broad coalition of stake holders - not just mountain bikers and shops - to help realize the goal. Since then I have been very intrigued and want to visit Park City to experience these trails and talk to these folks. I would love to see that type of a trails culture in Santa Cruz county.

Getting back to the IMBA summit, it sounds like the agenda will be awesome:

The 2008 IMBA Summit will be open to the public, and will feature advocacy seminars, trailbuilding workshops, networking, great food, parties, celebrity guest speakers and some big surprises. Topics will include the economic power of trails, sustainable trailbuilding, liability and risk management, urban trail networks, building club capacity and much more.

Trips for Kids will have a chapter meeting at the summit with the goal of inspiring IMBA clubs to create youth mountain bike programs. There will also be an epic ride at the end of the summit.

The 2008 IMBA World Summit sounds like it will be a great event. I'm already looking forward to it.

Old Skool Off Roadies

I was looking for information on the Last Chance properties near Big Basin and I came across this gem of a website from Ray Hosler. There are quite a few pages which document these legendary "Jobst" rides from the early 1980's. A bunch of riders including Tom Richey would do epic all day fire and dirt road explorations in the Santa Cruz mountains with their road bikes.

Check out the slide show which documents 26 years of riding in the Santa Cruz mountains. It's neat to see some of the vistas and places that these guys took their road bikes. There are all sorts of neat nuggets of history if you poke around the site including the train tunnels in the Santa Cruz Mountains.

No helmets, CamelBaks or suspension. Definitely old school. These guys were the pioneers of the sport.

Looking for Volunteers/Racers for 24 hour race

The 24 hours of Adrenalin world solo and team championships will be held in Monterey/Fort Ord on Sept 1-2. The race organizers have offered a complementary 10 person corporate team to mbosc in exchange for volunteering at the event. So far I have 4-6 people who are willing to commit and I'm looking for a few more. Here are the details of the event and commitments from the race organizers:

Mountain Bikers of Santa Cruz to provide:

♣ Two volunteers at the checkpoint at all times. One volunteer must accurately record bib number and the other one must hand out water and Gatorade, properly handle canceled laps, and assist with emergency situations
♣ Must have three volunteers for the start and finish of race. For example, you need three volunteers on Saturday from 11:30am to 3:00pm and on Sunday from 9:00am to 1:00pm.
♣ Minimum age of 18 for all volunteers
♣ Personal belongings that would attribute to a more enjoyable time at the checkpoint – blankets, small heater, flashlights, lamp, lots of warm clothes etc.
♣ Must ensure ALL team riders sign a waiver – VERY IMPORTANT
♣ Clean up of checkpoint during and after race – please ensure there is no garbage left behind.
♣ Provide own transport to checkpoint for shift changes
♣ Meet with twenty4sports on Wednesday to discuss weekend plan of attack
♣ Be responsible for the well being of the two-way radio

TWENTY4 SPORTS to provide:

♣ Complimentary Corporate team (10 people) – will provide web registration coupon
♣ Complimentary Premium Campsite near the Expo area
♣ Complimentary 10 x 10 booth space in the Expo to promote MBOSC
♣ T-Shirts for all volunteers
♣ Free Entry Pass for all the volunteers for the weekend
♣ 2 Sweatshirts to the “Best Volys” of the weekend.
♣ 1- 10 x 10 tent
♣ 4 Foldable Chairs
♣ 2 – 8 foot tables
♣ Gatorade and Water
♣ Responsible for transporting the Gatorade and water to the checkpoint as needed
♣ 1-Two Way radio for communication to base and the trail crew.
♣ Garbage bags for Clean up of GU Wrappers and other miscellaneous items.

The mbosc corporate team will not be a competitive team. We aim to have fun, camp, volunteer and party.

If you have thought about or are interested in a 24 hour team then this corporate team should be a great introduction to the venue and format. A 10 person corporate team means that you would probably "race" 2 laps in 24 hours so it would be a gentle introduction with very little obligation other than to volunteer at a check point and hand out GU and Gatorade to the racers.

Please contact me if you are interested in joining our team.

