Category Archives: Photo album

Photo album: Global Fat Bike Day 2015, Northfield edition

Despite the horribly warm & snowfree winter day, yesterday’s local Global Fat Bike Day ‪#‎GFBD2015 brought out two dozen riders for an afternoon 13-mile group ride around Northfield, culminating with snacks & refreshments at Downtown Bicycles.

Props to CROCT member Christopher Tassava @tassava & Downtown Bicycles owner Tom Bisel for organizing & hosting this event.

CROCT adds a major extension to its MTB trail in Rice County’s Caron Park

Our trail worker volunteers, under the guidance of dirt boss Marty Larson, have added an extension (Loop 2) to our Caron Park MTB trail. It’s now open for riding but since it’s the season of the freeze-thaw cycle, be sure to check the the CROCT conditions Twitter feed @CROCTconditions before you ride.

 

Photo album: National Trails Day & CROCT membership raffle at Caron Park

CROCT National Trails Day 2015 - Caron Park

Over three dozen trail workers (including 15+ kids) showed up at Rice County’s Caron Park on Saturday (National Trails Day) to work on the first segment of a CROCT mountain bike trail there. The weather was gorgeous and the bugs were non-existent. Under the direction of trail steward and CROCT board prez Marty Larson, the crew worked from 9 am to noon.

The results? Amazing!

CROCT loop 1 Caron Park CROCT loop 1 Caron Park CROCT loop 1 Caron Park

We don’t yet know the mileage on the new intermediate-level segment that we’re currently calling Loop 1, but it’s significant and it’s going to be a blast to ride. (If you stay connected via the CROCT Facebook page, Twitter feed, email newsletter, or Google Group discussion list we’ll alert you when the trail officially is open to ride.)

We broke for lunch and beverages at noon. Milltown Cycles in Faribault donated and served the hot dogs, brats and pop. Bauers Southside Liquor in Faribault donated and served a great selection of beer:

CROCT membership picnic 2015 - Caron Park CROCT membership picnic 2015 - Caron Park CROCT membership picnic 2015 - Caron Park

After lunch, we raffled off some swag donated by Milltown Cycles to CROCT members in attendance. John Ebling and Kevin Keane won helmets and Jeff Kreis won a jersey. Four others got 3-packs of cycling socks:

John Ebling - CROCT membership raffle 2015 - Caron Park Jeff Kreis - CROCT membership raffle 2015 - Caron Park Kevin Keane - CROCT membership raffle 2015 - Caron Park

As part of our spring membership drive, all 65+ CROCT members were eligible for the six $75 gift certificates from the three Rice County bike shops: FIT To Be TRI’d, Mike’s Bikes, and Milltown Cycles.

Trail Steward & CROCT President Marty Larson - CROCT membership raffle 2015 - Caron Park

The winners:

  • Jeffery Gunn, Karl Frischkorn ($75 gift certificates from Mike’s Bikes)
  • David Wolf, Sue Benson ($75 gift certificates from Fit To Be Tri’d)
  • Bill Nelson, Jerry Bilek ($75 gift certificates from Milltown Cycles)

It was especially fitting that Sue Benson was a winner and present with her granddaughter. Her family on her father’s side owned the land that became Caron Park.

Sue Benson - CROCT membership raffle 2015 - Caron Park

The album of 40+ photos:  Continue reading Photo album: National Trails Day & CROCT membership raffle at Caron Park

Sechler Park’s MTB trail rerouted away from Sechler Road. It’s now safer and more fun

After witnessing the speed of vehicle traffic on the recently reopened Sechler Road (it’s closed to vehicles during the winter months), the CROCT Board made a quick decision last week to remove the ditch crossing bridge that we installed recently and reroute the trail directly over the creek prior to the gate at the north entrance to the park, keeping riders completely away from the road/pavement.

The creek crossing required a bigger bridge than the one we used for the ditch so the two bridges that a crew of CROCT volunteers fashioned from the wood of the old Mill Towns Trail bridge were put into service:

 

Last Tuesday, CROCT member John Ebling used his tractor to transport the bridges to the shoulder of Sechler Road near the creek crossings:

  

 

On Wednesday, crews of volunteers carried and positioned the bridges over the creeks and carved out a new trail corridor route for the large creek crossing:

Yesterday, another crew  of volunteers did the finishing work (rock and gravel ramps) on the approaches to the bridges:

bridge ramp install 1 bridge ramp install 2

And they added a fun bermed corner that keeps riders away from the old trail segment that crossed the ditch:

 

As the crew was finishing up that berm, they were rewarded by two very appreciative young mountain bikers riding the trail for the first time:

 

(Photos by Carl Arnold, Laura Chihara, and yours truly.)

Among the volunteer trail workers who participated in this project:

Todd Amunrud
Carl Arnold
Jerry Bilek
Jeremy Bokman
Laura Chihara
John Ebling
Jeff Kreis
Sue Healey
Kevin Herman
Ryan Hutchinson
Scott Koehler
Marty Larson
Stew Moyer
Galen Murray
Todd Orjala
John Rubin
Tony Seidl
David Strachan
Jim Wellbrock

From the photos, there is at least one other I don’t recognize who needs to be added to this list. And there may be others I don’t know about. If you participated, contact me and I’ll add your name to the blog post.