Trail Work Weekend with Cog Wild and Treadwerks

Trail Work Weekend with Cog Wild and Treadwerks in Bend, Oregon

Spend an extended weekend learning essential trail building skills to incorporate into your current trail projects at home. You will learn how to stay creative while satisfying the basic tenants of green, sustainable trail construction. In addition to learning invaluable on-trail skills, you will learn the many steps necessary to take a trail project from its initial planning phases through to finished product. This advanced trail building weekend is also coupled with world class mountain biking in the Cascade Mountains of Central Oregon.

Friday
We will start our weekend by learning how to design sustainable trail. We will discuss how to combine the science of terrain and topography with the artistry of seeing to use terrain to it’s fullest potential. This will include learning how to develop “trail eyes” or trail visioning, install correct trail flagging and GPS marking. This will all take place in the Wanoga Event Area visiting trails in varying states of completion.
We will then move to a completely untouched area planned for trail and have each participant design and flag a fledgling trail corridor section. Once each section has passed the instructors evaluation, we will move on to the important steps to get started on installing trail. We will cover trail building safety and efficiency, proper tool use and maintenance, and how to share your vision with a trail crew.
We will then break for lunch with the plan to meet at the trailhead at 2pm for an afternoon ride starting and ending at Phil’s Trail head. We will end our day at the trail head with soda, brews and snacks reviewing our day and getting ready for Saturday.

Saturday

Our second day will start by roughing out the trail we created on Friday. We will start to contour our new trail with bench cutting, effective filters and signage, passing lanes, rolling grade dips, drainage and analysis of soil types to maximize sustainability. There will be a lot to learn and a lot of work to do, explaining why this will be our longest trail work session. We will be working in another location on Sunday, so we will work on putting in as much trail as possible before stopping for a group walk through of the trail to go over questions and critique the work we have installed.
After we break for lunch our afternoon ride will start right from the classroom/worksite area at Wanoga to ride back to Bend via some of the recently completed trails as well as some more of the classic Central Oregon popular trails. We will inspect several segments of trail both new and old to help with the critical trail evaluation process. Class will end at the trailhead where we met to carpool in the morning.
Note – Today might include some chainsaw work to clear trail. If you’re certified to operate a chainsaw and have all critical safety gear (hard hat, chaps, eye and ear protection, steel toed boots), you can bring your chainsaw with you to use. Please mention this when signing up.

Sunday
Today’s class will focus on when to construct a trail reroute, smart ways to re-vegetate after construction and proper techniques for rock armoring. We will have some hands on time for each subject after learning important details for effective and safe construction. Today will be a shorter day than the last two with a reward of a longer afternoon ride.
Our ride will start with a shuttle to the Mt. Bachelor area at 6200 ft. so we can ride some of the classic high country trails bordering the Three Sisters Wilderness. They’ll be plenty of vista’s, stream crossings, photo op’s and breathtaking descents on our 25 mile descent back to Bend.

Monday
On our last morning of instruction will start with a review of what we have learned before transitioning into mini-workshops on technical trail features, freeride terrain and effective trail work party planning. We will have plenty of time for Q& A about any of the subjects we have covered.
We will end our weekend with a local’s favorite ride from Swampy Lakes Sno-Park back to town. This 16 mile ride will include old double track turned into xc ski trail into new tight and twisty singletrack, dirt jumps and fast and flowy trail. Riding on the trails that have made Bend and Central Oregon a bike mecca is a great way to see what is possible to build. We will end our weekend at 4pm at Phil’s Trailhead with one last gathering before our weekend is finished.