Mountain Biking and Outdoor Education

I was notified of an interesting program offered by Roaring Camp which combines family mountain biking with outdoor education:

It is with much excitement that "we" share with you the beginnings of our NEW family cycling program through the California Redwoods at Roaring Camp Railroads in Felton, California (Santa Cruz Mountains/San Lorenzo Valley) . We have launched the exploratory inquiry and informational page on the Roaring Camp Dot Com Website, inviting our guests to submit their suggestions and sign up if they would like to become part of the focus group that assists in the launch of the new program and we would like to invite you to join us and share your interests as well. If you go to www.roaringcamp.com and scroll down to the photo of the cyclist it will take you to the new cycle page.

We have selected local cyclist - Eric Lynberg to serve as in the position of "Outdoor Specialist." Eric's enthusiasm and ideas of creating a fun and educational guided cycle program has been very refreshing as he shares the place he calls "home" the scenic and beautiful San Lorenzo Valley. Eric is discovering unique things about the forest including many "natural" and odd shape trees (trees growing out of trees) and did you know many things that grow in the forest naturally glow in the dark?

In the first day of our website launch we received over 20 inquires from media and tour operators from around the world so we are extremely pleased.

If you would like to join us on a test run of the program this fall, please complete the inquiry form on the website and we will add your name to our list. More details to follow soon.

Paul Nakamoto
Roaring Camp Railroads

More information and a web form can be found at:

http://www.roaringcamp.com/outdooradventure.html

I have already contacted them and have offered to help with this program in any way possible. Please fill in the web form if you have any feedback or want to participate in the focus and test groups.

This looks like the start of a great program.

Lance loves Santa Cruz Trails!

When I went to Washington a few months ago, the American Airways in-flight magazine had a one page fitness article on Lance Armstrong. The sidebar had a bit on "Top Cycling Spots" and I was overjoyed to see that he mentions Santa Cruz as an "absolutely great place for mountain biking" and "frankly, for my money, you can't go wrong."

I had heard rumors of Lance's visit to our town so I contacted a friend at Giro to get the story. A couple of years ago, Lance visited San Francisco to meet with some corporate partners. He paid a visit to Santa Cruz and brought along his mountain bike. He was doing a for an autograph and meet and greet session with Giro employees - who were a major sponsor of Lance. Then he snuck off for a ride with the Senior VP of Marketing at Giro and a couple of other people. According to my source, the pace was brisk on the climbs and Lance was flying on the descents as well.

Lance Armstrong is one of the only nationally recognized cyclists in mainstream America. Having him mention Santa Cruz as a "Top Cycling Spot" for mountain biking is a huge PR win. This little statement from a world renowned cycling champion in a throw away magazine is pure gold.

Update on Coast Dairies: BLM conveyance soon(ish)

The Coast Dairies property is a 7000 acre parcel of land north of Santa Cruz which was purchased by the Trust for Public Land to be protected as public open space. The details of the deal and the natural features of the land was well documented in an article in the San Francisco Chronicle.

A year ago, the 400 acres of the coastal side of the Coast Dairies property had been conveyed to State Parks. The remaining 5,700 acres of inland property was supposed to be transfered to Bureau of Land Management (BLM) but there have been some setbacks. Over the past couple of weeks I have had conversations with officials at the BLM about the status of the Coast Dairies Property.

One of the major problems which held up conveyance was a minor contamination issue from the CEMEX mining operations above the property. A canyon in the Coast Dairies property was used for waste rock and it was covering some pipes. There were concerns about leakage and BLM didn't want to take this area due to the potential long term liability of cleaning it up. We should note that there is no known contamination issue on the land. One proposal would be to sell the waste rock area back to CEMEX. However, the TPL and the County didn't really like this idea so it languished for a while. More recently TPL, the County, BLM and CEMEX finally came to an agreement to sell this portion of the land to CEMEX so the last major hurdle has been resolved.

All that needs to be done before conveyance to BLM is to do a new survey to draw up the lot lines and take care of other bureaucratic minutiae. The Field Manager felt that BLM will take possession of the property in October at the earliest or January at the latest. An interim public access plan will be in place soon after conveyance.

BLM has a mandate to protect and restore the natural habitat but the agency has traditionally been very recreation friendly. A trails plan will be drafted according to Chapter 7 in the Coast Dairies Long-Term Resource and Access Plan:

The Trails Plan will provide for a more extensive trail network on the Property than is described for the Interim Access Stage. It is likely that most of the trails specified in the Trails Plan will use the alignments of existing farm, ranch, and mining roads. However, not all of the existing roads on the Property are appropriate or desirable as recreational trails, and some trail alignments may use new routes or the alignments of old, abandoned roads.

