What do you do to stay busy in the off season?
That’s when we handle all our maintenance on machines, and when we do all of our planning for the upcoming season! Lots of dreaded desk time! This year has been unusually warm, so we actually still have crews in the field building ribbons of joy!
How do you stay active in the winter?
Personally? I’m a closet ultra runner, and dabble in winter mountaineering. So you’ll find me working the desk, then hitting a full workout schedule whether that’s some running action or hitting the local climbing gym to get some laps in on the walls!
What are you looking forward to in the 2024 build season?
We’ve got some awesome projects on tap for ’24. From bike parks to singletrack it’s going to be great! Personally I’ve really been enjoying the pocket parks we’ve been building around the Twin Cities metro. Nothing is better than seeing kids and adults alike discover offroad riding on something we’ve worked on! We’ve got some more of that goodness on tap! OTM is all about engaging youth and Pathfinder has great energy that I imagine speaks to young riders.
What was it that initially got you excited about your mission and bring out that enthusiasm for the sport that youth riders and youth builders can relate to?
What got me excited?! I think I’ve always wanted to be able to move a lot of dirt around and build bigger stuff. We couldn’t really do that…I would have killed for a place like Monarch growing up! I think we are in such an exciting time for mountain biking. You can start as a new rider and right here in Minnesota you can ride every type of trail you can imagine. You can just jump, you can just pound laps, you can ride lift access. We’ve really got it all, all purpose built, and built in a safe sustainable way, that’s pretty dang easy to access. If I can get one kid to cross over to adventure sports, that is what gets my stoke birds a chirpin’! Without my parents exposing me to that, I’m certain I wouldn’t be doing what I am doing now. So I guess I hope youth find the sense of adventure I find in trails.
What is something we might not know about you?
Not a lot of people know I had a video production company before I got back into trail building, I worked with athletes across a bunch of different sports! You might have even seen my work on Red Bull Media House projects and on ESPN. The furthest run I’ve ever done is the RimtoRimtoRim run, which is crossing the Grand Canyon and back again. I’ve also done a solo winter summit of Mt Whitney! I’ll never forget the ranger at the permit office telling me, “If you die up there we aren’t coming up till spring to get ya!” Apparently January isn’t a common time to do a summit attempt. Hahaha
