Cycle
Report from Friday, May 31, 2024
All aboard!
The first thing I noticed about the shuttle bus when it pulled up was the bike rack attached to the back that could hold what appeared to be two dozen mountain bikes.
It was Friday, the first week after Mammoth shut down its ski operations, and the bus was fairly empty, meaning we would have the freshly opened bike park to ourselves today.
Open 9-5 daily now, Mammoth’s bike park is truly world-class.
Being our first time visiting the bike park, we didn’t know what to expect, especially with all the lingering snow in the forest from the solid winter Mammoth just had.
But we need fear not.
When the bus dropped us off at the top of the mountain bike trails we were delighted with what we found.
We cruised down a smooth green trail called Downtown that held grippy, perfect dirt.
Fat, girthy, tall trees sailed past at speed as we took the gorgeous trail down toward the Village.
It was cool, sunny, and fresh—perfect California weather, minus a hint of smoke in the air from a nearby controlled burn.
We sailed easy to the start of two black diamond trails, hitting one called Shotgun first.
Shotgun was twisty, turny, techy, rocky, jumpy, droppy, and so much fun.
The trail was long. At the bottom, we were stoked and craving more.
We cruised back to the bus to do it all over again.
We hit Shotgun twice and each time there was no one else on the trail besides us two.
After that, we took Downtwon to Smooth Operator, a double black diamond trail, and tried our luck there.
It was a faster, more playful track with fewer rocks and a lot more jumps than Shotgun.
The wood bridge at the top of Smooth Operator was beautiful and so much fun to hit; I admired the artistry that went into building such a smooth, playful wooden bridge with two good-sized drops at the end of it.
How do people come up with this stuff?
The jumps afterward were the perfect size for me and felt smooth from takeoff to landing.
I guess that’s why they call it Smooth Operator.
Needless to say, we hit it again.
The builders of Mammoth’s bike trails are truly masters of their craft.
Even though only a fraction of Mammoth’s bike park is open right now, what is available is tremendously fun and flowy.
When we were there today we saw Mammoth workers toiling tirelessly to clear snow from the trails and I even ran into my old buddy Anthony from Ruidoso, New Mexico.
More bike trails are opening effectively every day, making it the perfect time to hop aboard Mammoth’s magic mountain bike bus and venture into the forest for a smooth ride.
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