// ARFREERIDERS.COM | HOME OF THE ARKANSAS FREERIDE SOCIETY 2010

We, the members of the AFS, have a lot to be thankful for in this time of the season. We have great friends and families, most of us ate a whole bunch of Turkey and stuffing, and we ride cool bikes. Life is good. But as we begin to ride the lines in our new dirt jump park, we are also very thankful for the serendipitous occurrence of the National Trails Symposium here in Little Rock this year. Without it, and Scott from IMBA wouldn’t have made the trip, visualized our park as part of a demonstration model for the event, and hired Ben Blitch from B4 Consulting and Construction to come and help us get it on the ground.

So to all involved…thank you very much for the assistance. The AFS promises to be a good steward to our gift.

Our 1st annual Groundhog Jam was a success. The weather played out good for us, but it was sketchy in the few days leading up to the event. In the end, there was a small but energetic contingent of mountain bikers and a bigger group of BMX’ers. To say the least, the BMX crew showed us how it’s done downtown. We’ve taken home a few lessons learned that day. A good time was had by all. Too bad we forget about the video most of the time. We missed the backflips, tailwhips, 360’s and 720’s. Oh well. Here’s the best of the rest. Enjoy.

-AFS Crew

A special thanks to Kit Williams for the AFA’s new jump. Kit is a guy addicted to his bike and he is going to ride whether or not anyone else is; plus he has an obsession for jumping. The reason I bring that up is because this time he went out of his way to construct the new jump at the AFA. It took a lot of work and a few weekends to build this thing and he was motivated enough to spearhead the whole thing and get people motivated. That being said, mad props to you Kit!

With the building of the new jump quite a few people showed up to help build and ride. “mtb_jeff” and “Bok Choy” aka Jeff and Jeff drove in and got some riding in and also helped on the building. It was great to see some new faces and a lot of fun hanging out with these guys… Special thanks to Jeff and his wife for all of the pictures. We hope to see all of you guys again real soon.

Click here to check out the pics…

~ Happy New Year Everybody!

*UPDATE*

Mettler and I were able to get in a little street session early on Monday. Met up around 9:00 under the bridge and took off downtown. Turned out to be a great ride and the weather was perfect. We met up with Kit for lunch and then headed over to the quarry to see this jump he had built. After looking over everything and figuring everything out I have to say this thing is going to be sick! The jump is huge, and while that may make some a bit nervous, including myself, I think that it is going to prove itself very inviting for all skill levels. Of course right now a launch without a landing looks nuts, but I promise you once the deck and landing gets put in its going to be great.

*ORIGINAL POST*

With the lack of daylight after 5:00 and the abundance of urban riding that we have been doing, Kit “I wanna jump!” Williams made his way to the AFA to build our newest edition to the dirt pile. Dealing with mud and jacked up lips on the previous jumps, this one has a wood transition. With the cold rain coming in Kit had to abandon his post promising to return and finish the deck and landing on the monstrosity. He told me the take off is 6′ plus and will have a landing deck right after the lip followed by a nice long dirt tranny to bring everyone up to speed before any gap is placed after the lip. He also plans on building a smaller one next to it in case a 6′ takeoff isn’t your thing.

Don’t forget that an entire DJ park is in the works for the Argenta Freeride Area. As well as some other NEW developments that will be released at a later time.

A few AFS test pilots made their way to the park and had some fun when the other sissies were sleeping in. They boldly went where no man had been before.

E2 and I spent some time “documenting” the stuff on the warmup loop last Sunday. I became the defacto videographer after a horrific accident on the teeter run disabled my front brake rotor: click here.

Anyway, we had fun and there were some visitors and spectators checking out the scene.

More videos to come…

-Ryan

The warm up loop for the Argenta Freeride Area is now at 90% completion. All of the physical structures are built and ready to ride. Over the next weekends we will be cleaning up and manicuring the trail. At the current time there some rocks in some spots that will be removed and the overall trail bed will be smoothed out. We are also creating a fall zone around the stunts free of rocks and debris to ensure safer riding.
With that said, be careful when riding the trail. Until it is groomed it will be a bit rough in some places.

Let’s talk about the loop. This is a warm up loop for the gravity fed trails to come. The loop has very little gradient making it very suitable for sessioning. Some of the stunts are harder than others, some are just fun. Kit and Ryan had a good time playing “HORSE” on Sunday seeing who could complete the loop with the least amount of touching down. For the most part the loop is subtle from a freeride standpoint. HOWEVER, if you plan on riding this trail WEAR PROTECTIVE GEAR AND RESPECT IT. Even the smallest stunt cause injury. And riding clipped in would not be advised. This is a freeride trail, not XC.

Please stop by and check it out. If you have any questions please contact us on the forum.

Extreme thanks goes out to everyone involved in making the first phase of this project a reality. And an extra special thanks to John Taylor of T&S Sawmill. John was kind enough to donate wood for the park. Without his help nothing would look the way it does. John is a very cool guy and it was nice to see him riding the park on his new 6point6 this weekend. If you see John tell him thanks. Even though we built the stuff, he made it a reality.