The Trails Plan will include trail alignments, allowable uses for each trail, and targeted use levels. The Trails Plan will seek to balance the goal of allowing recreational access to the interior of the property with the goal of resource protection by specifying appropriate trail densities, uses, and design standards.

MBOSC is looking forward to a partnership with the BLM and will be participating in the trails planning process. We will be active participants in the stewardship of the Coast Dairies lands so that we can protect and enjoy this treasure of public land for many generations.

Yuppies are the target market

A few weeks ago the New York Times travel section had a great article on mountain biking in Fruita, Colorado. This article is practically a brochure for mountain bike tourism in Fruita and sounds like it could have been written by the chamber of commerce. It's also notable that this article appears in the New York Times - which is not your typical mountain bike rag. Fruita is targeting yuppies who are looking for an adventure vacation. These types of tourists would go on active eco-vacations like skiing, white water rafting, hiking and mountain biking. These are the same people we would love to bring to enjoy the trails of Santa Cruz County.

The inspiration for Fruita embracing mountain bike tourism is mentioned in the article:

Just over 10 years ago, Fruita was a depressed agricultural town with an oil refinery being shut down by the Environmental Protection Agency. Then, Troy Rarick, a 44-year-old cyclist from nearby Grand Junction, conceived a plan to transform Fruita by giving it a new identity: ecotourism hub.

Fruita has several hundred miles of single-track and is widely recognized as one of the premiere mountain bike destinations in the world. That town does a great job of attracting mountain bike tourists. They have an amazing Fat Tire Festival that continues to bring in a lot of revenue. I know of a lot of mountain bikers who have made the trek to Fruita in the past few years and they have all enjoyed their stay. Mountain biking is a source of civic pride for Fruita and they have bike murals and sculptures on the main street.

The town of Fruita inspires me that Santa Cruz can similarly embrace this brand of eco-tourism and we can all grow the global market for mountain bike tourism. Perhaps some day the New York Times will be writing about Santa Cruz and the swoopy single track dancing in and out of the redwood trees with blades of sun piercing though the morning fog.

That would be sweet!

Kenny!

It's beer o'clock and I want to do a shout out to one of our supporters.

Seabright brewery is an awesome supporter of mountain biking. The brewery is practically across the street from Santa Cruz Bicycles. The owner Charlie Meehan is an avid mountain biker and a supporter of MBOSC. We have our monthly meetings on the patio at Seabright and Charlie comps us the beer! This makes the meetings fun, lively and increases participation.

One of the best benefits of the holding the MBOSC meetings at Seabright Brewery is that we get to drink the fine beer that they brew on the premises. That would be fine in any establishment but Seabright is a brew pub and it also makes my favorite beer: Kenny!


The "Resolution Red Ale" a.k.a. "Kenny" or "Ken-nay!" is my favorite beer in the world. It's so good that it's always in short supply at the brewery. The story behind the nickname of the Red is really interesting. Charlie sez:

The face on the label is one of our security guys named Kenny Kahn. One of the staff took that picture of him at last years Xmas party and posted it at the Pub. Our graphics guy made a label as a joke and we went with it. (My idea dammit). At the pub the Resolution has become known as simply Kenny! I'll have a pitcher of Kenny!!! BTW, Kenny digs being on the label.

The "Blur" is a delicious Indian Pale Ale named after the Santa Cruz bike. It doesn't need to be very cold to taste great so it's perfect for camping. This was the official beer for the MBOSC road trip to Utica Reservoir.

The Blur, Kenny and Oatmeal Stout are available in 22 oz bottles in selected stores in Santa Cruz County and the Bay Area of California. I know for a fact that Seabright Beers are available at Mission Liquors in Santa Cruz and at the Summit Store up on Skyline Road - convenient location to find a tasty snack and beverage after riding at Demo.

A warning: all these beers have over 7% alcohol so it's not for kids.

MBOSC has it's monthly meeting at Seabright on the second Wednesday of the month. Come out and learn about our advocacy efforts and taste these delectable beers.

Thanks for the support, Charlie!

