What better way to celebrate our first birthday than launching a new trail

On the 24th August 2014 BikePark Wales will be exactly one year old.  A lot can happen in a year, ups, downs and everything in between.  We’d be lying if we said it has been easy, but all of the best things in life are worth fighting for right?

On the evening of the 23rd August 2013, as the founding partners sat enjoying a cold one at midnight the night before opening day, having just finished the final touches there were a lot of nerves.  Would anyone turn up?  Would they like it? Are we ready?  “Build it and they will come” had always been our mantra but we’d be lying if we didn’t admit to a bit of self doubt as we sat there reflecting one year ago.

Come 8AM the next day a queue of cars over a kilometre long had formed from the car park all the way to the nearby A470 dual carriageway.  “I guess they will come then!” we remarked.  Riders came in their masses during that first weekend and we are ecstatic to see that riders are still coming from far and wide to enjoy the riding here at BikePark Wales.  Every smile and burst of laughter makes the 6 years of hard graft to get the place open worthwhile, a hundred times over!

It hasn’t been plain sailing of course, we were greeted with the wettest winter on record just 6 weeks after opening.  The torrential rains and high winds threatened to blow the park to pieces and wash it down the hill.  The trail design was solid though and our trail crew did an amazing job of keeping on top of maintenance and the park stood solid in the face of destruction.  We’ve had power cuts, escaped animals on the trails, breakdowns (vehicles that is!), floods and much, much more but somehow we’ve found a way to keep going.

We would like to thank every single customer that has visited the park this first year.  We hope you have enjoyed your time at the park, each and every one of you is helping to create a sustainable future for this amazing facility.  Our ever expanding trail crew are flat out not only maintaining but also upgrading existing trails.  Checkout the all new “Insufficient finds” trail as well as improvements on Zut Alors, Willy Waver and Enter the Dragon.

And now for the really exciting news, to celebrate our first birthday we will be opening the first of two new trails for 2014 on Sunday August 24th.  The aptly named A470 line is the UK’s biggest and best jump trail, this red graded trail is a work of art, each lip and landing sculpted with love and care from Welsh rock and dirt.  Created as a collaboration between trail building company Back on Track and our own trail crew, A470 Line is set to be a new favourite for visitors to BikePark Wales from across the globe.

If you aren’t excited enough already, take a look at the above short edit by Liam Murphy featuring Trek World Racing rider Laurie Greenland shredding A470 Line in a recent test session.

A470 line will open on Sunday 24th August.  We will also have many of our great sponsors in attendance to enjoy the weekend with us so stop by and say hello to the guys from Mercedes-Benz Vito Sport, Mojo/Fox, Trek and Shimano as well as the guys from MBUK.

Thanks again to everyone for making our first year such a great one, this is just the beginning, there is plenty more still to come from BikePark Wales. 

Build it and they will come

To book online and find out more visit https://phpstack-147804-425502.cloudwaysapps.com/uplift