Gravity Logic Update

Burns Lake Mountain Bike Association and Sugarloaf, New Brunswick: Communities Building Shred Momentum

For those of you who don’t live in an area that houses legendary riding (like a lot of places in British Columbia), great shred spots can be few and far between. Gravity Logic spends a lot of time on the road worldwide working with bike parks and bike associations that are comprised of a few really dedicated folks who want the best for their trails and their riding communities. Over the month of June, we’ve been lucky enough to be working on opposite ends of Canada designing and building trails for two very different but equally excited and organized groups of mountain bikers: Burns Lake, British Columbia (where construction of two new full length shuttle trails begins this summer) and Campbellton, New Brunswick (where the Sugarloaf Bike Park opened for business on June 20th).

Burns Lake, BC is located in Northern BC between Prince George and Prince Rupert along Hwy 16. It’s a village of about two thousand people and though it seems small and remote, the Burns Lake Mountain Bike Association has gone to impressive lengths to create a trails system to attract riders to their town. With programs like Sprockids (the number of participants in this program is likely comparable to some of the more successful bike parks like it in the world), an existing trail network that includes the Full Boar shuttle trail and an annual bike festival, Burns Lake is proof that riding communities can be built with a bit of hard work and enthusiasm.

Before getting a riding clinic at the base of the trails network, Sprockids participants hit the trails for some maintenance each week.

After BLMBA packs up the Sprockids clinic at 5:30 on Wednesdays, they all get together to put their own efforts into the existing trails in their network (a lot of work goes into the Full Boar shuttle trail which is definitely one to check out when you’re in town). Every. Single. Wednesday.

Between the enthusiasm BLMBA has in building a riding base within the community and their hard trail work and fund raising, they also work each year to host a bike festival to showcase their trails. This year’s Big Pig Biking Festival runs from August 14-16 and will showcase a 4X race, a downhill race on the Full Boar race course, a jump jam in their bike course and a cross country race. Check out burnslaketrails.ca for more information.

There’s a good chance that when you roll through Burns Lake in the next few months and check out Boer Mountain, you’ll run into the local construction crews and Gravity Logic project managers building the newest additions to the Burns Lake trails system. Stay tuned for some more amazing riding in Northern BC!

Construction of the two new designed trails begins July 2009.

“Campbellton, New Brunswick is beautifully situated on the south bank of the Restigouche River, almost at the point where it meets the sea. The City is an entry point to Atlantic Canada from the Province of Quebec and is also the gateway from New Brunswick and the United States to the Gaspé Peninsula. It is the largest service center in its home county of Restigouche.”

About 3 kilometers outside of Campbellton lay the Sugarloaf Bike Park, which sits humbly in the shadow of Sugarloaf Mountain. It is, in fact, more of a hill than a mountain. At 500 vertical feet it doesn’t tower over anything:

For a period of two months over the past two summers the Gravity Logic crew has been busy transforming a small hill with a smattering of renegade trails into a legitimate east coast riding destination.

Hard work in the open sun.

Constructing the frame for the wall ride.

Sugarloaf opened on June 20th, in the pouring rain, and the diehards were treated to 9 quality trails from old school singletrack with drops, roots and rocks to a perfectly buffed new school jump trail chock full of step-ups, step-downs, tables, and berms. Visitors from Nova Scotia. New Brunswick and Quebec ripped it up and returned on the opening weekend to sample the goods, which are getting better with each passing day. The evolution of Sugarloaf will continue throughout the summer as the Park staff embrace their new playground and enhance the foundation laid by Gravity Logic.

Hitting the wall ride on opening day.

Season’s Pass…$99.00. Poutine in Quebec across the bridge…$5.00. Nailing the wall ride to Step-Over on Sugar Daddy…Priceless.

Stay tuned for more work from Gravity Logic around the world this season…(P.S…construction gets back under way at Winter Park this summer and at the Municipal Bike Park in Kelowna this fall!).

Gravity Logic