10th Anniversary of MBOSC

This year marks the 10th anniversary of MBOSC. In honor of the 10th anniversary, I would like to share this article by Keith Kelsen (the founder of MBOSC and the first President) on the beginning of MBOSC.

Enjoy!

MBOSC - ITS TIME HAS COME

KEITH KELSEN

The headline in the newspaper I was reading was bold and unexpected - "Gray Whale Ranch Bought by Save-the-Redwoods League". Right away I thought, "Wow,this is great!"

Gray Whale Ranch is adjacent to Wilder Ranch State Park. A riding haven on the west coast near Santa Cruz, it had been a favorite of mine to ride for years before it was purchased and trespassing laws enforced five years earlier. But now Save-the-Redwoods League had just purchased the 2,500 acre property with coastal vistas, redwoods, long meadows and chaparral for some 12 million dollars. Save-the-Redwoods League, a nonprofit, has been purchasing land for state parks since it's inception in 1920's. In exchange, they were asking the community to repay $600,000 of the purchase price.

The article also stated that the open space alliance was involved in putting on an auction to help raise some funds. Well, I called some of my riding compadres and told them I would put in $100 if they would put up the same. In no time we had a $1,000, so I raised the anti to $200. So we had $2,000. Not bad, but hey, we could do better than that.

I called the local paper and told them that local mountain bikers... uh... Mountain Bikers of Santa Cruz... were pitching in to raise money for the purchase of Gray Whale. They printed the article and a couple of weeks later we had raised close to $7,000.00 and Mountain Bikers of Santa Cruz was born.

To raise a portion of the $600K we decided to hold a raffle - the "WIN A BIKE and a Place To Ride Raffle". Our goal was to have our name on a grove ($20K) and more if possible.

We went to manufactures and local bike shops. They were very supportive and gave us over $23,000.00 (retail) worth of donations, including 9 bikes (3 full suspension). And I would like thank them all for the incredible response.

We received media support through co-sponsors for print, TV and radio. We produced commercials for both TV and radio and created ads for print. Along with the commercials we produced a 9 minute documentary on Gray Whale which aired on the local cable channel.

We selected two dates to hold the raffle and distributed tickets to bike shops, who agreed to sell the raffle tickets. The idea was to advertise and bring people into their shops to buy tickets. I was told it was an impossible task. But we kept up on the media and articles in the paper and Gray Whale became a visible movement in the community.

We were also very fortunate to link up with ROMP in the Bay Area to get their help with ticket sales. Also, ROMP donated $1,350 on behalf of its members. IMBA was a great help as well. They published an article in DIRT and IMBA members mailed in their money for the raffle tickets and support. One IMBA member, Tom Shepard, won 5 out of 20 times including a front suspension VOODOO.

For each raffle we opened up Gray Whale just for the day for biking, hiking, and horseback riding. Over 400 mountain bikers showed up for the first raffle and 200 for the second. We finished with $20,000 from the raffle. The total we raised with donations from riders and a Giro donation of $5,000 was $31,000. Not bad for a challenge between friends.

The side benefits to all this were incredible. We have a full-fledged club, we do trail work, a news letter (qtrly), group rides, brochures and actively present a positive image for mountain bikers in the community. We actively seek trail use in other parks. This organization is an idea who's time has come. The work is actually just beginning!

The Big Picture

I've been spending a lot of time in Google Earth these days. For years I have wanted to catalog every mountain bike trail and large land parcels in GE so I can plan for new trails systems and look at the entire inventory of large public and private land holdings to seek opportunities for more access. I seem to have a lot of time these days so I've been listening to a lot of internet radio and clicking, clicking, clicking...

The image above captures the state of legitimate mountain bike trails in Santa Cruz county that I'm aware of. If you know if any other legal mountain bike trails in Santa Cruz County then please contact me. The orange and yellow lines represent dirt roads and single track respectively. The white lines represent paved roads which act as connectors within and between parks. Technically, Butano State Park is in San Mateo county but I count it as part of the Big Basin trail system.

There is a lot of opportunity for more mountain bike access in the land holdings which do not have any trails open to bikes. We are currently working on initiatives and projects to expand legitimate access for mountain bikes. If you want to help out then please contact me at http://www.mbosc.org/about.html

Old MBOSC newsletters are online

This year is the 10th anniversary of the founding of Mountain Bikers of Santa Cruz so I have been going through the archives to get a sense of history.

