Cam's Blog: Spring Road Trip

25 Apr 2013

It must be that time of year again! I am on the road visiting all the bike shops promoting the Bike Park, and I am like a kid in a candy shop! All these new shinny bikes lined up ready for purchase and there are so many great platforms to choose from! It seems like almost every company has a great DH bike in their lineup and so many all mountain bikes to select. I don’t think you can make a wrong choice these days. Be thankful for your local shop, with their knowledge, they can help you make those decisions and for the service they provide to take care of that shinny new bike!

We are very excited about the 2013 season at Silver Star Bike Park. The mountain is still experiencing the potential in our wonderful sport and this allows the trail crew to continue to push the Park forward. Improving on what we have, building new trails and venturing out into new areas. The 2013 season will see some major changes in our Park and here are just a few things we have on the plate this year.

First off, one of the things I am very excited about, is the addition of XC trails to Silver Star again for this season. We have a long history of running events at Silver Star and they are not all DH races. We ran a number of XC races from Canada Cups, 24 Hours of Adrenaline and even a World Cup back in the day. Some of those old trails are still out there. Some “local” trails on the Resort have not been pulled into the master plan. All these trails need to be signed, mapped and tweaked. Now keep in mind that some of these are old school XC trails and the direction our bikes have taken, the trails will need to be updated and revitalized to the keep up to our new style of bikes. Not all of them, but some. And we’re going to build some new trails too! I can’t wait to get to work on this new network. However, please keep in mind that it will be a work in progress and it took us a few years to get the Bike Park to where it is today. We will have XC trails open and ready to ride this summer and over the next few years we will have a network that will rival some of the best around. I know, bold statement, it may not be this spring but it is coming! And I get to pedal on the mountain, out of the heat this summer!

We are going to continue the rebuild and upkeep on our original machine built trails. If you rode the mountain last year you may have seen what happened to lower Super Star and lower Challenger. We are going to continue this theme with upper Shazam and upper Super Star. Not the whole trail is going to be effected just the areas that need a little “flow” adjustment. This is what Silver Star Bike Park is famous for and when we are done, the idea is; no breaks, no pedals, lots of smiles.

The brand new sections of trail off the top will be ready to ride early in July, snow pending, opening day. The new Shazam section gives us all another option off the lift. J

We are holding the BC Championships this year for our BC Cup DH Race. Should be a crazy weekend, July 28th! The course was so well received last year it will see very little change. I say that now but once we get going I am sure we will see it tweaked a little. Ha Ha! Stay posted on that.

Trail Crew wants to make a small adjustment to the bottom of Walk the Line. This trail is so fun, but that one section has just a little too much pedaling. If the weather cooperates and we can get in there early… we will make that adjustment. If not we may have to wait until the fall. Fingers crossed. Time for the new trail… Jedi Mind Trick. This is going to be a top to bottom ripper. This is going to be a 3-year build and we are going to build it from the bottom up. The planned feel for this trail is fast, flowing, berm filled, jump fest, where you are not sure it your tires are on the ground or in the air. Where you feel the wind rushing by but not certain if you can feel the dirt under your tires. You will not be sure if you just had a Jedi Mind Trick played on you or did you just ride the best trail of your life?

We have a Cracker Jack crew of builders in our Park, a full returning crew again this summer, so we will see if we can pull this off… I think we can!

All in all we have a lot planned for the Park this summer. This is only a tease of what the crew wants to do. Check back here once we get going and I will try my best to keep you posted on our progress. If I am a little slow with the posts I am sorry, but this is a good thing because this means I am out in the park digging!

Enjoy that new shinny bike!

LaterCam

ABOUT CAM SORENSEN: Cam has been heading up the trail crew at Silver Star since 2005 and has designed the master plan for the bike park trail network that you enjoy today with the help of some of his closest friends and colleagues on trail crew. There is no one that knows this park better because he's built every berm, designed every jump and dreamed up every new trail.