Winnemucca and Battle Mountain, NV: Small Towns, Big Trails

Subaru/IMBA Trail Care Crew leaders visit the BLM in Nevada.

Nat and Rachael's Subie and local volunteers make the climb up the mountain to pose for the camera.
A mining road is reconstructed as a new trail, with swales and undulations to make it more interesting (and shed more water) than the original straight and flat roadbed.
IMBA's Nevada Regional Representative, Dale Beesmer drove from Reno to attend the trailbuilding school and show his support of local communities and the BLM who are making efforts to expand trail opportunities to mountain bikers in Nevada.

In mid-May, Nat and Rachael Lopes visited two BLM districts to work on future trail plans and lead a Trailbuilding school. The two small towns, Winnemucca and Battle Mountain, are surrounded by vast areas of undeveloped BLM. The BLM recreation and trail specialists are beginning to take advantage of this land by planning new trails.

Winnemucca has a nice stacked loop system called the Bloody Shins Trail, which offers a route for beginner, intermediate and advanced mountain bikers. The local BLM district is now looking to design a new trail that would climb the 2,000-feet to the top of Winnemucca Mountain. The Trail Care Crew focused on assisting the BLM to conceptualize a gradually climbing contour trail to the peak.

In the same weekend Nat and Rachael led a Trailbuilding school in the small town of Battle Mountain. Just outside of town the BLM has started a system of singletrack trails that will amount to over 30 miles of trail once it's complete. BLM fire crews and local volunteers attended the school and worked in the field on an unfinished section of trail. The group constructed a 450-foot long section and collectively volunteered 30 hours of time.