I got a new scanner a couple of weeks ago and I have been scanning and cleaning up the old newsletters. I've put the online as pdf files here:

http://www.mbosc.org/about.html

We no longer produce a Quarterly newsletter (does anyone want to do this?) but it has been really enjoyable to look back at the archives and see some familiar names.

It's amazing how many of the issues that we were discussing back in '97 are like Gray Whale are still unresolved. 10 years later, there are probably many more mountain bikers in Santa Cruz but local mountain bike advocacy doesn't seem to reflect it.

The Gray Whale and Nisene Marks issues seemed to have soured the riding community from getting involved with advocacy. Many riders feel that we have a great collection of unauthorized trails and can't see why they should invest time and energy into expanding the legitimate trail network. The answer is that it could be much better. There is a lot of public and private land in Santa Cruz county that could be potential riding areas. Open up Google Earth and look at the area bounded by Big Basin, Empire Grade, the Coast and the Santa Cruz city limits. There are existing trails, road and other off road goodness that is utilized by locals only. This is our playground. With effort and persistence we can open this up to the global mountain biking community and create new economic opportunities for our residents.

Sea to Sky Mountain Biking Economic Impact Study

About 6 months ago, I blogged about the Yukon Study about the economic potential of mountain bike tourism. That study analyzed the potential and demographics of the global mountain bike tourism market. It was a great document which used market research to identify the mountain bike tourist and contained case studies of communities which embraced mountain bike tourism. It was a great document to introduce a community to the potential of mountain bike tourism and want to know more about the market.

Earlier this year the Western Canada Mountain Bike Tourism Association (MBTA) released a study which illustrates the economic benefits of a mature mountain bike tourism industry. This study complements the Yukon study in that it shows the economic results for Whistler, BC - a community which embraced mountain bike tourism.

The economic impact study gives credible data on the economic benefits of mountain bike tourism. The executive summary states (all numbers in Canadian dollars (1 US$ = 0.93 CD$) ):

"Total visitor spending in Whistler attributable to mountain biking exceeded $34.3 million over the period June 4 to September 17, 2006 supporting an estimated $39.1 million in new economic activity (GDP)."

Not a bad summer season! Whistler continues to be a positive draw of the global mountain bike tourism market. This study discusses the survey methodology, breaks down visitor origin, size of the party, number of nights stayed and spending per visitor. The benefits of out of town visitors to a community can not be overstated:

"The study found that mountain biking draws visitors to Sea to Sky communities and generates significant overnight stays. Overall, 20% of non-resident riders stayed overnight in Sea to Sky communities, staying an average of 4.8 nights and having an average party size of 2.8 people."

It emphasizes the need for authorized trails in order for the tourism economy to succeed:

"The authorized trail system in the Whistler Valley generates considerably more economic activity than the trail systems in Squamish and the North Shore where few authorized trails exist. Whistler has been able to capture higher visitor expenditure in part by having the ability to promote its municipal trails and associated services (bike rentals, guides, camps, etc) directly to visitors both within the Resort and externally."

The bottom line of the study is something that should please local business and government:

"In total, mountain biking has a sizable impact on the summer economy of Whistler and British Columbia, with total expenditures totaling more than $34.3 million between the valley trails, the Bike Park, and Crankworx. This spending generated more than $39.1 million in economic activity, and supported more than $26.5 million in wages and salaries and 798 jobs throughout the Province. Mountain biking in Whistler also supported considerable tax revenues, with over $8.5 million and $7.3 million in government taxes paid at the federal and provincial levels, respectively; while municipal revenues throughout the province exceeded $2.1 million."

These numbers only shows the direct economic impact of tourism. However, I'm sure there are further benefits to the BC bike industry due to the world class mystique of the free ride style of riding. Rocky Mountain, Norco, Cove Bikes and Brody have probably benefited from being part of the BC bike culture which exploding onto the public consciousness around 1998. Many visitors were introduced to the local bikes and may consider taking a bit of BC's finest back with them.

10-15 years ago I lived in Vancouver and rode the Whistler and North Shore trail systems when they were unauthorized. Back then only the locals rode the trails and there were very few tourists (friends of friends). In 10 years, revenue from mountain bike tourism in the Sea to Sky area has gone from immeasurable to CD$39 million.

