Tag: <span>Lori Hauswirth</span>

Last Thursday and Friday, I attended the IMBA Midwest Fat Bike Access & Grooming Workshop in Cable WI, a gathering of practitioners devoted to improving off-road cycling and fat biking in winter.

QBP  MORC logo 200 IMBA CAMBA
The event was sponsored by QBP and hosted by Minnesota Off-Road Cyclists (MORC), International Mountain Bicycling Association (IMBA), and the Chequamegon Area Mountain Bike Association (CAMBA).

John GaddoDSC06075  Cold Rolled

Following a late Thursday afternoon/evening fat bike ride by approximately 15- 20 riders on the newly groomed Esker trail in the CAMBA trail system’s Cable cluster, participants gathered for the opening reception at the Lakewoods Resort. QBP’s John Gaddo showed Cold Rolled, the  documentary by Clear & Cold Cinema featuring the 15-mile winter singletrack Snow Bike Route (SBR) that’s part of the Noquemanon Trails Network in Marquette, Michigan.

Events Photo album

Last June I attended my first regional IMBA Summit, held in Crosby, MN near the Cuyuna Lakes Mountain Bike Trail System. It was titled the 2nd Annual Great Lakes Summit.

This year, it was titled the IMBA Upper Midwest Regional Summit and it was hosted in Cable, WI, in the middle of the Chequamegon Area Mountain Bike Association (CAMBA)’s off-road bike trail system.

IMBA Upper Midwest gang, ready to ride Seeley Pass Trail Sawmill Saloon IMBA Upper Midwest gang at Sawmill Saloon Ron Bergin, Steve Morales
After the IMBA Upper Midwest Regional Leadership Advisory Council meeting on Friday afternoon (I didn’t attend), a group of us got in a 10-mile ride on CAMBA’s Seeley Pass Trail from the HWY 00 Trail Head. I was indeed “superb rolling, flowy singletrack.” We then made our way to the Sawmill Saloon in Seeley for refreshments and dinner and where I got a chance to chat with a couple of fellow geezers that I’d met briefly on the ride, CAMBA’s Executive Director Ron Bergin and longtime CAMBA trail coordinator/volunteer Steve Morales.

Hansi Johnson opens 2013 IMBA Upper Midwest Summit Hansi Johnson opens 2013 IMBA Upper Midwest Summit 2013 IMBA Upper Midwest Summit 2013 IMBA Upper Midwest Summit
IMBA’s Midwest Regional Director Hansi Johnson opened the Summit on Saturday morning at the Cable Community Centre, thanking the 35+ attendees for coming and citing examples of regional cooperation in the past year (e.g., teaming up on get-out-the-vote efforts for the Bell-Built Grant competition).

Adam Harju, Superior Cycling Association (SCA) Kit Grayson, Cyclists of Gitchee Gumee Shores (COGGS) Aaron Hautala, Cuyuna Lakes Mountain Bike Trails (CLMTBT) Mark Fisk, Woolly Bike Club (W/B/C)

Reed Smidt, Minnesota Off-Road Cyclists (MORC) Scott Sherman, Winona Area Mountain Bikers (WAMB) Ron Bergin, Chequamegon Area Mountain Bike Association (CAMBA) Jereme Rauckman, Chippewa Off Road Bike Association (CORBA)

Matt Block, Central Wisconsin Offroad Cycling Coalition (CWOCC) ?, Capital Off-Road Pathfinders (CORP) Aaron Rogers, Copper Harbor Trails Club (CHTC) Stephen Schmidt, Iowa Trail Bombers (ITB) Robert Peters, Southern Keweenaw (SöKē)
Representatives of the Upper Midwest IMBA chapters at the Summit (there are over 20) then each gave short summaries of their chapter’s activities and accomplishments in the past year, as well as their plans for the upcoming year.  In a follow-up email, MORC Board Secretary Susannah King captured my sentiments:

It was helpful to see so many other clubs working toward a common goal, dealing with similar (and different) successes and challenges that we do.

 Jeremy Fancher, IMBA Director of Public Affairs Aaron M. Smith DSC01219
IMBA Director of Public Affairs Jeremy Fancher (with support from colleague Aaron M. Smith) presented on the legal ins and outs of IMBA Chapters having  MOU’s, partnership agreements, contracts, etc. with land managers/owners.  Several Chapter board members I talked to afterwards seemed grateful, worried, and motivated to roll up their sleeves upon returning home to delve deeper into their land manager agreements and do what needs to be done to make them better.

