The mission of one builder to shape sustainable trails across North America.
Words by John Finch & Adrienne Scholfhauser
Photos by Brandon Watts
I got the fire in me to build trails almost instantly. It was 1994, and I’d just picked up mountain biking. Back then, the ride scene in Northern California was still pretty renegade, and I was lucky enough to hook up with one such off-the-grid posse that showed me their gold-mine stash of trails.
There was one stipulation: I was welcome to join their pack, they said — if I swore to secrecy.
Their trails were fall-line types: steep, gnarly; no regard to contour or hillside. Wicked beasts of a ride, they made your steel pony wild-eyed, your gut wrench like cranked iron. They were fun as hell. But I noticed right away that they lacked one thing: true craftsmanship; and as such, they weren’t sustainable. If we wanted these trails to last, we had to build them so.