These are impressive numbers and I really believe that Santa Cruz County has the potential to realize a similar level of mountain bike tourism economic activity.

Mitigating Risk for Private Land Owners

There are many advantages of allowing mountain bike access on private land. The trail design can be more "creative" and trail networks on private land are generally not subjected to the same level of scrutiny as trails on public land.

One of the biggest obstacles to gaining access to private land are the land owner's concerns of exposure to liability. There are a number of tools that we can use to engage private land holders to allow mountain bike access.

The following page at IMBA has a great discussion on the issues of liability for land owners.

The relevant section for private land owners concerns "Recreational Use Statutes". There are a few important points to note:

"Recreational Use Statute" is a term given to legislation generally intended to promote public recreational use of privately owned land. The statute does this by granting landowners broad immunity from liability for personal injuries or property damage suffered by land users pursuing recreational activities on the owner's land."

Justification for the RUS policy:

"The underlying policy of a Recreational Use Statute is that the publics need for recreational land has outpaced the ability of local, state, and federal governments to provide such areas and that owners of large acreages of land should be encouraged to help meet this need."

How it works:

"Under prior common law (law made by precedent), the landowner had different duties of care depending on whether a person was on the land as an invitee, licensee, or a trespasser. The greatest duty of care was owed to an invitee and no duty was owed to an unknown, adult trespasser. Under an R.U.S., recreational users are treated in the same manner as trespassers and thus the landowner owes them no duty of care. The protection of the statute is lost, however, if the landowner charges for the use of the land or if the landowner is guilty of malicious conduct."

Generally, a land owner is not liable for recreational use on the land if they do not charge for access and there is no malicious conduct on the part of the land owner to create a dangerous situation.

How this may manifest itself as challenging trails on private land:

"If a landowner has no knowledge of a dangerous condition, he or she is under no duty to investigate the land for dangerous conditions."

The full text of the California Recreational Use Statute is here. A summary brochure can be found here.

Be nice out there!

I just got an earful from an angry hiker who read the Good Times article. She saw that the article mentioned "jittery horses" but she wanted to know if we were doing something about 'jittery hikers".

She then went on a rant about how all the mountain bikers she has encountered while hiking race by her at high speed. I tried to get her to talk about a specific incident and location but she just vented. I can sympathize at how frustrated she was needed an outlet.

I can't claim to represent all mountain bikers who ride in Santa Cruz but I think her assessment is unfair. Most mountain bikers are conscientious trail users and respect other trail users. However, I recognize that there are minority of cyclists on the trails who do not yield to other trail users. These riders spoil it for the rest of us.

She wanted to know what I was doing to solve this and didn't come up with anything practical other than that we emphasize the multiple use trail guidelines: mountain bikes should yield to hikers and equestrians. User education is the one avenue that we have been pursuing. Biker only trails is another novel solution. What else could be done? The IMBA book Managing Mountain Biking has a lot of practical solutions which include strategies for education and trail system design.

I can't emphasize enough how important it is to be good trail citizens. We should all get along with other trail users and ride responsibly. Trail user conflict and the perception of conflict is our biggest issue in gaining access to trails.

Please be nice out there.

Mountain Bike Tourism in Santa Cruz County

The Santa Cruz weekly newspaper Good Times has an article about MBOSC this week. This article makes it public that the focus of our organization is the promotion of mountain bike tourism as a sustainable economic activity for Santa Cruz County. We have been developing a tourism initiative for a while now among ourselves so we may as well explain our strategy.

Mountain bike tourism is a global market and a sustainable economic activity. Communities from all over the world are recognizing the economic potential of this form of eco-tourism and have been embracing it to revitalize their local economies.

Santa Cruz has so many natural advantages for the development of mountain bike tourism including:

• A tourism based infrastructure already in place
• Nearby greenbelt areas and parks within riding distance of hotels and motels
• Spectacular redwood single track and coastal views
• Alternative activities for non-biking guests and family members
• Supportive bike industry and bike culture
• World-class destinations including San Francisco, Monterey and Silicon Valley less than 2 hours away

We believe that there are a number of benefits of mountain bike tourism which could benefit the community of Santa Cruz County including:

• City of Santa Cruz: More hotel and sales tax revenue.
  
