The Recap

Well hello everyone,

I know that I have been on one major hiatus this last few months but man my life has been busy! I had a lot on my plate with all the building and what not involved with Cottage Grove Bike Park but a lot of cool stuff has come of it. I have made some new friends and met more people. We have been able to do some pretty impressive stuff in a matter of a few months. It has now been about a year since the project began with a 30 minute conversation with Zac Docktor, followed by a series of meetings and then hours and hours of fund raising followed by hours and hours and hours of building, then a Party at the Park and then more building, then the IMBA Advanced Trail Building School and that is pretty much it!

We have completed 2 of the planned 6 sections, the 4 x course, a downhill BMX track built for 4 riders wide instead of 8, and the Pump Tracks. Next spring we will build the beginner skills track. This is a short track designed with the youngest riders in mind, strider bikes and the likes. After we complete this we will begin to build the dirt jump section of the park. That will be our large undertaking for the season… It should be a good time! We have a pretty solid crew that is passionate about riding and dedicated to build the most bad ass riding area in the state! I know we can do it!

This park has truly been a testament to what a community both bike and residential can do when they see the potential in a park. I have personally invested about 1000 hours since last fall when the process started but this summer we had approximately 3000 volunteer hours, which is absolutely crazy because that equals what all of the rest of the MORC organization produced in the season at 10+ other trails. We also raise some where north of $20,000 to help fund the project and swept the MORC awards. Mike Mullany won trail builder of the year, Adam Buck won volunteer of the year, the City of Cottage Grove won land manager of the year, Rumpca Excavation won sponsor of the year and I won the president’s award!

It was truly an inspiring year on all fronts and we are looking forward to some more epicness in the future. The project is expected to be completed by Fall of 2015. We are currently in the process of writing some grants and if we are awarded the grant money, it will truly take the park the next level. We are hoping to hire a professional company to come in and build the mountain bike skills course and the Slope Style course, if everything goes as planned, those will be built in the spring/summer of 2015.

On top of building more stuff next spring/summer we will make the park look like a true park. The city will be adding a hang out area, signage and enclosing the park with split rail fencing. We will continue to educate the community and the users about proper etiquette as we had a lot of miss use this summer. We were constantly fixing ruts in the riding surface as riders were not listening to the closed signs and riding it wet. We hope that with fences and a designated entrance that will have signage and the ability to close when wet or under construction that people will get the drift a little better and stay out of the park when wet.

Now that the building season is over and the outdoor riding season has come and gone most think it would be time to hang the bike up and call it a year or get out a fat bike and hit the snow trails, well I’m doing neither. I have found this little gem of an indoor skate park in Zumbrota Falls, MN about 1 hour south of CG.  The name is Over the Top Skate Park located at the Bluff Valley Camp Ground and the only thing I could ask for would be for it to be closer to home but we have already made 3 trips and plan to make many more but more to come on those trips in future blogs!

Keep it real!