John Gaddo, QBP Reed Smidt, MORC
John Gaddo from QBP gave an overview of the rapidly growing fat bike market (expected to double in the next two years). In the Western US, there’s a push with land managers to allow fat bikes to share the use of cross country ski and snowmobile trails for touring-type riding in the winter. But here in the Midwest, he felt it’s far better for Chapters to focusing on grooming some of their singletrack for both fat bikes and regular mountain bikes; hence, a good chunk of his presentation was about the variety of snow grooming techniques and equipment being used in the area. Reed Smidt, president of MORC, gave details on their grooming experiences in the past few years.

Adam Sundberg, COGGS Kit Grayson, COGGS Lori Hauswirth, Copper Harbor Trails Club Aaron Rogers, Copper Harbor Trails Club (CHTC)
The session on fundraising featured Adam Sundberg and Kit Grayson from COGGS and Lori Hauswirth and Aaron Rogers from the Copper Harbor Trails Club.

COGGS has learned 1) how to leverage small grants into a series of ever-larger grants; and 2) that face-to-face, ongoing contact with the grantee organization is critically important, ie, it’s not enough to just submit the application. They’ve also learned that 1) its annual Gala allows them to reach out to a segment of the Duluth population that doesn’t mountain bike but who believes in its importance to the area. Attendees include community leaders and the more financially well-off; 2) it’s best to have auction items have wide appeal rather than being mtb-related (eg, vacation packages, restaurant deals, etc); and 3) the committee in charge of the Gala works on it for the entire year.

Copper Harbor has learned 1) how to scale the value of its sponsorships from local business owners; and 2) how to conduct a raffle with large ticket items (2013 raffle: $6,000 camping trailer, $4,400 Trek, etc).

Leslie Kehmeier, IMBA Mapping Specialist MTBProject.com
IMBA Mapping Specialist Leslie Kehmeier presented on their new partnership with MTB Project which this IMBA page describes as

a next-generation mountain bike guide and trail map web site. This robust platform for online mapping displays the known trails in any given area, complete with elevation profiles, full GPS routes, photos, detailed ride info and more.

They’ve just added a feature that I think will create an incentive for Chapters to participate/contribute: once a trail has been mapped, embed code for it can be put on a Chapter’s own website. The quality of the mapping is not something that a Chapter could easily do on its own, so this a pretty big deal IMHO.

Leslie blogs about the project at IMBA.com. See all the IMBA blog posts in the Mapping Category, including her recent blog post, Understanding “rides and trails” on MTBproject.com:

If you’ve visited the MTB Project website you may have noticed two categories: “rides” and “trails.” Some have wondered what the difference might be — one doesn’t exist without the other, right?

Ron Bergin IMBA Upper Midwest gang, ready to ride new trail on Camp 38 rd, with Katie Johnson and Bonnie Finnerty
CAMBA Executive Director Ron Bergin led the group ride after the Summit was over. I took one photo as riders were getting ready to depart but the vicious mosquitoes created a strong incentive to keep it in my hydration pack thereafter.  His description of the new (built last summer) cross country flow trail:

5 miles of fast riding, open & flowing with dozens of bermed turns plus two super-fun gravity features and a 180-foot log ride. Start from our newest trailhead on Camp 38 Rd. – so new there are hardly any signs yet.

CAMBA log skinny - photo by Scott Anderson CAMBA gravity cavity - photo by Scott Anderson IMBA Upper Midwest gang at the Rivers Eatery in Cable, WI
I found some photos of this new trail in the CAMBA Trails Flickr group including the two above by Scott Anderson of that 180-foot log skinny (which can be ridden backwards) and the roller coaster Gravity Cavity section (which can be ridden repeatedly in a loop). These two photos are small thumbnail-sized screenshots that are linked to Scott’s originals. Be sure to click through to see them. After Saturday’s ride, we gathered for refreshments and stone oven pizza at the Rivers Eatery in Cable.

CAMBA Rock Lake Trail - MTB Project Rock Lake Wall Street section CAMBA No Hands Bridge
On Sunday, some did the 27-mile Rock Lake IMBA Epic ride and others, including me, just the 12-mile Rock Lake trail (click here to see the difference between a ‘ride’ and a ‘trail’). Most notable for me was 1) the steep rocky downhill section called Wall Street; and 2) the No Hands Bridge (I used both hands and road the angled cut board). The above right photo is from this blog post about the entire Rock Lake trail by someone named rlove2bike.

