Mid-State: Burchfield

[jonw9]

Bob Supremecy is closed. Reroute is in place. Swamp Thing is probably underwater near the beginning. I only saw the exit and it is under water. Caleb's telephone pole bridges look awesome in the water. They fixed a problem so glorious poperds remains open. Nathan dynamite is very wet. Ride easy!

Just do laps of Poperd's and break finish breaking that section in!

[reidabel]

Bob Supremecy is closed. Reroute is in place. Swamp Thing is probably underwater near the beginning. I only saw the exit and it is under water. Caleb's telephone pole bridges look awesome in the water. They fixed a problem so glorious poperds remains open. Nathan dynamite is very wet. Ride easy!

A very mixed situation out there today.

The ridge trail is in great shape, even the ravine is dry. The river is very close to this trail in some other spots. On the main beginner trail just South of the entrance to Hellboy, in that low spot by the post, there is a huge body of water taking up probably 40 feet of the trail! I had to drag the bike about 150 yards East through the field to get around it, and still had to walk through a few inches of water. Hellboy is fine, though, the water is a few feet from the trail, and the stunts are all good for riding. The trail from Hellboy toward the river (the White Cutoff?) is underwater starting at the bottom of that little hill. Remember Me is underwater in the low part, and not passable. I didn't go North of there, does anyone know about the entrance to Serenity just North of the bridge? That first part is probably at least wet, if not a few inches underwater like I've seen it in the past.

On the North side, all I saw was from the Riverbend parking lot to the new stunt on Hansen's Be-Bop (working on it today). It was a little greasy in spots, but mostly fine. Two families rode by me today, Dads with one or two boys, all helmetless, but having fun

I suspect tomorrow, after some drying time, many of the trails will be fine, will others will be submerged. It is probably not going to be a good idea to start off from MacNamara Landing, as you will effectively be cut off before Hellboy. Can anybody report on the North part of the trails? AllMountin' - how's the new area you cut in? You're getting some immediate feedback on whether or not it goes too low, on the bright side.

[reidabel]

On Poperds I also noticed (riding slower makes you see different stuff!) a post with left+right green advanced-mtb-trail arrows, where the trail goes straight. What's up with that?

If that's the one in the open field near the beginning of Glorious Poperds, you must REALLY have been riding fast to not have seen it before. I've been seeing it every time for a couple of years now ... of course, my own pace is sub-sonic! I believe there was originally supposed to have been a separate jump line there, on that little downslope.

Was out today before the rain started, and Hansen's (to the new stunt) is starting to get muddier even where it was good a week ago. We need these upcoming sunny, warm days to firm things up.

... Bob's supremacy ... Sad to see that Reid's log pile at the start had been taken apart by someone/something.

I meant to get out there and take a look this morning, but had to get back home too soon, so I didn't get a chance. Worked on the foundation of the turnaround platform on the new Hansen's stunt instead. I am hoping you're mistaken about the log pile, but you know Burchfield well, so I doubt you are. I stabilized that pile by counter-sinking boards across and into the logs, so if somebody pulled it apart, it wasn't easy to do. That is unfortunate, and if this trend continues (destroying my work) it would be difficult to justify continuing to spend the kind of time and money that I expend out there building things.

A "shout out" to Matt from Eaton Rapids, who I met for the first time this morning at the Hansen's stunt - if you find your way here, welcome!

[bleve]

Rode out here Tuesday night and the trail was mostly good just keep your mouth closed when riding next to the river. Swamp thing was mostly passable using a couple bypasses and makeshift bridges out of the old bridges. Also it was nice to see the jump section opened up and not overgrown. I only rolled it but it looks like it could be fun.

[Mike 373]

It was great out there! Until the rain started. We were playing on Hellboy a little when the rain came. I need some flat pedals for that thing! Only made the low easy crossing. Was going to do the high one but it was getting slick on the wood. Yeah, thats it! Had the place all to ourselves. We did see a group on the way out. We rode everything. I love the two long water crossing skinnies. Pretty cool! Had a great ride. I wish more trails were that twisty. Steve did a great job on the loomans mod! Very fun. Once it gets rode more it will be even better! Hats off to all you guys, that place is a gem!

[Mike 373]

Nathan Dynamite was probably the worst we rode. I thought anderson would be wetter!

[reidabel]

Flat pedals sounds like a good idea for Hellboy - in more ways than one. You probably already know this, but for The Highway (the name of the high line you mentioned) be sure that your pedals are up and out of the way when you go over the peak. You'll need enough speed so that you don't need to pedal at the peak, or your pedal will touch down and it will suddenly become quite exciting - trying to save yourself from going off the side. I always give it a burst of speed so that I can coast over the top, then hit the brakes as I go over the peak, especially if I'm taking the option (The Offramp). Note that Pitchfork (the skinny upramp at the corner) is much wider on top - if you want to try it out without doing the whole thing, you can just do the upramp and stop on top. It requires more speed than it would seem, to get up to the top without stalling out and having to bail. Twisted (the banked line), well, that's another story, and it can be tricky. Follow the shingles and keep your eyes on the exit when you are halfway through the banked curve.

