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IMBA Trail Care Crew visit - March 31st/April 1st

Go here for the TCC2 report as posted on the IMBA web site!.

From: Marcel Slootheer
Date: Mon Apr 2, 2001 8:15am
Subject: great IMBA/OEF weekend

can't say enough good stuff about the IMBA class on Saturday morning. At first I was disappointed about only seeing 14 people show up for this OEF event but 15 minutes into the slide-slow I didn't care anymore. Joey Klein from IMBA did a great job making the people in the room feel excited about being part of the mountain bike community, as a club and as an individual. The trails shown in the slides, the comments about the challenges faced and the solutions that were applied made me all giddy and ready go out there to try to improve the great trails we have. I also wanted to take up all of my vacation and ride the awesome looking trails he showed and had worked on (with clubs and organizations just like OEF). We had good discussion about trail access issues, user impact, design problems, solutions, etc. The situation at Bluff Creek was addressed. In general we have great potential to further improve our trails, try to fix some erosion problems, mark more while following Joey's suggestions, work with state parks, etc.
The Bluff Creek work day was cancelled due to the rain, but at the end of the morning session we heard that NuDraper was dry and we went for a group ride. NuDraper was in surprisingly good shape with only a few muddy spots. We showed Joey around (he had done a Bubba race out here in 99) and stopped often to just talk (James was there... :-), take pics and we all had a great time - the weather was picture perfect for mountain biking!
Sunday we had the ride at the Nose. Despite all the clouds it didn't rain on us at all and the trail was in good shape (a little wet near the lake and in the canyon). I don't remember how many people showed up but it was a good group. Joey was totally impressed with the place and one word kept coming up - potential! He had lots of suggestions to improve the existing trails, make them more sustainable, make them flow better and get more out of them. Several areas had great potential for more trails. Best of all he was impressed with some of the new stuff TBB and friends put in (great bench-cut :-). Some of the turns need to be improved but that was obvious. Joey called this place a little Fruita or a mini-Fruita. He could spend 2 months out there changing this place into mtb heaven. Who's gonna pay him???
The IMBA trail care crews rock. Joey, Nicky (sp?), thanks for stopping by, I'm glad Texas 'cancelled' them so we could spend some quality time talking and riding together. So many more people could have learned so much this weekend... I'm just glad I was there. Thanks for organizing Charles & Walt. I'm sure they will report about this weekend soon (they are still working with them today, Monday).

Marcel.
OEF member
IMBA member

Pictures and text: Marcel Slootheer

Joey (standing) listening to us introducing ourselves.

Slides of nice looking trails.

James leading the NuDraper ride.

Regroup at the Lollypop.

Joey trying to clean a V-tree with mini bridge.

James going down the V-coaster. Joey was very impressed with this BC type construction :-)

Group pic on the older (green) loop.

Walt going down the Big Dog.

On to Roman Nose - Anthony Caldwell.

Inspiration Point.

Charles, Walt & Joey on the new section.

Joey Klein. Very impressed by the Nose. It has great potential for more cool stuff.