Freeriders put daring twists on standard mountain biking

Billings Gazette
August 20, 2006

HELENA - There are those who are slaves to our fears and front teeth and those who ride their bikes off 6-foot jumps, over 8-inch skinnies and bank turns at 25 mph. The former are simply called mountain bikers. The latter are known as freeriders.

Ben Hayes has a friendly, crooked smile, a firm handshake and a 2003 Norco Sasquatch downhill mountain bike. He also has a memory lapse of the day before and the day of his crash-landing off a 6-foot jump and a dental record that shows two root canals, also the results of crashing on his bike.

"I'm lucky," said Hayes, who works year-round at the Great Divide Ski Area. "I've never broken any bones. Just a couple of concussions. Nothing very serious. My accidents were normal - they just happen."

Freeriding is a tough sport to define. It involves the fearlessness and imagination of being, say, a 7-year-old with a backyard full of stuff with which to build a sweet obstacle course. It also involves speed, a slope and a bike with enough suspension to soften a hard landing. There are other sports that use the term freeride - skiing, snowboarding and windsurfing - but freeride mountain biking does not have the benefit of snow or water to cushion a fall.

"I'd define freeriding as downhill and dirt-jumping put together with a new breed of mountain biking," said Hayes, 20. "I'd define freeriding as fun. Lots of jumps and drops and gaps and technical trails."

Emmett Purcell, occasional freerider, trails assistant for the Prickly Pear Land Trust and trail adviser to Hayes, describes freeriding this way: "It's about expanding the skills of mountain biking - bringing in the style of BMXing. To some degree, it's the next generation of bikers."

This is also the way the International Mountain Biking Association thinks of it, calling it a variety of mountain biking that "celebrates the challenges and spirit of technical riding and downhilling."

"Young mountain bikers identify with the challenges and spirit of freeriding," the association says on its Web site. "By recognizing and supporting this connection, IMBA will help assure the future of mountain biking."

The North Shore of British Columbia, the X-Games and a Playstation video game take credit for developing this sport. If you've seen photos of people riding their bikes over narrow logs or hurling themselves off gigantic rocks, you've seen freeriding. Those who want to see it in person need only look as far as the ski area near Helena in summer.

Hayes and a league of freeriding volunteers have been building their own freeride trails, according to IMBA specifications, at the Great Divide Ski

Area near Helena. The new trails feature skinnies (narrow logs), ladders (jumps made of logs) and banked turns (think turns on a bobsled course).

Janel Martinez, 19, was one of a handful of volunteers who braved the extreme heat on a recent Sunday to help Hayes out at the Great Divide. She's new to freeriding but is looking forward to the day when she can overcome the obstacles and get to the bottom of the hill still riding upright. Luckily for her and for the rest of us who have to work up a little courage to ride over ladders and skinnies, each stunt has a plan B.

"There are two lines to choose from," Martinez said. "There is the A line, which is the stunt (the obstacle), and there is the B line, which is the easier way around it."

Hayes, who happens to be Martinez's boyfriend, recommends that people who want to try freeriding start little and work their way up to bigger obstacles. And Hayes does plan to have little obstacles for folks to practice on.

"Don't pass your ability too quickly," Hayes said.

The volunteers have been working on two new biking trails that the Mount Belmont lift will access. Hayes describes Kamikaze Warrior, a trail for experts only, as a "steep and fast trail with big drops and a 70-foot-long skinny section." The other new expert trail is called North Woods 2, which he describes as "fast and flowy with banked turns, jumps and gaps."

These trails are in addition to four existing trails: Zig Zag, Meadow Mountain, Rawhide Road Rush and Sunshine and Shade that were built for mere moderate-minded mountain bikers about 10 years ago.

"We ran the lifts every Sunday through the summers from about 1996 to 1999," said Kevin Taylor who operates the Great Divide Ski Area. "It was a good thing and a lot of fun. A beginner ski trail is an expert mountain bike trail."

Depending on the fire season, Taylor plans to bring biking back to the area next month this month. Starting next weekend, the Belmont Chair will run from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m., delivering riders and their bikes to the top of Mount Belmont.

The chair, which will be equipped with special hooks to accommodate bikes, will also run Sept. 2-4, 9-10 and 16-17. Ticket prices are $20 for adults and $12 for kids, or you can pay $99 for a summer season pass. The lodge and bar will also be open.

No worries if you're still riding the bike you bought in college - before suspension, disk brakes and Camelbaks were invented. Even Taylor admits he'll leave the jumps and skinnies to the freeriders.

"I think it's impressive - what they built and what they plan to ride," Taylor said. "I don't have that kind of skill. I am looking forward to riding the existing trails. It's a lot of fun and there's a wide variety of terrain for every mountain biker. And helmets are required."