• Local bike industry: increased sales and opportunities for new businesses.
• Local businesses: hotels, restaurants and tourism.
  

We wish to engage the local business community, visitors center and city council to recognize the economic potential of mountain bike tourism. These partnerships with civic leaders could help us cut through the red tape and get the resources to open more legitimate trails and promote Santa Cruz County as a destination. More legitimate trails and embracing mountain bike tourism could create opportunities for mountain bike events like 24 hour races, fat tire festivals and the development of new businesses to support mountain bike tourism like shuttle and guide services.

Mountain biking is a healthy, eco-friendly, and fun form of outdoor recreation and it should be encouraged for its low-cost, low impact use of public and private land. Santa Cruz is well known as a mountain biking destination to active mountain bikers in Northern California. The city and county can market Santa Cruz as a world-class mountain bike destination with very little investment and effort.

IMBA Trail Care Crew is comming to Santa Cruz this Fall

Mark your calendars! The IMBA Trail Care Crew will be coming to Santa Cruz on the weekend of Oct 20-21st, 2007.

The IMBA Trail Care Crews are sponsored by Subaru and travel year-round throughout North America and beyond. They lead trailwork sessions, meet with land managers, and working with IMBA-affiliated clubs and members to improve mountain biking opportunities. The Trail Care Crew experts will also lead a series of popular two-day IMBA Trailbuilding Schools.

Kristin Butcher and Ryan Schutz will be the crew who will be visiting us. From their bio on the IMBA TCC site:

Kristin Butcher and Ryan Schutz hail from Deerfield Beach, Florida, where they created ClubMud, an IMBA-affiliated "trail maintenance, advocacy and merrymaking" organization. They helped lead the charge to gain approval for freeride trails and technical trail features in Broward County parks, oversaw the construction of two freeride areas, and helped organize a bevy of cycling events. Prior to joining the Trail Care Crew, Kristin was a successful and multi-patented software engineer at an international telecommunications company. Ryan has earned a Masters in Urban Planning, has a passion for trail advocacy, and is fascinated by Elvis impersonators. He spent the last 5 years working in GIS, municipal land planning, and his buddy's bike shop.

The agenda is still to be determined. This will be the same weekend as the MBOSC 10th anniversary bash at Seabright Brewery so it should be a great weekend.

Rain is forecast for the week of May 1-4, 2008

... because they just announced that these are the date for the Sea Otter in 2008. I remember that they moved the festival from March to April because rain and crappy weather was pretty much guaranteed in March. An April Otter didn't fair too well either.

I thought that it would be dry this year because the general lack of rain this season made the chances of rain unlikely. As most of us know it rained really hard on Sea Otter Saturday.

If we really want to address the pending drought then we could just hold a Sea Otter every month.

Carrot Fest was really "transformative" this year

Last Saturday mountain bikers equestrians participated in Carrot Fest at Wilder Ranch. The goal of Carrot Fest is to desensitize horses to mountain bikes and increase communication and understanding between mountain bikers and equestrians.

It was a small and intimate gathering up on the horse camp marine terrace but one which was extremely valuable. Geoff Smith did a stellar job working with Soleil - a skittish Arab Mare. At the beginning of the clinic, Soleil was really afraid of bikes. Towards the end of the clinic she was feeling much more comfortable around a moving bike. Watching that horse undergo that level of transformation in a few hours demonstrates how valuable this event is to the safety of trail users.

I would like to thank Sebastien Praly (MBOSC) and Rebeckah Crill (SCCHA) for organizing this event, Supervising Ranger Joseph Connors taking care of the event logistics, Geoff Smith for having the expertise and patience in working with Soleil. I think you made a new friend. Finally, I would like to thank all the bikers and equestrians who participated in the event. You all have made a difference in renewing the co-operation between our two user groups.

I really treasure the great relationship that exists between mountain bikers and equestrians in Santa Cruz county. There is a still a lot of work that could be done at the State and Federal level to facilitate communication between these two user groups. Equestrians and mountain bikers can look at what we have done in Santa Cruz county as an example of how to get along and share the trails. We have a lot of common ground and we are trail users who have a passion to enjoy the open space with our favorite steeds.

