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Post by riderdown on Aug 25, 2010 16:27:56 GMT 10
In the latest Enduro Mag there is an article about IMBA trail dudes visiting Australia. The comment in the article is that Australia has great "Mountain Bike Parks" but no "Epic Trails". Which got me thinking about SCUM tracks and the book we use as our reference "Trail Solutions" put out by IMBA.
Trail Solutions is a good reference especially the environmental issues such as dealing with water run off. However it talks about trail use and in particular it refers to multi use trails (eg shared with Bush walkers and horse riders ect) they are therefore wider, "neater" and over engineered. SCUM trails are more specific in they are purely Mountain bike Race tracks (Moto's not with standing).
The question to the masses (all 6 of us)
How do we see our tracks? and how does this effect further Track development, if any?
Cheers
Matt
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Post by Between the Tape... on Aug 25, 2010 17:16:33 GMT 10
Our trails were primarily designed to hold events on and have done that very successfully over the years with great raves from riders of all levels......but where do we go from here??.....lets face it if State Forests hadn't come along and rained on our parade, we'd have trails comin' out of our kazoo.... ;D ....fact is fact though and to conform to their requirements of upkeep/maintenance etc we do it tough to atract support....I'll refer to the last maintenance day at Superbowl...  .....unfortunately I'm lost for answers...  |
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Post by Lewy on Aug 25, 2010 18:29:21 GMT 10
I agree with Pat, if ForestsNSW hadn't stopped us building tracks, Butterfly and Superbowl would be linked, plus Butterfly would be much larger and Coondoo would be a lot bigger loop. I had pretty much walked these areas and was ready to start making tracks, then I stacked my moto and ruined my shoulder so it didn't happen. (maybe I should really hate Moto's ;D) Since then I suppose I have lost interest and was hoping more people would step in, but apart from the select few who are out there now, not really many new people have stepped up. Obviously 100+ plus people are happy to come ride our tracks every month, but I would say, less than 10% of that number have had any signifcant input into building/maintaining them. As far as epic rides go, you could always jump onto www.motionbased.com and do a search for the last 3 30/60km race courses and then link a nice epic ride out of that, if we were allowed to show maps of our tracks  |
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Post by dunkman on Aug 25, 2010 23:46:57 GMT 10
Wow, I thought the opening post was a good line for discussion but the responses open up even more lines of thought again.
While I'm all for creating more tracks for moto's in a lot of ways I'm thinking the clubs decision to work with state forests, and the delayed trail building that came with it, has been a blessing if somewhat disguised.
Allow me to digress a little...
IMBA started in the US (International much like the World Series baseball) to promote/advocate/argue the positive benefits of mountainbiking to the wider community. Why? Because with limited space and a huge population it was pretty obvious that access to trails was, and would continue to be a major issue. A lot of access issues came about because to landowners (forests and national parks) mtb's were linked to motorbikes and 4wds as vehicles. So when it was considered necessary to limit access to these groups it was easiest to just ban/limit all vehicles. IMBA and other groups then had to go into to bat for the mtb'ers to then have them treated like walkers and horseriders who still had access to the trails. It is for this reason that most IMBA trail info relates to multi use trails rather than mtb only trails. Since then IMBA has become more truly International and recently opened up a branch here in Aus.
Does this relate to us? How many legit trails can you ride between here and Sydney? Yep it relates to us. Almost all clubs in our area are negotiating with State Forests now because in Australia esp NSW we have no access to National Parks (yet) and that leaves state forests as our best partner in developing trails with a future.
The other major thing that IMBA had to bring ot the table when gaining access, was that mtb trails were sustainable and low impact. So yeah I'm sure you get all that about building trails to reduce erosion and tyre impact etc, but we have a harder issue to manage. Ok so we make km's of new trail and ride it and all's good. Moto's or horses (man can they be track trashers) or whatever come in and bugger it up. We give up on that and make some more... and it goes on. What landowner is going to be happy about that. What happened in the US in these cases was, the land was again closed off. It was much easier to not let anyone than trying to limit who used it.
We have a good opportunity to work with State Forest here and the clubs south of us are doing alright dealing with the same issues we have. At a recent meeting with State Forest the club executive considered the options;
1. an agreement for the currently approved tracks (Coondoo and Funnelweb) and abandon the other tracks
2. work toward an agreement to include all the tracks (add Superbowl and Butterfly).
Given the deterioration of some parts of the tracks and the lack of club members available for track maintenance in the past it is understandable that the club must consider the notion that it can only really sustain one track.
Of course the low involvement rate could well be a result of the lack of understanding as to what is really happening with our tracks. Perhaps if club members understood where things were heading they would like to be more involved?
Anyway it does bring us back to Matt's question; "How do we see our tracks? and how does this effect further Track development, if any?"
Is there a need for anymore than one XC track i.e. is Coondoo enough for SCUM? Are people interested in riding the current tracks outside of races or do they prefer to ride elsewhere? Should the club be focussed on 'race tracks' or something else?
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Post by Between the Tape... on Aug 26, 2010 8:33:54 GMT 10
Sorry mate I'll try and specifically answer the question; I see our trails as fun, challenging at times, very event savy but to our long serving members of the club they'd probably like to see something new...... You'll have to excuse Lewy and I, we come with trail building/maintenance baggage ;D albeit justified though.... I really like you and Matt's approach to trails and hope your enthusiasm is rewarded....  |
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Post by dunkman on Aug 26, 2010 9:17:54 GMT 10
Sorry mate I'll try and specifically answer the question; If you don't digress I don't get to either. No fun in that for either of us. You'll have to excuse Lewy and I, we come with trail building/maintenance baggage ;D albeit justified though.... and glad you share it. Blind enthusiasm is dumb, reality bites and somewhere up the middle is the blue groove. |
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Post by riderdown on Aug 27, 2010 19:49:10 GMT 10
I should answer my own question to be part of the discussion.
I guess the question of further track development is the key one at present with the Club. Coondoo is not enough, it's good but not tough enough to stand alone. Butterfly is tough enough, a bugger for us heavy SCUM, is holding up well to use but any rain and you cann't get into it.
Super Bowl is close to forrest road so access is good, or could be good. It is on and excellent slope which if used well should alow for good water flow and the rock in the ground alows for some techinicality (new word). Problems with it are: Some of the current lines coming down are not sustainable and need reworking. The climb from east stump to the top has been rendered usless my Moto's (IHM).
So track developement I feel Superbowl is the go but it will need many minds and hands. The minds for carefull planning taking into account enviromental issues, IMBA trail building techniques and the vision of what the origional builders of the track had. Probably a dose of humility as many minds makes for many ideas so that could cause some angst. Many hands is obvious but do we have them? I'm keen Stong back week mind.
Long term it would be good to link them all together for epic rides such as the Lewy 30/60.
Cheers
Matt
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Post by shaunhardtailyew on Sept 4, 2010 20:53:48 GMT 10
So are we (SCUM) thinking of cutting back to only one track?? and just making it different trails there??
And also i know for a fact if you need volunteers, myself and friends are really keen to help.. when we are not at school of course....
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.....unfortunately I'm lost for answers... 
