Category Archives: mountain biking

Help Tahoe Win a Bell Built Trail Grant!

Corral Trail rider

Me enjoying Corral Trail last fall. Photo: Jeff Glass

Over the years, mountain biking has become as much a passion of mine as skiing. I’m not great at it, but I love climbing local trails in order to enjoy the thrill of the descent. So it should come as no surprise that I am a member of the Tahoe Area Mountain Bike Association (TAMBA). What you may not know is that thanks to TAMBA’s continued efforts, a South Lake Tahoe trail is now in the running to win a $30,000 grant – and we need your help (and vote) to win it!

The Bell Built program helps communities build sustainable trails, including pump tracks, flow trails, and downhill trails. Of the more than 100 applications submitted from across the country, TAMBA’s submission of the Corral Trail in South Lake Tahoe has been selected as one of the twelve finalists.

The grant includes the construction of 30 jumps and features on Corral Trail, a hugely popular local that has served as a test project by the US Forest Service on how to build and permit mountain bike specific features on public Forest Land. These efforts go back 8 years now and have had many riders give input.

Once all the planned features are built on Corral Trail TAMBA will be able to take this model and apply it elsewhere in the Tahoe basin. The Bell Built grant is for projects that have approved plans and are shovel-ready, meaning they can start building this spring. Corral is just that.

Want to help? It’s easy. Just vote Corral Trail for Flow Trail Projects by April 12 here: http://www.facebook.com/BellBikeHelmets/app_228716427271717

And be sure to share this with your friends, family, mountain biking partner, drinking buddies, etc.

This is a terrific opportunity for mountain bikers who love to ride Lake Tahoe.  It is the only California project, so this honor, along with the hard work to buff out this classic trail, will make it a role model for future progressive trails that can be built on Forest Service lands.

Don’t delay – vote for Corral Trail for Flow Trail projects today!

Mountain biking inspiration

Corral Trail. 11.24.12. Photo: Jeff Glass

Enjoying the tacky dirt on Corral trail. Photo: Jeff Glass

It may officially be ski season here (7 or so Tahoe resorts are open as of Thanksgiving Day), but mountain biking conditions are currently awesome.   As a result, I’ve spent more time on dirt than snow this holiday weekend.  This is a big deal, because those that know me know that I live for skiing.  So this admission is borderline heretical.

Good trail conditions, just like good snow conditions, encourage me to push myself. I’ve found myself pushing more on the bike this autumn, thanks to intermittent storms that kept the trails tacky.  Yet I don’t actively seek to improve my skills.  I don’t go to workshops, or focus on re-riding a particular ‘problem’ until I master it, as other friends do.  So this video, which I came across today, was inspiring on many levels. It made me think that maybe, just maybe, a clinic (or many) might help me get to the point where jumps and drops are tricks that become part of my repertoire, as opposed to just scaring the crap out of me as they do now.

If she can do it, I can too.  Or so I hope.

Fun Marks

Riding Christmas Valley

Fun times, fun marks…

Between the hilarity of Sierra Recon on Saturday, and some attempts to push myself on my new mountain bike the past few days, I’m sporting a lot of leg wounds.  Last night’s ride only added to the collection, and forced me to get all steezy as I wrapped a bandanna around the bleeding knee.

A friend told me that she tells her 6 year old daughter that cuts and scrapes are ‘fun marks’, a sign of how much fun you’re having.  It’s an awesome perspective.  Clearly I’m having a whole lot of fun.  I just don’t want to have more fun on top of the fun I’ve already had, because truth be told, that’s not so fun.

Destination Mountain Biking

I work in the tourism industry, where there’s a lot of talk about ‘destination travel’, the notion of going somewhere because of what it offers.  Think Tahoe for skiing, or Hawaii for the beaches, or New Orleans for the music.  I wanted to try to apply that to mountain biking, but on a much more micro level.

So, on July 4th we set our eyes upon a different sort of destination – Base Camp Pizza in the Heavenly Village.  To get there we admittedly took the least efficient route, but it was all in the name of food.

Riding the TRT from Star Lake

Riding the TRT from Star Lake. Photo: Jeff Glass

We began by climbing up to Star Lake and then taking the Tahoe Rim Trail (TRT) towards Heavenly’s Stagecoach Lodge.  This is a stunningly scenic portion of the TRT (really, what section of this trail isn’t?), one that I don’t ride that frequently.  In between technical sections there are dramatic vistas of both the Lake Tahoe basin to the west and Nevada to the east.

Views of Nevada from the trail

Views of Nevada from the trail. Photo: Jeff Glass

From the TRT we then descended the new-ish Van Sickle trail, another ridiculously scenic 3.3 mile section of trail, featuring views, technical sections and swoopy singletrack.