Here’s the information and live MTBProject.com map (using their embed code) for the Rock Lake Trail:

All in all, ’twas a memorable weekend of great weather, good information, tasty food, excellent microbrews, and exhilarating riding, all stitched together with friends new and old.  Saaaaaweeeet.

Advocacy Organizations Trails

Griff Wigley, Aaron Rogers, Karl Erbach, Hansi Johnson Lori Hauswirth, Hansi Johnson, Aaron Rogers, Mike Brunet, Lyle VanderSchaaf Jay and Claire
During last week’s Ride the Keweenaw, Copper Harbor’s restaurants provided opportunities to do some scheming about IMBA’s Upper Midwest region (Facebook page).

Left photo: Friday night dinner at the Harbor Haus with Aaron Rogers, Karl Erbach, and Hansi Johnson.

Center: Monday morning breakfast at the Pines Restaurant with (L to R) with Lori Hauswirth, Hansi Johnson, Aaron Rogers, Mike Brunet, and Lyle VanderSchaaf.

Right: The conversation at times turned to mountain bike tourism for the Upper Midwest region, as epitomized by Jay and Claire, two college students visiting Copper Harbor from Vermont. They were traveling to Montana, trying to visit as many mountain bike parks as possible on their way. For their next stops after Copper, I told them that the sequence (heading west) would be to ride CAMBA, Spirit Mountain, COGGS, and then Cuyuna. Alas, due to the wet and cold spring, only Cuyuna would work for this trip.

People

BBQ fundraiser: Ride the Keweenaw BBQ fundraiser: Ride the Keweenaw BBQ fundraiser: Ride the Keweenaw
When the mountain biking was over on the Sunday of the Ride the Keweenaw weekend, the festivities in Copper Harbor park ramped up.  Many dozens lined up for the $25/person BBQ fundraiser while…

DSC00493 DSC00505 DSC00510
an excellent rock band, a GoPro-equipped quadcopter, and a, um, enthusiastic dancer provided entertainment. (Just in case you’re looking for the top quadcopters under 100 bucks – check out more reviews here.)

Lianna Miller, Lori Hauswirth, Bill Marlor DSC00495 DSC00496
Lianna Miller, Lori Hauswirth and Bill Marlor from the Copper Harbor Trails Club began selling tickets for their big 2013 raffle (drawing is Sept 1).

Fellow mountain bike geezers from Ishpheming, MI Dave Markman, Tony Schwenn Griff Wigley, Oliver Cooper
Left: It’s always good to see some fellow graying geezers on the trails and at the party. These guys were from Ishpheming, MI
Center: Hollywood Dave Markman and CHTC Board Member Tony Schwenn provided security
Right: He doesn’t know it yet but MTU student and hot shot mountain biker Oliver Cooper is going to be my coach next time I’m back up there.

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As the sun went down, the dancing cranked up. A fitting end to a memorable event.

Events People

Lori Hauswirth, Caleb Wendel, Hansi JohnsonI arrived in Houghton yesterday afternoon, all psyched for this weekend’s Ride the Keweenaw.

First stop: The Bike Shop in downtown Houghton where IMBA’s Midwest Regional Director Hansi Johnson, Lori Hauswirth, Executive Director of the Copper Harbor Trails Club and I paid our respects to co-owner Caleb Wendel. (I first met Caleb at Ray’s Indoor Bike Park in Milwaukee back in Feb. when he took a video of me riding the hamster wheel.)

The Bike Shop, Houghton, MI The Bike Shop, Houghton, MI The Bike Shop, Houghton, MI
The Bike Shop (and companion boardshop Rhythm) has expanded this year from the basement to the entire first floor and mezzanine. It’s huge and classy. I’m likely to spend some money there today.

Businesses

Rhett Williams Bell-Built
This is the story of what Minnesota Off-Road Cyclists (MORC)/IMBA member Rhett Williams did to rally the troops last week for the Bell Built mountain bike trail-building grants competition. (See my earlier blog post Vote Midwest in the Bell Built mountain bike trail building grants competition for more details on the contest.)

A couple weeks ago, it occurred to me that organizing get-out-the-vote parties might be another way to inspire Midwest mountain bikers to get their non-mountain biking friends and family to vote. The idea was to replicate what get-out-the-vote organizers do when D-Day approaches and the hard/tedious work of stuffing envelopes, making phone calls, and sending emails has to be done: 1) They get the volunteers together in one room and make it a fun and social event; and 2) They urge the volunteers to make one-to-one contact with potential voters.

