In 28 years of riding and racing I’ve pretty much ridden every kind of trail imaginable:  ledgy limestone, chunky granite, desert sand, gnarly roots, soft loam.  In terms of mountain biking, there isn’t much I haven’t seen.  

But prior to moving to Salida there’s one type of trail I had virtually no experience with:  flow trails.  What exactly is a flow trail?  Basically, it’s a mountain bike-specific downhill trail with a variety of jumps and bermed turns to allow you to carry your speed with minimal pedaling.  Riding a flow trail is like riding a personal roller coaster that you get to steer.  And it just so happens that Salida has several of them.  

Most mountain bike trails are hiking trails that you can ride on.  They may go uphill or downhill and they may go long distances cross-country.  Mountain bike trails have varying degrees of technical features like rocks and roots and require a great deal of pedaling, often strenuous pedaling, for miles.  And while some mountain bike trails may be described as “flowy” that’s usually a function of the terrain on which they’re built.  All flow trails are flowy but not all trails that flow are flow trails.  

Put that in your brain and let it rattle around.

Cross-country racing is done on typical mountain bike trails.  You rarely see jumps.  If you do, they’re small and most likely have an alternate line where you can avoid them.  Back when I raced, I could always tell the guys who came from a BMX background.  They were the ones looking for the jumps.  The guys that could pull a perfect tail whip three feet in the air off the smallest bump.  I was always a little envious of those guys.  If my tires ever came off the ground, it was an indication that something had gone horribly awry.  The thought of launching off a jump was completely foreign and a little unnerving to me.

But after riding Salida’s trails for the past four years I’m getting better at it.  Tentative at first, I gradually got faster, until I started feeling comfortable separating tire from terra firma.  A low-altitude astronaut, breaking gravity’s grip, if only for a second.

My riding is still more cross-country than BMX, I don’t go that high, but there’s nothing like that feeling when you hit a table-top jump or rail a bermed turn just right.   It’s just…

And you understand what is meant by “flow”.

So, here’s a short video look at two of Salida’s flow trails, Sol Train West and Solstice.  Flow trail riding right in my backyard.