An autumn day for mountain biking

This year's 1st annual event focused on kids safety which incorporated a bicycle safety course and skills area. This was very popular with the kids as shown in our video! Also popular was the educational tour with Sacramento Valley Conservancy historian, David Scharlach, who told the kids about the native Americans and gold rush era settlers who lived in this area long ago. The kids also got to see an active beaver lodge that exists on Lake Clementia - and two of the groups even saw the beavers swimming around working away. The advanced riders and teens were able to go out to Deer Creek Hills and experience mountain biking out on the 4,400 acre open space nature preserve that is right in our backyard.

For this free event started the day with Kiwanis registering the participants including a name badge, MTS giving out a free gift bag with a Clif bar, bicycle safety and open space preservation and protection information from Murieta Trail Stewardship and Leave No Trace, stickers from Fox Racing, and International Mountain Bicycling Association (IMBA) number plates for the kid's and parent's bikes. Then Bicycles Plus made sure kids bikes were safe and functional. The Sheriff’s department helped kids and adults properly fit their helmets.  

After that was complete, we organized the kids into the right riding group based on age and their skills. We offered a safety course for the young beginners including stop lights, street intersections, walk/don’t walk signs, stop signs and simulated traffic conditions. In addition, we had a skills course for young riders to help them learn how to navigate and practice maneuvering using rolling ramps, obstacles and various terrain. We also offered a beginners ride for very moderate skills and an intermediate ride about four miles in length around Lake Chesbro and back to Lake Clementia specifically for those older kids who had already established good skills for climbing and shifting. The advanced riders enjoyed a more challenging ten mile loop on single track trails in Deer Creek Hills. Parents accompanied most all of the kids and our volunteer docents riders lead every ride. 

Kids from about ages 5 to 65 participated. We had over 100 riders who attended the event which was our goal!  

We’ve had nothing but positive feedback from everyone volunteering and the families who participated. We are already looking forward to next year's event!

We had about a dozen docents participating and many volunteers from Murieta Trail Stewardship, Kiwanis and the Boy Scouts.

At the Swap Meet several bikes and bike parts swapped hands to lucky new owners. One of our Murieta Trail Stewardship volunteers picked up two bikes for $50!  

We would like to thank all the volunteers who came together to make this event a complete success. Murieta Trails Stewardship conceived the event along with Kiwanis, who had been wanting to host a kids bike day for several years. Working together, we finally did it! The kids also enjoyed live music, a bounce house, a good lunch compliments of the Kiwanis, and booths for the swap meet, sheriff's department, Bicycles Plus, Sacramento Valley Conservancy, and Murieta Trails Stewardship where they learned about the pump track proposal for Riverview Park on the South. Special thanks to:

• Murieta Trails Stewardship
• MBA
• Kiwanis
• Bicycles Plus
• Boy Scouts Troop 633
• Murieta Cycling Group
• Sacramento Valley Conservancy
• T’qeela Shotz Band.
• Leave No Trace
• Sacramento County Sheriff’s Department
• Metro 59 Fire
• Rancho Murieta Association
• Rancho Murieta Community Services District

Next year should be even better, absolutely again next year! We appreciate any feedback or recommendations to improve next year's event. Send to murietatrails@att.net; and murietacycinggroup@gmail.com

JASON ZENKER
MURIETA CYCLING GROUP