I pitched the idea privately to some local mountain bike leaders and advocates and got encouragement to go for it.  I put together this video/screencast that explained the idea and with the help of IMBA Midwest Regional Director Hansi Johnson, emailed a link to it to IMBA club/chapter leaders in the Midwest:

I got a small team of people to volunteer to help me but when everyone got so busy with their other duties, I had to concede that the idea was too much and too late. MORC board member Jay Thompson asked me to create a how-to-vote video (YouTube link here) but basically, I gave up.

But then last Monday I saw this comment by Rhett Williams in the MORC forum message thread about the Bell Built competition. Rhett wrote:

Copper Harbor Trails is hosting a voting party…. Griff they found out your idea

Lori Hauswirth 2013-04-10_18-51-52_452-1000w 10111_10151442970258533_127315950_n
Sure enough, Lori Hauswirth and friends from the Copper Harbor Trails Club hosted a get-out-the-vote party in Houghton, MI on Wednesday night.

When I posted a couple of photos from the event in the MORC forum, Rhett wrote:

Rhett WilliamsI recognize some of those people… people will come when you have half a barrel of beer lol Hopefully this helps the midwest!!! On facebook it said 40+ people were going.

The only places i can think of up here that would be good meeting places are, bike shops, the legion, bars in anoka or an ice arena meeting room… but the ice arena costs money

Although i work at the coon rapids ice arena and we have a few rooms we could use. I work tomorrow and can call today and ask if i could get a deal or just use the rooms if people will come.

Chance Glasford
MORC board member Chance Glasford chimed in:

well ask a bike shop or a coffee shop or the legion and make it happen Rhett! time is a ticking!

RHETT:

If i can, my arena has wifi and coffee, get a room, i need to know that people will come. I can have tables chairs wifi coffee. If MORC reserves the room (if i cant get it with a deal) will be either $25 or $40 if you want both party rooms. It would be ideal to have at least 5 people to show up, and i will stop by and help when im on my break. I need to know asap if we are going to use this venue. I dont know of a big enough place with wifi around here.

ME:

Rhett, probably the best thing to do is what Copper Harbor did: create a Facebook event on the Elm Creek Facebook page with the time/date/venue info and then start alerting everyone to that event so that they can indicate ‘going – maybe – no.’ (You have to be an admin of the page to do that.)  Then the admins who run the MORC and other Twin Cities’ area MTB pages can promo the event on their FB walls.  I think a coffeehouse or pub would be best because then there’s a stronger socializing element, whereas ‘come to the conference room at the arena’ isn’t quite as compelling. But at this late date, whatever works!

RHETT:

Im just trying to think of places where theres wifi and that are social… we dont have much up her like this… look at maple grove for somewhere to meet. If no one finds anywhere let me know. Should i make a facebook event and make you guys admins so we can change times and places…. mike loerzel said if we get a room he could bring subway to help make it a party

CHANCE:

do what you have to do! Griff can you help Rhett out at all with this?

RHETT:

Thanks chance, any help will help, im at school til 830 tonight. I will set things up online, if we dont have a place by 7-8 tonight i think i can still set up a room… we arent that busy tomorrow i think so we will have room and time to do all this

CHANCE:

see if they will donate the room since it is for a non-profit organization and if it is not being used it should be a big deal. definitely put it on blast whatever you are doing…. time place and all that f/b group would be good

RHETT:

Yea i think i can get the room and i can provide some drinks (non alcohol) and if people bring some food or snacks i also can do popcorn…. bring laptops and ill get it set up if we get a good amount of people… i know of 3 so far

CHANCE:

make the facebook page and get it out there i will put it up on all the pages I manage

RHETT:

Alright i will at 4 once my class is done, then post it on everything and make guys admins. I got a room no charge… i need times now

ME:

Rhett, I just spoke with Jay Thompson who’s the admin of the Elm Creek Facebook page. He’s going to make me an admin so I’ll create the event page for this.  Can you phone/text me asap at 507-319-5541?

[and then an hour later:] Okay, after a flurry of text and Facebook messages with Rhett Williams and Jay Thompson, we’re set: Dunn Bros Provision Bakery Cafe in Anoka tomorrow night, 6-9 pm/ Let us know if you can come via the event page.