Sick views on the Van Sickle trail.

The Van Sickle trail ends at (wait for it) the Van Sickle Bi-State Park, located near the bottom of the Heavenly gondola…and the village.  Base Camp Pizza, located in said village, makes a Thai Chicken pizza that was enough of an incentive to ride 25 or so miles, which made for a much more decadent lunch than the smushed sandwiches we typically carry.

Destination thai chicken pizza.

After a lunch like that, a meandering ride home through the meadows was much needed, since both of us were not much in the mood to climb hills.

The final miles home.

But that said, it was a destination ride we would do again.  The pizza, and singletrack, were that good.

Star Lake in June

Star Lake in June

the earliest I’ve seen the snow melt up here, but I’m not complaining!

So, it’s nearly summer.  Signs of it are evident here. Temps in the ‘70s, longer days, more pronounced allergies, and the removal (finally!) of the cover at the public pool.  The bike trails are mostly melted out here too, even after a second round of snow that hit early last week, which means it’s time to start riding up in order to ride down.

Last weekend I headed up to Star Lake via the new-last-summer connector trail.  It’s an incredibly efficient way to climb up to 9200 feet, and I give huge kudos to the team that built it, because I love not feeling utterly spent by the time I reach the top.  It’s well worth the effort, whether you ride uphill for the views, for the descent, or for a combination of the two.

I will admit it felt a bit odd to be up there in shorts in early June.  Typically this doesn’t melt out until July, and last year I think it only melted out in August.  But, given this winter, I’m taking advantage of what will no doubt be a long mountain bike season here.

Since it was my first long-ish ride of the season, I descended the way I came, Star Lake to Cold Creek, which is a super fun descent ranging from rocky technical stuff to buffed out turns to switchbacks. But there are so many *other* possibilities from Star Lake, whether you ride the Tahoe Rim Trail (TRT) over Freel Pass to Armstrong or onto Toad’s (or for the super ambitious, onto Big Meadow and the Christmas Valley Downhill), or head back towards Nevada on the TRT over Monument Pass, and either continue along the Rim to Spooner, or descend Van Sickle to civilization (and a much needed beer).

Suffice to say, with options like these out my front door, I’m finding it hard to rally to travel anywhere with my mountain bike.  At least for the time being.

Memorial Day Snow = Mountain Biking Bliss

Cloudy views of Lake Tahoe

Cloudy views of Lake Tahoe

It’s been a depressingly low snow year at Lake Tahoe this season, but I should not have been surprised to see snow here this weekend.  After all, it’s Memorial Day, which typically brings this type of weather.

Banked turns & snow

Banked turns in the snow

Snow and rain means the equivalent of a powder day for mountain bikers.  Despite still freezing weather on Saturday, we bundled up and went exploring.  Lower trails were the order of the day, and we weren’t disappointed.  Just a tad cold.  But it was worth it, even if it did take my feet more than an hour to thaw out.

Smiling even though I can’t feel my feet

Trail conditions should be fantastic now that the clouds have cleared, which is where I’m headed this morning.

And suddenly…Summer?

Oh single speed, oh single speed...

Oh single speed, oh single speed...

A week ago I was making powder turns off Mt. Tallac.  Today I went on a 3 hour mountain bike ride in shorts.  Certainly the weather in the Sierra is a bit crazy, but this seemed particularly strange.   Mid-seventies after a few feet of snow last week? Yeah, no global weirding here.

But, seeing that it really is beyond our control, we went with it.  With a lot of sunblock, for there was a lot of exposed pale skin.

Trail conditions at the lower elevations range from dry to wet and muddy to snowy.   Our goal was south facing trails located far from creeks, and surprisingly we found pretty dry trails for the most part.  Even found snow-free climbing to 7000 feet by Cold Creek.

And while I’ll always be more of a powder hound than a dirt jumper, I was pretty happy to see my trusty single-speed again.

The New Star Lake Connector Trail

New Van Sickle Trail

What an unfinished section of trail looks like

New trail construction in the Tahoe area doesn’t happen regularly, so the fact that we have not one, but two new trails that connect from the Tahoe Rim Trail in South Lake Tahoe is a big deal.  One that I hope continues, thanks to the efforts of the recently revived Tahoe Area Mountain Bike Association (disclaimer: N’s on the board, and I am a member).

Admittedly, one of them – the Van Sickle – isn’t completely finished yet, but still.  It’s rideable, so it counts.

The US Forest Service recently finished a nearly 4 mile (according to my bike odometer) trail that connects High Meadow to Star Lake.  This trail now means that you can ride from lake level (approximately 6300’), via the Cold Creek Trail, all the way to Star Lake (elev. 9200’).  That’s a lot of climbing.

