Making progress on the pump track...

Late last fall I started on a pump track but ran out of good weather and didn't get much done on it... fast forward to spring of 2007 and I'm finally making some headway..

Last year I didn't really know what I was doing so I basically made an oval with 2 big berms and a couple rollers. Bad idea. My berms had WAY too large of a radius (about 15' ) and I had to pedal thru them to maintain speed. Not good, considering this was supposed to be a pump track where pedaling is minimal. So, this year I've torn out a few of the berms and re-worked the shape of the track into more of an "L" shape instead of an oval. This weekend I made some progress on a new section that features a couple tighter AND faster berms with a bunch of rollers thrown in to maintain speed.

Next weekend I'm having more dirt delivered so I can make the berms TALLER and hopefully finish the rest of the track. Here are some pics...

The view from the back edge of the track...



Here's the section I worked on this weekend.... takes a lot of riding, digging, watering, and packing to make sure the flow works, the rollers are spaced correctly, and the berms large enough...



Rider view of the section shown above... I need to make both berms TALLER and packed more firmly so I can maintain more speed... I thought I dislocated my shoulder when I blew thru the top of the second berm and abruptly face planted...



This berm has been a pain in the a$$ to get right. And its still not quite right. I'm hauling azz into this thing so I need to make it taller and pack it a lot more firmly....


Here's the straightaway that comes right after the berm shown above.. It currently has 6 rollers spaced about 7.5 feet apart...at the end there will be a sharp left hander leading to another straightaway with more rollers...


More to come as I make more progress. Once I finish the basic "L" shaped layout I plan to add more sections so I can ride multiple layouts. Not sure how long its going to take to accomplish all of that because this is a pretty time consuming process AND it involves a tone of dirt, which I will need to have delivered. Stay tuned...