MTB Trailcare

What a magic weekend of weather.  It was so nice out in the bush.  Everyone was smiling; walkers, runners, riders, dogs - even roadies racing at the velodrome today were smiling.

Some time ago, QPWS granted us permission to re-route a short section of Brett's that was badly affected by subsoil water in black soil on clay.  It was also a trail line that accentuated the problems of sodden trail with tyre ruts and stall turns in badly drained areas.  

Pics of the taped section for re-routing were posted in a previous trail news - here's one

We had previously worked on the trail leading to this site and part of the process this weekend was to change the way you ride into the newest section.  It has been exciting since the last lot of work, but really bad weather and lots of use have left trail that looks better than it rides.  We prefer the opposite.

This is how things looked after the last work day.  Looks good, but in reality the size of the berm and drains made riders lose confidence and ride conservative lines, leaving ruts, impairing drainage and leading to trail degradation

Note the steep drains and some exposed clay, which can be so solid and fast in the dry, or mushy, rutted and impeding drainage in the wet

Plus a final exit berm on the downhill approach that was too short, in the interest of drainage

As things changed with use, this is what we were left with.  Not good enough by a long way.  A poor entry line with over-dramatic corners, lacking flow the trail deserved.

In the next pic, from above on Saturday evening after our pre-prep, you can start to imagine the left-right-left riders will experience when riding "uphill".  We have not yet made this section of trail.  It requires careful grade dip placement - next Saturday

So, here's how Saturday ended and Sunday morning started

So, we have a re-route, but we had to start by setting the line to that new section and working elsewhere.  

Normally, reducing a berm would be bile in the mouth, but by reducing the sidewall slope of the berm leading into the low section, we could encourage a more relaxed line and entry into the next bermed-turn.  Plus we salvaged soil for the berm we actually had to enlage - the next one.  

One smaller, one bigger - better riding we believe and so did passing riders.  The bigger berm at the bottom is a cool berm.  It rises and descends from each side, like a rainbow.  There's another rainbow in today's work as you will see soon

On Saturday we cut a lot of timber and stored a lot of debris from the fallen trees, leaving this

However, there was still one fallen tree hung-up across the trail that only Doug had the skill to remove.  It was not a simple procedure, but  Doug was UK tree feeling Champion in 1991!  Look carefully in the background and you will see another change....

Ignore all the debris added to soil top-dressed onto the old trail line and enjoy the evolving, new trail and alternate line - a rainbow-shape skinny

This skinny was named 7PL by the crew who helped move it - "7 People Log".  We moved it from it's previous home near the berm, to it's new site in two stages.  It took 100% effort from all, including Michael and Lynn of mtbtrailcare.com and friends from North Vancouver Canada

Coming fast into the bottom berm is now met with a longer berm, turning out higher into the new line - nice

The new line will require stone armouring through the wide, creek crossing.  It is all very boggy terrain with black, organic soil over clay, so we will be back here next Saturday afternoon to do more work

On the other end (closer to the top of Brett's Trail) we were really happy with the subtle changes made to "advertise" the best riding line.  Looks good and rides good too because you can now keep left and ease into the slimmer, upper berm and then flow into the bottom berm.  Being longer, that berm now offers a better exit.  It also makes the double jump into the first berm more obvious...

Hope you enjoy this section of trail, but we would like some help to finish it next Saturday, if you have time

Thanks to Doug and Ash who kept working while I took pics

Louis