Letters

IMBA Trail News
Volume 13, Number 5
Winter 2000

In War-Ravaged Yugoslavia, Mountain Biking Endures

Yugoslavia is definitely not cycling friendly. When people see you riding a bike most of them think that you don't have money for gas or that you don't have a car. Drivers behave like you don't exist, police officers ignore you and most of the towns don't have cycling friendly roads. It's a different story when you are out in nature though. Most of our mountains and woods are still wild - you can ride a bike near downtown Belgrade and feel like you are in the middle of nowhere.

Once a year there is a mountain bike marathon called Frushkogorski. People come from all over Yugoslavia to participate in this 80 km ride. The route of the marathon had to be changed last year because of unexploded bombs along the old route. This year during the ride I was speeding down the road when I came to a bomb hole 12 meters deep and six meters wide. I was thankful my brakes didn't betray me.

One of the best traditional places for riding in Yugoslavia is a mountain and ski center called Kopaonik. Kopaonik is a 7,000-foot mountain between Serbia and Kosovo. The border of the two countries runs along the top of the mountain. This week while riding to the top a NATO chopper landed to send us back down - on the summit was a bombed-out military base with active explosives. While riding back down a singletrack trail we came to a sign saying "DANGER! KEEP OUT! MINES!"

Mountain biking is one of the fastest-growing sports in my country. Last year there were around 60 racers; today there are more than 100. There are no professional MTB riders in Yugoslavia and there are no sponsors so riders have to search hard to find equipment to ride on.

Damir Andric
Pancevo, Yugoslavia

IMBA's core work does not generally entail assisting cyclists in war-torn nations. Spurred by this letter, however, IMBA staffers recently led a push in the bike industry to acquire bike parts to keep Damir and friends rolling. Thanks to Patagonia, RockShox, QBP and Shimano for their contributions to this effort.

Trail Care in Carolina

This past weekend I had the pleasure of hosting Jen and Rich Edwards here in South Carolina. It was great working, riding, and just generally hanging out with them. The weekend was very productive: we looked at ongoing projects at Hickory Knob State Park and the Long Cane Horse Trail in Sumter National Forest. They offered a lot of good insight and input, and we flagged in re-routes at both locations. We rode the trails at Baker Creek State Park where we have recently done some fairly lengthy re-routes to get the trail off the fall line, and also looked at a number of bridges on the Wine Creek trail that we are going to be repairing/replacing in the near future. A busy weekend. The Trail Care Crew program is a great one.

Michael Burton