No Dig, No Ride - Trail Building With Nils Klasen

I'm Nils, 27 years old, from Bad Salstädtfurt. I ride a lot of mountain bikes and build mountain bike trails. We are now here at the Racepark Schulenberg. I'll take you with me for a couple of days and show you what I'm doing here all day. Today is the plan, part one of the weekend, at least what's left of it, to pump this curve a bit. Because it's been on a bump for a few days and I could imagine something more beautiful from a substance point of view. And that's what I'm starting with now. This No-Dick-No-Ride topic was actually part of day one, I would say. At the homespot where the friend who told me about it took me, we rode two laps and then the locals came and pressed a shovel in my hand and said, you have to shave with me, because the trails don't fly from the sky. Then I thought, okay, I imagined it differently. I realized that this is full of creative work, where you can also realize yourself, where no one else says, you have to do it this way so that it works, but it's a learning by doing. I've been leading this process for 15 years now. Here in the Racepark I found the perfect place to live out myself. That's not self-evident either. A little trail building lesson for everyone who wants to build a few trails themselves or do something at the bike park. Do what you like and don't build such a piece of wood here, because that's just a pain. It doesn't work and it's just ----. So always build everything from the ground. Now it's about generating earth, because such a curve is more built from earth, not from wood. And I just get it from the inside of the curve on the right. It's washed in anyway and then it looks nicer anyway and there's a lot of earth available. Yes, trail building in Germany. That's a big topic. I'll shorten it now, in order to leave out details that may be important to some people. When it comes to how I see it, I would say that there is very, very much missing and very often the mountain bike cult and this culture of building trails. Yes, very often a company is commissioned to put the 35th Float Trail in an area. It's all right that there are these Float Trails and I have to be honest, I also benefit from it. But I don't like this relationship of building catalog Float Trails somewhere. Yes, building this real trail, the way I see it. Exactly what I'm missing, there's a lot here in the race park. There are also two or three other places. But that's exactly where this trail building cult takes place, because only people do this, whose main motivation is not to make money, but who have a love for the sport and for what they do. And then there are also trails with character that are fun and where you notice that they are built by locals. That's how I see it. Things make the approach a little wider here. In the park, it's about 80 percent like this, that we first put a line somewhere as a basis, ride it every weekend. Then we get ideas on how to pimp the whole thing a bit. Here, too, like with the kicker, it goes up and to the left. It runs great, but the approach here is a bit narrow. It is now a bit bench-cut so that you have more space and that it doesn't come out of the kites so much. If you want to start with the whole thing, a lot has happened in recent years when it comes to club structures. At least in my environment here, there are some organized forms. Whether it's a bike park like here, which is happy for every help. I would always start where there is already something going on and try to get involved there. But if certain framework conditions don't fit and that can only take place in very limited possibilities, then no one can complain if he builds something himself in the old school way. Because that's how I did it too. I just have to say, it's still a possibility to do that. Done. Yes, done now. Small measures, hopefully great effect. We'll see tomorrow when we ride it. Yes, the plan has worked out. You can now have a nice curve here. Yes, great success. Yes, nothing big, nothing wild, but it fits and is fun. Yes, I could build the next one right now. Because speed fits, motivation is there. But unfortunately no more time.