[reidabel]

Welcome, Matt! Glad you find the right forum. You probably already found it, but you will also find general discussion in the MMMBA part of "MMBA Member Organizations" one level above this. In there are many threads discussing more specific things for our local area trails, including Burchfield, Anderson Park, Rose Lake, Bennett Park, Ella Sharp, Sleepy Hollow, etc.

Some of those threads are even for individual stunts, including the new one on Hansen's:

http://www.mmba.org/forum/viewtopic.php?f=40&t=118799

That thread includes much more detail about the stunt, if you're interested in seeing how it is being done. Work has stopped for the moment due to the mosquito density - I don't really want to be standing basically still for hours on end in a muddy area at Burchfield right now! I will be posting updates once I get going on it again.

[reidabel]

There's a huge tree down as you exit the Timinator ... it's a LOT of tree.

HELL-O! Do I hear something calling my name?

I have to admit that I'd be WAY more excited if people weren't messing up the stuff I've built out there .. that's only a short distance from the vandalized log pile, and I'm pretty hesitant to start any new projects.

This one won't last for stunts. It's across the regular trail rather than onto the mtb trail. You'll be spared building a stunt on this one. Haven't been back in on BobSupremacy to see what's happened to your log pile there. Hopefully whoever was messing with things has moved onto other "entertainment" and left the park.

Hopefully they are gone, but I doubt it ... and there may be more than one group at it. One group seems to be vandals, the other seems to be people who don't see why they should leave things as they are and learn how to ride them as designed. Instead, they make it easier to get onto the stunts and care nothing for people who may ride up onto them without having the skills to handle the danger in the middle. They don't see that the reason why the entries are difficult is to keep inexperienced riders off of them. I would have far less of an issue with it if they would just remove their modifications when they were finished having their fun. Personally, the difficulty of the entries is a big part of the fun.

I have been moving wood from fallen trees over to the advanced mtb trail so that I can build stunts with it. The wood used for the base logs of the new Dragonball Run stunt came from a tree 100 feet away that fell across the nearby beginner trail. Not much fun to move it, but I'm glad to have the wood.

[plunderspunk]

Yeah, it's nice to not be inhaling them. Riding unmasked is an improvement!

[rvd]

The bugs are reduced a lot from before...

They all moved to my backyard

The mounds at Smokey and The Bandits are in great shape for repeated looping, they've really been ridden in well.

Good to hear. Did someone shape them at all into jumps or are they (still) just tall rollers?

[reidabel]

They are still the same - just awesome tall rollers ... bockrona was talking today about shaping the jump line, but I think we have to insist that the rolling line be left intact. It's just too good to lose it. There's nothing like it anywhere I've ridden, and while it can't really be "pumped", I like it better than the Eastgate pump track (on Meridian Road East of Okemos).

[AllMountin']

Trail was surprisingly dry. Loose, sandy, and dusty in several spots, in fact. Pretty good riding overall. Some slappers here and there.

Sizable tree down on the backside of the big pond, near where everything got rerouted(around Looman's). Over a foot in diameter. Chainsaw required.

[Overdrive]

Without hitting any single track, how many miles could you put on hitting only dirt roads, pavement and two track on a cyclocross bike? Pavement mentioned if needed to loop back to either of the parking lots. Loop ideas would be highly appreciated.

With a touch of singletrack (purple) it's a six mile loop using the original trail (more recently known as the beginner trail?).
You could skip purple by using that middle trail from the north end rather than either of the trail entry points. I've got some favorite loops that I use for CX training. If you want more details on those maybe I can draw up something or find a file when I had gps on the CX bike while out there. It makes use of the sledding hill, volleyball court that's out by the ball field and more.

Though with care, a whole lot of the trail can be ridden on the CX bike.

Island Lake is really great on a CX bike.

[peterlcole]

... and an unfortunate incident at Hellboy.

What happened, Peter? What line was it on? Hope there was no injury involved. I just inspected it earlier this afternoon and it looks like it's in good shape, other than some plants growing up through the spaces that wouldn't affect anyone riding it. Was it unrelated to the condition of the stunt itself?

I was on the high line and at the pinnacle I somehow lost my momentum and balance. I ended up veering off the bridge to the right. I landed on the right side of my face and taco'd my neck and did something to my elbow. Fortunately, an x-ray and cat scan showed nothing serious.

It had nothing to do with stunt itself, I think it was just a fluke. I have ridden it many times in the past without an issue. The worst part is that I know on my next ride I am going to be gun shy when it comes to stunts.