Creek crossing on the Star Lake Connector Trail

Creek crossing on the way to Star Lake

We decided to check it out last weekend, so N, my friend K and I met at the High Meadow trailhead, which shaved a few hundred feet off the total elevation climb.  To get to the new connector trail, you can either ride up Cold Creek trail, which has a few technical sections, or up the High Meadow dirt road, a steep, albeit smooth, affair.   Once up at High Meadow, we found signs for the new connector trail, which was beautifully constructed by a trail crew hired by the USFS.  It’s a not-too-steep climb with fun rock sections, views at pretty much every corner, and the odd stream crossing and waterfall.   Considering the elevation gain, it was pretty efficient.  Way more so than the first part.

From there we rode the TRT towards Stagecoach.  I’ve done this section in the opposite direction multiple times, and it was way easier in this direction.  Sure there were a few uphill sections, but overall it was downhill.

Descending the TRT from Monument Peak

Descending the TRT from Monument Peak

Just above the last descent to Stagecoach Lodge, we followed the new trail to the Van Sickle Bi-State Park, which has plenty of the rolling up and down terrain for the first mile or so, which means every climb has an equal descent.  We hit a t junction, with one trail going down to Van Sickle Park, and the other heading down to Heavenly’s Boulder Lodge.  Our direction was Van Sickle, which meant we started to descend – big time.  It will be a fantastic descent once fully done, but for now we had the added excitement of unfinished trail sections which required slower speeds and/or hike-a-bike.  I’m hoping by next year it will be uninterrupted flow.

Lake views on the Van Sickle Trail

Gorgeous views on the Van Sickle trail

Because we had to head back to the car, we cut off the Van Sickle trail and headed back to Power Lines trail, which was a bit more challenging for me, as I realized I was bonking.  N commented that he’d never seen me ride this beginner trail so slowly.  But I had climbed around 4,000 feet in the 25 mile loop, so I felt I had an excuse.

It wasn’t a fab end to the ride, but the trail was awesome enough that I’m eager to ride it again, though I’ll pack more food next time.

Finding Kindred Spirits at the All Womens Sports Camp

Group shot on Sawtooth Ridge trail

Fun times on the Sawtooth Ridge trail

This past weekend I had the opportunity to attend the first All Women’s Sports Camp held at Northstar-at-Tahoe, thanks to a friend who couldn’t make it. It was a two day camp that catered to women of all athletic abilities, with a focus on running, biking, swimming and mountain biking. It was a perfect fit for the tri crowd, and as I have a pal doing the Iron Girl in South Lake Tahoe next month, I was able to convince her to join me.

Learning Movement prep with Darcy Norman

Movement prep session outdoors

Besides the fact that there were opportunities to do a number of activities that I don’t do, but am intrigued by (see: yoga, SUP), it was the two mountain bike rides that really drew me. While I’ve been mountain biking for a number of years now, I’ve never really had proper instruction, so the fact that Marla Streb would be there as an instructor was huge. Turns out I don’t suck as badly as I thought, though there are a number of things I need to think about, including but not limited to my tendency to have a death grip on my handlebars.

Marla was a lot of fun, with an offbeat humor that I’m not sure everyone totally appreciated. Even dealing with the elevation, it was clear she could still easily kick everyone’s butt on the trail, including those belonging to the great guides at Tahoe Mountain Guides that shuttled bikes & bodies to the trailhead both days. We were able to practice our new-found skills on a short 6 mile section of the TRT near Brockway Summit, one with some technical parts, and a fair bit of dust. No doubt our long train of 20 riders frustrated some of the hikers who were unwittingly in our downhill path.

Marla Streb talking technique

Marla Streb talking technique

Other fun stuff included an actual lesson on a stand up paddleboard (with two women who compete in SUP races), which was very helpful given my last experience. Turns out I can stand up, and with some technique I can paddle. Admittedly my turning-around-a-buoy skills still need much work, as I clearly illustrated during the ‘fun’ SUP relay race we were all in. Luckily I didn’t totally screw it up for my team, as we ended up winning!

bike maintenance with Cycle Paths

Learning basic bike maintenance

The event itself was a full one, with a two-track agenda that went from 6.30 am – 4 pm both days, and allowed all attendees to attend both activity specific sessions and more general health & wellness ones like yoga and sports psychology. Despite all the moving parts, the event was very well organized, and props must be given to Inger and her team to keeping everything moving so smoothly and fostering such a positive atmosphere. MTV reality show vibe this was not.

But more than that, it was very cool to meet so many other women who are athletic and enjoy playing hard. Many came from outside the area, but there were more than a few from the Reno-Tahoe area, and I’m looking forward to meeting up with them again soon.

And I’m already planning for next year’s event. After all, my running skills need a lot of work.