Soleil makes progress at Carrot Fest 2007

It was a wonderful day to enjoy Wilder Ranch State Park with our Equestrian and equine friends. We were high up on the Horse Camp marine terrace with great views of the ocean and the back country. It was sunny, warm and clear. Perfect spring weather on the central coast.

Rebeckah from SCCHA and Sebastien from MBOSC discussed the basics of horse-bike interaction on the trails and hosted an open discussion of experiences and lessons learned when encountering the other user group on the trail. Then we broke into a clinic to help desensitize horses to mountain bikes.

We started the clinic by having the bikers ride in large circles and let the horses follow them. The objective is to make the horse feel like the predator rather than the prey animal so that the horses could get used to the sounds and sights of a mountain bike. Then we placed ourselves in the position of coming up from behind and passing the horse. I was really impressed with the control and confidence of Claudia's bay mare Silhouette around bikes. I was pedaling right beside her so closely that I would turn my head and glance into the horse's eye.

The most transformational moment was with an Arab mare Soleil and Geoff Smith (a mountain biker). Soleil is a 12 year old horse who was never frightened of mountain bikes when Claudia first got her at 7. Claudia didn't think that Soliel had a specific negative experience with a mountain bike but something recently made her fear the mechanical steeds that we choose to ride. She said it was analogous to a young child who suddenly gains a realization of his own mortality. But she says that it's a mystery and demonstrates that horses have personality which may change over time.

We were experimenting and trying to find the boundaries of Soleil's fear of bikes. She wasn't afraid of the cyclists (we could walk up to Soleil with no problems). She wasn't afraid of bikes, since a bike lying on the ground wouldn't spook her. However, if the bike was moving she would tense up. Geoffrey spent most of his time working with Soleil to get her comfortable around bikes.

Geoff would pet, talk to and feed Soleil without his bike to make Soleil feel comfortable with him. Then Geoff picked up his bike - Soleil would immediately tense - but he would hold the bike behind him and go over the same exercises. Then Geoff would move his bike back and forth - again Soleil would tense up - but after a while she would get comfortable with the moving bike. Then Geoff would put the bike between himself and Soleil so that she would have to lean across the bike to get the carrot. Soleil still wasn't completely comfortable with bikes at this stage. She would stay as far from the bike as possible and crane her neck in order to get at the carrot. Geoff would continue working with Soleil on these exercises and after a while Soleil would accept that bikes are not a threat.

After the clinic all the riders headed into the Wilder back country to enjoy the rest of the day on the trails. Bikers Geoff, Sebastien and I rode with equestrians Kristin, Katelyn and Rebeckah up the fence line dump trail towards Enchanted Loop. The bikers had a bit of a lead on the moderate slope up the trail but when it got steep the horses passed us quite easily. At Enchanted Loop the two user groups split up and the bikers rode clockwise while the equestrians rode counter-clockwise. We met up at the bottom of Enchanted to practice bike/horse interaction.

Silhouette, Soleil and their riders showed up a bit later on Enchanted Loop while we were at the bottom, she had improved considerably. Soleil's rider mentioned that a bike had passed her from behind but she stayed still. Previously, Soleil would attempt to run away. Soleil was not fully comfortable with bikes but she had made incredible progress in the clinic. That alone was a great justification for this event. Geoff has a new friend.

I treasure the great relationship that exists between mountain bikers and equestrians in Santa Cruz county. Many of the carrot fest participants will take the knowledge that was learned about the other user group and spread it out among the people they ride with. There is a still a lot of work that could be done at the State and Federal level to facilitate communication between user groups. Equestrians and mountain bikers can look at what we have done in Santa Cruz county as an example of how to get along and share the trails. We have a lot of common ground and we are trail users who have a passion to enjoy the open space with our favorite steeds.

More words and pictures here: http://picasaweb.google.com/lick.the.toad/CarrotFest2007

BICYCLE TRIP BIKE PARK GRAND OPENING PARTY

City of Santa Cruz Parks and Recreation Department announces

Santa Cruz Bike Park Grand Opening!

BMX Stunt Show by 2Hip Bikes and Local Riders!

Music - Free Snacks!

Friday, May 4, 2007 - 4 to 6 pm @ The temporary BikePark - located at

35 Pacific Avenue (the Fun Spot) - across the street from the MunicipalWharf entrance.

Free valet bike parking by People Power. Ride your bikes parking limited and expensive