The Arvest Foundation donated $10,000 to Friends of the Parks for the construction of a pump track that will add to the Northwoods Trails System and provide mountain bikers with another feature to use in Hot Springs.
The pump track will be built at Cedar Glades Park and help mountain bikers learn to use the suspension of their bike while also preparing them for downhill flow trails. Flow trails have many different features including rollers, table tops, step-up and downs and hip jumps.
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"Riders ride those in one direction," Northwoods Trails Coordinator Traci Berry said. "You can't go up on these trails. There's riders coming down really fast on them and they're hitting features, jumps and rollers and things like that. Those rollers are meant to kind of help you pump and gain speed in certain sections without pedaling."
The pump track will help riders practice those skills and, in turn, keep them safe on the actual flow trails. Cedar Glades Park Coordinator A.J. Johnson said practicing skills on the pump track will increase confidence in young riders and confidence increases a rider's ability tremendously.
"On a daily basis I see kids in our skills area on these wooden features that we have," Johnson said. "This is just another tool that they can use to advance their skills."
Mountain bikers of all different experience levels can benefit from the pump track.
"It helps them learn how to use their bikes more efficiently and their suspension on their mountain bikes," Berry said. "That is what will be so cool about this pump track. It'll help experienced riders maybe clean those skills up a little bit. And it's also a lot of fun, it's a great workout and helps beginner riders kind of gain that skill so we're super excited about it."
A local youth rider in Hot Springs, Milo Moore, actually brought the need for a pump track in Hot Springs to their attention.
Moore wrote a letter his mom sent to Northwoods Trails and the letter eventually traveled to County Judge Darryl Mahoney. Mahoney contacted Johnson about whether the pump track was something needed and Johnson was on board.
"A pump track in itself is to help advance your skills," Johnson said. "So, it'll be a great addition to Cedar Glades Park."
The county will supply materials for the track from Fox Pass Development, while Visit Hot Springs, Friends of the Parks and the Arvest Bank Foundation are funding the build.
The donation from Arvest secured 50% of what was needed for the track.
"It probably wasn't going to happen until they jumped on board," Johnson said. "I've been hoping for it for a long time. I was ecstatic."
McGill Trail Fabrication, a company based in Colorado, will build the pump track sometime between the middle of October to late November. The McGill brothers worked on projects before in Hot Springs.
"They've been here and they do awesome work," Berry said. "They do really cool projects all over the country. For them to kind of jump on this and be willing to come back was super awesome."
The company also helped with drainage issues at the park.
"They did such a great job with the skills area that we have and the jumpline that we have," Johnson said. "I trusted them. There's only four of them I think that I worked with before. They did it in a timely fashion. They had a great bid as far as financially goes so I'm looking forward to working with them again."
The pump track provides yet another attraction for tourists to Hot Springs. Berry said on a daily basis she sees license plates from all over the country.
"Any feature we add to the trail system attracts riders to come," Berry said. "If we have a pump track that they can hit and warm up and maybe hit the jumps a couple times and the skills areas before they get out on the trails that's kind of a plus in our book. We don't have anything like this in this area."
At first, license plates from neighboring states were common, but now license plates from states like North Carolina, South Carolina, Michigan, Minnesota, Colorado, California and Kansas are seen with more regularity.
"We've also had riders come in from Canada, from Mexico, from across the pond, you name it," Berry said. "Our city kind of survives or thrives on tourism. It's important that we have things that'll continue that."
Locals benefit from the trails, too.
"We also get to benefit from it as locals because now we have this in our backyard," Berry said. "That we can just, 'Hey I'm going to go hit the pump track today. I'm going to go get a 10-mile trail ride in.' It's accessible from just north of downtown."
The trail system attracts all types of riders and proves to be an important part of the outdoor experience in Hot Springs for tourists and locals alike.
"We've gained more riders, more local riders," Berry said. "We're seeing more women ride, we're seeing more new riders. We're seeing a larger number of young riders come out and so that impacts us positively by way of our health and the benefits we get from being outside and getting on a bike or just hiking the trails."