Massanutten Bike Park!
This past Sunday, I was given the opportunity for a "last-hoorah" day of riding at the brand new Massanutten Mountain Bike Park. As I hadn't been able to get out to it since the park opened in July, I was super stoked to hit these trails!
All of the advanced trails are accessed by lifts to the top of the mountain. It was quite enjoyable in almost 80 degree weather with sunny skies and the leaves peaking to their best color!
Views from the lift
Being new to the downhill park scene, I took my time down the first few runs of both Creamy and Crunchy. There are 4 advanced trails there right now; World Cup and All or Nutten are definitely the higher-tech trails, while Creamy and Crunchy give the options of jumping or working on super tight 180-berms with a few rocky sections scattered throughout. I opted out of doing the other two trails for the day as I was feeling a bit rusty (pretty much hadn't touched my mountain bike since the Shenandoah Mountain 100) and didn't feel like risking injury. I was also having a blast just working on improving each of my runs down those 2 trails!
Ryan and Adam both joined for the day, and we also got to ride with Lindsey (she works at the park) for a bit. It was awesome to see so many people we knew from town or other bike events out there! One woman who was visiting the resort to see the beautiful leaves even asked, "Why are there so many bikers?! Are you all part of a club or something?" This interaction was taking place while we were passing each other on the lift, so my only response could be "Yeah! We're part of this bike coalition in Harrisonburg!"
View from the very tippy-top of Massanutten
The energy throughout the day was happy and chill. I never felt pressure to push myself into anything I would be super uncomfortable with, but also felt comfortable enough to push my usual boundaries. By the end of the day, catching air and speeding down the trails and through those tight berms was less scary and more fun.
We were there ALL day. By 4:15pm Ryan and I called it quits. Our quads were tired and our index fingers/hands were starting to give out on us. With 9 runs in for us and 11 runs for Adam, I would definitely called it a successful day. It was also great to test out how my new Stumpjumper Pro Carbon 29 would perform on park trails - oh my gosh this bike was a party!
The bike park season is closing now, so it was nice to be able to finish it off on such a beautiful day. I'm already looking forward to when it opens next year! Can't wait to get that season pass! :)
-Kelly