Upcoming Events - February/early March


We're hoping that the weather for February is better than it was last year, because there are some significant things for area trails coming up this month and in early March.

-February 4th, Wed. is the regular monthly meeting at the Schlafly Tap Room. If you have a project you'd like to get GORC involved with, then come and talk about it.

-February 7th, Sat. there are 2 workdays, both running from 9am-1pm, so you have your choice of where to go:

Chubb-we will be clearing the river bottom trail of the logs which the recent floods left. We will also be improving the Tyson Creek crossing, which washed out during the Ike storm in September, and rerouting a small section of the trail. Look here for further details.
Indian Camp Creek-we hope to open a new piece of trail after this workday, but it will require a large turnout in order to do so.

-February 28th, Sat. 9am-1pm, Lost Valley- big things here. Pending final approval, there will be a significant amount of new trail added here to replace the section near the bridge on the northwestern side of the trail. More details will be published on the forum as they become available.

-March 7th, Sat. 9am-1pm, Matson Hill- will see us starting Phase One of construction on the new property, in addition to rerouting some unsustainable areas on the existing trail. This is the start of a multi-year project that will see Matson's singletrack triple or quadruple.

As you can see there's a lot going on, and need all the volunteer help we can get. Please consider coming out and helping. Also, look on the forum for information about planned work at Greensfelder which has 3 workdays scheduled this Spring. We're hoping to re-open the DeClue extension after some significant reworking of areas that proved unsustainable.

2008- The Year in Review





It was another busy year for GORC. Despite the challenges presented by Mother Nature, we managed to get a lot done. The Spring workday season was fairly unusual in that we were forced to cancel a number of workdays- 5 out of 12 scheduled. 3 of these were not made up. The weather made it very challenging to build, let alone ride, trails in the area. A lot of time was spent on maintenance, but we still found time for some new projects. Here are some of the highlights from this year:

-Gateway Mountain Bike Patrol is launched.
-Completed 2 new trails (5 & 6) at SIUE.
-Bangert Island opens with 3 miles of new singletrack.
-Creve Coeur Park has 2.15 miles of new singletrack.
-Work is nearly finished on the proof-of-concept skills area at Klondike Park.
-GORC membership reaches an all-time high with 170 paid members.
-Midwest Mountain Bike Festival in Peoria.
-Maintenance of North Trace Creek section of Ozark Trail.
-GORC visits Brown County, Indiana. In addition to being great fun, the quality of the trails there gives us many new design ideas for our own trails.
-Durango Trip
-Burning at the Bluff
-Berryman Epic Race/Tour
-GORC Volunteer Appreciation Party at Greensfelder.
-The Ozark Trail Association is working on the construction of singletrack between the Huzzah Conservation Area and Harmon Spring on the Berryman on the Courtois section of the OT. Once this section, called the Courtois Gap, is complete, it will be nearly all singletrack between Huzzah CA and Hazel Creek Campground. In addition, the OTA shuttle has made it possible to ride some sections of the trail, like the Middle Fork, without having to juggle cars.
-Broemmelsiek and Indian Camp Creek both have new trail sections, and maintenance was done on existing trail.
-Castlewood, Chubb, Greensfelder, and Lost Valley all had maintenance work done.
-The St. Louis Adventure Group has come out in force to help at trail workdays, with their attendance numbers rivalling those of GORC members. Many are even joining GORC and vice-versa, so this distinction between the 2 groups probably won't matter for long.
-All told GORC contributed 3992 hours of volunteer labor this year.

As usual, we have big plans for area trails, and not enough manpower to implement all of them, so if you like what you see on your local trails, please try to make it to a workday or two in 2009. See you on the trails!

GORC & the Bike Swap


Midwest Bicycle Expo and Swap Meet
Hosted by the St. Louis Regional Bicycle Federation
Sunday, January 25, 2009
9:00 a.m. – 3:00 p.m.
Gateway Center
One Gateway Drive
Collinsville, IL 62234

(just 12 minutes from the Arch)


Yes, I know, the bike swap has nothing to do with mountain biking... right?

Wrong.

If you've been wanting a new dirt ride on the cheap or want to find some used (and new) bits for your tricked-out all-rounder then you should be making plans to hit the 2009 Midwest Bike Swap.

Where else are you going to find bike frames for a couple hundred dollars, tires by the box, maybe even a few hot cyclocross bikes (my goal!)... yeah ... Bike Swap.

Our club will be present offering free information, taking memberships, allowing people to sell some things, maybe even hold a raffle... hmm. There's an antique bicycle show, a bike corral to test ride complete bikes and more fun stuff.

See you there.