And on Friday night, we gathered. See the large slideshow of a dozen photos (recommended) or SLOW CLICK this small slideshow:

I’ve also uploaded these photos to an album on the Elm Creek Singletrack Facebook page where I’ve tagged faces and added some descriptive text.

Did the effort help? Earlier in the evening, we were behind Colorado’s Bear River Bike Park in the voting by 1%. By the end, we were tied at 39% each. We like to think we made a difference but of course, there’s no way to know.

Are there lessons to be learned? Maybe.

  • In this age of social media, photos of bike advocates in action do matter. The photos of the Copper Harbor crew’s party were definitely an inspiration.
  • Leadership doesn’t come only from leaders. 18-year old Rhett Williams saw a need and took charge.
  • Online networks can facilitate organizing in ways that are otherwise difficult to do. This would not have happened without the MORC forum and Facebook.
  • The hard work of advocacy can be both satisfying and fun. If Elm Creek Bike Park doesn’t win next week, we can still savor the week’s experience.  And if it does win, I have a hunch that another party will be in the works.

Advocacy Photo album

Last fall, Bell Helmets and IMBA announced the Bell Built Trail Building Grants and the 12 finalists were named earlier this year.

Bell Helmets is providing $100,000 to fund three, mountain bike trail projects, one each in the categories of bike park/pump track, flow trail and downhill/gravity trail. Out of the 12 selected as finalists, the public will have the opportunity to vote for their favorite project in each category on Bell’s Facebook page, beginning March 5.

Bell BuiltThree Midwest parks are finalists in three separate categories:

Pump tracks/bike parks

  • Elm Creek Bike Park: Minnesota Off-Road Cyclists, Maple Grove, MN

Flow trails

  • Hobbs Hollow Flow Trail: Hoosier Mountain Biking Association, Brown County, IN

Downhill trails

  • Overflow Trail: Copper Harbor Trails Club, Copper Harbor, MI

The big push here in the Upper Midwest and Great Lakes regions has been to vote for all three Midwest parks (you can only vote once in each category). The deadline is this Friday, April 12.

Copper Harbor Trails Club at Wheel & Sprocket's Bike Expo Sale Copper Harbor Trails Club at Wheel & Sprocket's Bike Expo Sale Copper Harbor Trails Club at Wheel & Sprocket's Bike Expo Sale
Last weekend, Aaron Rogers and Lori Hauswirth from the Copper Harbor Trails Club had a booth at Wheel & Sprocket’s Bike Expo Sale in Milwaukee where they cajoled passersby into logging into their Facebook accounts to vote. Very cool.

I’ve been doing a little work behind the scenes on this because A) Elm Creek is in the Twin Cities, about an hour away my hometown of Northfield; B) I’m a member of MORC; C) my riding ability has improved immensely because of the Eagan pump track so having more bike parks around is great for the sport; and D) I expect to be making frequent trips to Copper Harbor to take advantage of their downhill trails.

Because the Bell Built Facebook voting process can be a little cumbersome, I created this 3-minute how-to video/screencast:

httpv://youtu.be/j5S-1y8g3z8

So don’t delay. Vote now for:

  • Elm Creek Bike Park/Maple Grove, MN in the Pump Track Category
  • Overflow Trail/Copper Harbor, MI in the Downhill Category
  • Hobbs Hollow/Brown County, IN in the Flow Trail category

We Midwest / Great Lakes mountain bikers would appreciate it.

And now that I’ve blogged about this, I’m going to nag, harass, and bother my non-mountain bike Facebook friends into voting. My message:

As you probably know, I’ve fallen in love with mountain biking the past two years. (You can read more than you’ll ever want to know on my blog, Mountain Bike Geezer.)

Right now, three Midwest mountain bike trails have a great opportunity to win a large grant from the Bell Helmet company. Most area mountain bikers on Facebook have already voted but because you can only vote once, it is critical to get our non-mountain biking Facebook friends to vote. Which is why I’m harassing you!

Step 1 (optional): See my short YouTube video on how to vote.

Step 2: Go to the Bell Built Facebook page and vote for:

* Elm Creek Bike Park/Maple Grove, MN in the Pump Track Category

* Overflow Trail/Copper Harbor, MI in the Downhill Category

* Hobbs Hollow/Brown County, IN in the Flow Trail category

If you vote, come on back here and ‘like’ this post and I’ll find a way to thank you.

Advocacy