Flow Trail Maintenance: Assessing and Maintaining the Chi of your Flow

Dates: Thursday, March 21 (afternoon), Friday, March 22 (8 am - 5 pm)

Cost: $275

Instructor: James Flatten, Singletrack Trails,

workshop DESCRIPTION

A mountain bike flow trail is being constructed every 7 ½ minutes in the United States.  When built well, these trails are incredibly to ride and add incredible value to a trail system or bike park. But what happens when there are design oversights or construction flaws?  What happens after that 100-year, every-year rain storm? What happens after 3 years of trail riders?

What happens is that the Chi of the trall softens- it doesn’t provide that same life ride-enhancing, flowing experience or maybe it doesn’t provide an experience at all because it’s been abandoned. In any case the value and quality of your trail system or bike park has diminished, and it is happening on flow trails the world over.

The Chi of Flow Trails require knowledge and practice. Engage with a leader in the industry to mindfully, yet with intent, put the focus of the trail back on the roller into the berm.  After this session, you will hop away a grasshopper that has the knowledge to focus on the longevity of flow.

Learning Objectives

1. Understand the concept of an all-levels flow trail.

2. Identify the root causes and effects of flow trail degradation.

3. Utilize minimum resource impacts to plan and perform lasting maintenance.

WORKSHOP AGENDA

Day 1: Field Classroom and Field Work: as a small group, we will walk and assess an existing trail for maintenance needs.  Then we will work together to accomplish the maintenance as we learn and collaborate through the day.

Day 2: Field Work Session and Assessment of second trail

WHAT TO BRING

Gear (clothing, footwear, water, food, sunscreen) to spend the day in the desert- it may be searing or snowing . Though your maintenance techniques will be made in the shade after you attend this conference, there is not much shade in the desert.

INSTRUCTORS

Chi Master James Flatten joined the Singletrack Trails crew in 2007. As the Chief Trail Supervisor, he is now responsible to ensure that projects are completed on time and exceed expectations. His career as a dirt shaper was packed into prominence as the Lead Course Designer and Chief Builder for the Ranchstyle Mountain Bike Festival near Grand Junction, Colorado. Under James’ tutelage and sculpting, the event became a Silver Level Freeride Mountain Bike Tour event in 2010. Building competition courses for the 1% of mountain bikers and extrapolating that knowledge to build dirt jumps, pump tracks, and flow trails for the 95% is James’ special talent. He has been adding the “free” to freeride trails since 2002, and when he is the master dirt shaper, everyone’s Chi is enhanced.

Turns for the Better: An Introduction to Climbing Turns & Switchbacks

Dates: Thursday, March 21 (afternoon), Friday, March 22 (8 am - 5 pm), and Saturday, March 23 (morning)
Cost: $325
Instructors: Christine Byl and Gabe Travis, Interior Trails, PTBA Member

DESCRIPTION

When sited, laid out and built well, turns can be the highlight of a trail, providing aesthetics and flow. But they are often sited poorly, laid out wrong, and built without proper attention to grade, drainage and geometry. In this class we'll discuss turns as control points in the design process. We'll lay out switchbacks, and slope grade and entrenched climbing turns. Using basic layout tools, learn how to make your turns beautiful, low-maintenance and FUN.

Learning Objectives

1. Understand turn geometry

2. Use turn locations as control points

3. Site and lay out turns correctly for construction

WORKSHOP AGENDA

Day 1: Half day: Discussion of layout principles & turns, including slides, diagrams, tables, photos, & hands-on exercises.

Day 2: Field Exercises: in small groups, get comfortable with layout tools and how siting turns fits into the design process. Practice laying out and staking turns in a variety of settings. Lots of on-site discussion as well as hands-on instruction for folks at all levels of experience.

Day 3: Half Day: Field Exercises & Assessment

WHAT TO BRING

Appropriate field gear for the weather. Expect to be outside on Day 2 & 3. We are in Colorado in March - please prepare for the unpredictable weather.

INSTRUCTORS

Christine Byl & Gabe Travis, co-owners of Interior Trails, have been building trails for more than 20 years. After 12 years working on federal trail crews in Glacier NP, Chugach NF and Denali NP, in 2008 they founded Interior Trails, specializing in sustainable trail design, layout, construction, consulting and training in Alaska. Christine & Gabe have layout and design to clients from across the country. They live on a few acres of tundra north of Denali National Park and spends as much time as possible in wild places by foot, bike, ski, boat and dog. For more information on Interior Trails, visit www.interior-trails.com.

Customized Trail Design Workshop (Post-Conference)

Dates: Friday, March 22 and Saturday, March 23 (8 am - 5 pm)
Cost: $380
Instructor: Troy Scott Parker, Natureshape LLC (PTBA Member)

NOTE: This workshop is offered as a pre-conference workshop as well

workshop description

This hands-on, small group workshop is the next best thing to a custom trail design workshop on your own site. We'll be in the field for all of both days; NO classroom time. Emphasis is on: 

• identifying problems and generating context-appropriate solutions

• optimizing trails and sites

• learning to work with trails as seasoned trail experts do, i.e., intuitively, structurally, and aesthetically at the same time

• shaping lively, wonderful, fun, and sustainable natural surface trails for any type of use you want to work with (hike, bike, horse, accessible, OHV, etc.)

The workshop is based on trailshaping and 30+ years of thought. Trailshaping is a self-structuring framework for expert-level decision making that makes trail experts smarter and that novices can quickly learn and use. It leads us to look for what matters most with any trail, for what most potently shapes it within its own unique context. It integrates intuition (our sense of what’s “just right” and what isn’t), logic, feelings, the site, aesthetics, nature, the user’s trail experience, user psychology, all physical aspects (soils, water, materials, drainage, stability, etc.), impacts of trail use, trail sustainability, trail structures, and all trail planning, design, construction, maintenance, and management issues within a context-appropriate framework. The framework grows itself, almost effortlessly, from the specific forces that most potently shape all trails. With it, we can understand, explain (in natural language), predict, and assess any existing or proposed trail.

Note: In addition to field days, you’re invited to meet with the instructor indoors during the evening before the first day and the evenings of both field days to discuss your own projects and interests in greater depth.

What to bring

Bring your hiking boots, imagination, an open mind, and photos and topo maps of your trail challenges, opportunities, and successes. 

About the Instructor

Troy Scott Parker, Principal of Natureshape LLC, a trail planning and education firm and PTBA member; developer of trailshaping; and author of Natural Surface Trails by Design: Physical and Human Design Essentials of Sustainable, Enjoyable Trails

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Workshop includes a copy of the instructor’s book, Natural Surface Trails by Design: Physical and Human Design Essentials of Sustainable, Enjoyable Trails. (If you’ve already read it, this workshop goes much further.)