This is not just a tee shirt. At Over The Edge Sports it's our mantra. Every one of us lives and breaths riding bikes, especially mountain bikes. The thing about mountain bikes though is that you need trails to ride them on. You may think we are spoiled here in the land of singletrack goodness, but we haven't had much trail building in the North Fruita Desert for almost 15 years. But that will soon change...
A small group of us, and some receptive folks at the Bureau of Land Management, have been meeting almost monthly for the last two years in an effort to finally get the ball rolling for construction of new trails in the North Fruita Desert, AKA 18Rd. We've created a website, spent countless hours bugging manufactures for donations, written grants, blown up Face Book, made posters, passed out posters, planned events and the list goes on and on. All while working our "real jobs." Don't take this as complaining. If by the end of April I'm carving corners on new single track it will all be worth it.
To kick off this major fundraising effort we started with a celebration of every mountain biker's favorite holiday. St. Patty's day? Nope! We were celebrating the time change! More light in the evening, and more light on our handlebars thanks to Baja Designs Mountain Bike Light Systems, who was my title sponsor for "Celebrate the Light," the kick off event for "Forty Days for Fruita Trails."
We started with a night ride at 18Rd, stopping to talk about where new trails will be and what they will be like.
And then we surfed the North Fruita Desert knowing that burgers and beer were waiting back at the shop.
I hope everyone who's considering the purchase of a bike light this year considers Baja Designs first. They support the trails we ride our bikes on. Check out their lights here...
http://www.bajadesigns.com/Products/bicycle/Strykr_and_Double_Stryk_bicycle_lights or buy them from Over The Edge, thus supporting TWO businesses that support your trails.
Rad Ross zips down Zippity Doo Dah with plenty of lumens to light his way.
Earlier in the day, Max and I had went to Center Town Liquor's to buy beer for the evenings events. They happily gave us a fat discount so when you are in Fruita and need some drink, look them up. It occurred to me while buying two full shopping carts of beer that I was living a dream. In highschool...errr, I mean college... we longed for such a scenario. Of course back then a case of Natty Light was pretty sweet, but there was none of that in those carts.
We arrived back at the shop with a full blown party happening, burgers and dogs on the grill paid for by Aspen Street Coffee shop, and a donation jar positively bulging with cash.
"Celebrate the Light" was just the start. If you missed it don't worry. More events are on the way from The Hot Tomato Cafe and other businesses that want more trails, not because it effects their bottom line, but because their mantra is the same as ours. "RIDE! It's what we do!" Go to
www.fruitasingletrack.com for all the info you'll need to join us in building the next generation of Fruita trails.
