Kielder Needs You!

Funding for trail building projects is harder than ever to come by these days but it seems the Kielder Trail Reavers aren't letting that stop them. KTR have been furnishing the Northern wilderness that is Kielder Forest with mountain bike trails for five years now. Their latest plans include improvements to existing sections of trail as well as an ambitious 1.5km new build on the Lonesome Pine trail which will see a forest road descent replaced with single track. Moredirt spoke to Chris Tait, the chairman of the Kielder Trail Reavers about their plans and it turns out they need your help. KTR's plans include a major project at Capon Hassock where they need extra volunteers to help with a build which, if enough volunteers are found could be completed in around 18 months. The Reavers hope to find enough people willing to commit to seeing the project through to completion. Chris said: "It would be absolutely fantastic if we could find volunteers who were happy to commit to one day a month for the next 18 months but I think it is more realistic to ask people if they can commit to a minimum of six or seven build days over a twelve month period. We could then attract a large enough pool of people which should mean we can guarantee a good core turnout every build day." The route for Capon Hassock on the Lonesome Pine trail has been decided and a corridor has already been cut through the trees by the Forestry Commission. However, apart from a few ditch crossings, no features have been planned so far which means volunteers who want it can have major input into the details of the descent including technical trail features. Chris added: "Lonesome Pine is a red grade trail so what ever features are chosen can't be too difficult. It is basically a blank canvas right now. There may be opportunities to design black grade features which could be added in once the trail is completed". An open day is coming up very soon where interested parties can not only find out more about the project but can also visit the proposed site to get an idea of what may be possible. There are improvements planned for the Final Countdown section too which is a descent belonging to the Cross Boarder trail at Bloodybush Fell near the boarder between England and Scotland. KTR have identified a series of jumps and berms which they intend to alter. The plan is to vastly improve the experience for riders by improving the overall flow of the section. Chris from KTR said: "The great thing about this project is we can target individual features and improve them massively in just one build session, meaning the trail never needs to be closed and the plans are achievable even with a fairly small group of builders. Final Countdown and Capon Hassock are not the only things going on and if we don’t manage to recruit enough people for the Capon Hassock project to be viable there will be plenty of other interesting stuff for volunteers to do." An open day is being held at Kielder Castle on Saturday 20th November starting at 10am. Anyone who fancies it can come along. Free refreshments will be provided. Outdoor clothing should be worn and those who want to get stuck in on the day should also bring stout footwear and gloves with them. For more details log on to the trail build section of KTR's forum at www.kieldertrailreavers.co.uk