~The AFS

CLICK ON THE PICTURES BELOW TO OPEN A FULL VIEW!

*56k Warning: the images are very big

Teeter Run

Want to see more?

This weekend marked another step forward in the development of the Argenta Freeride Area. Our crew was out Sat and Sunday building what turned out to be a bomb-proof 14′ teeter-totter. The teeter-totter is located right around the bend from the skinnys. A lot of work went into this thing and it should be standing for a long time. Props to Travis and Mettler for the heavy lifting. The wood we are using to construct everything on these trails is massive. Not your normal home-depot style wood. Much props to Mark for cleaning up the trash around the trail.

One thing that was really cool this weekend was seeing new riders coming out to check out the place. Apparently the news is starting to spread and it was nice to see some interested faces. If you are interested in helping out stop on by the forum and let us know who you are. Every Sunday is a workday and the more help the faster things can get done so we can enjoy the fruits of our labor.

On a serious note. Anyone going out there please respect the fact that these trails are under construction. A lot of the stunts that are being placed out there are finished in regard to construction, but the trails still require maintenance and grooming to be perfected. There are a ton of rocks in the trail and around that are being cleared out as we go. So please be careful if you plan on trying any of the stunts out there if you can’t wait until the trail has been groomed. And as always, if anyone would like to help out just let us know.

No pictures to post this time. Too many tools to carry left no room for a camera.

Cheers,

The AFS

This is one of the first runs on the new skinnys at the AFA done by Kit.

Ladies and Germs, the Argenta Freeride Area has officially become official. With the good blessing of “The Man”, we have put ourselves on the map, or at least on the ground. Our first two skinny stunts are complete. The warmup loop on the top of the hill will be taking shape over the next few weeks. We’ll have more and more cool stuff to ride and practice up before we move on to our next phase - downhill trails! It isn’t taking long to use up all of our sawmill material that we brought from NWA. We’ll hopefully resupply this week at John’s sawmill. We need everyone to get up there and ride/fall off the skinnies and offer up some feedback so we can make everything sweet!

What you see here is the second one we built. It has two lines; one that is pretty wide that goes up and over the post on the left and a 4″ wide super duper skinny that takes the low line on the right. The contemplative gentleman in the image is the one and only Mr. T, Travis T-Biscuit Herbner. Check out the sweet gloves. What he’s thinking right now is how we’re all probably going to fall off into the hole between the boards in the middle of our skinny. The first skinny we built is in the background. Here’s a better shot of it:

So there’s optional lines here as well. You can see that there is a ramp on the right to get up, or it’s possible to hit the step on the left. Either way it’s going to be fun. Check the work days thread on the forum for current info about helping build.

-Ryan

Ok since it has been mentioned, I’ll provide a bit more detail on it. Ryan, Eric and Damon presented to the Parks and Rec department a proposal for a local freeride park. The presentation proved to be a success and the first trail was started this weekend (thanks Ryan). If you have heard anyone saying that the park is going to be huge with shore style trails, a downhill course, and that there is going to be a full size (worthy of national events) 4X course and a dirt jump area then rest assured all of this is true. Here’s a draft we did for the dirt jump/slopestyle area. These are the ideas, but things are subject to change as funding/material availability allows.

Of course it is going to take a lot of man hours and much will be built through the fall and winter months and into the spring but it is happening. So to give you an overview, I created the image above. The open are around the “4X Course” is a steep quarry. Everything goes down at a pretty good grade from the top of that. The center ring in the trails area will be the beginning trail with all of the other trails spawning from it. You can see the road at the very bottom to gauge how big this area is.

If anyone is interested in helping out, Ryan is organizing some upcoming work days. Please stop by the forum and drop us your info.

-The AFS Crew

Greetings all. Things in the central Arkansas area have gotten more interesting as of late. The Arkansas Freeride Society has created a buzz about town.

The ground on the hilltop above the quarry has finally been broken! A connection trail and a warm-up loop have been cleared. The warm-up loop at the top of hill will be loaded with wooden features. Upon completion of the warm-up loop, we’ll begin construction on the downhill freeride trails.

We’ve been lucky enough that the “man” dropped off a few truckloads of sweet, sweet topsoil. Mettler spied it and began digging. We’ve got three lines on the dirtpile, with one (the big one) being the clear favorite. We’ve hit it a million times it seems. Kit and I have been amazed at the amount of fun a giant dirtpile can provide. He seems to get the dirtiest. We heard he takes showers wearing his elbow and knee pads. At the end of the day he was rockin’ it! Not sure if it was the new bike or what…

Travis nailed some no footers and a no foot Can can. It was sweet. We also had a stud photographer come out today just to grab some quick shots of us jumping. Let’s just say that Alton’s shots look righteous! It was a sweet session on the pile. It’s fair to say that everyone’s getting some good dirt jumping practice.

-Ryan