by Derek White
At the Colby city council meeting on Feb. 4, Colby resident Dave Williams addressed the council looking for permission to build mountain biking trails at the West Side Park in Colby. Williams is a cycling coach with the National Interscholastic Cycling Association, drawn into the organization due to his son Parker’s love of bicycling.
Williams found the North Central Raptors cycling team out of Osbourne, Kansas. A composite team located over two hours from home, consisting of riders from Osborne Beloit, Tipton, and Glen Elder. Williams travels to Osbourne on Sundays for Parker to train and practice with the team. As most parents involved in their children’s sports, parents in Northwest Kansas become accustomed to long road trips on a regular basis.
Williams has been approved by NICA to build a team in Northwest Kansas, he is the director and coach. He has another coach in Atwood with a few kids interested in joining the team to start. The challenge now is how and where to train these kids for competitions so that they can develop the skills to perform, have fun, and be safe at competitions.
We're starting from scratch, there's no bike shop here, no biking community existing. We expect to go slow, we're not trying to get too far ahead of ourselves. We're just trying to be realistic. the first step to having a team out here, we need to have someplace to do some training.
Williams began searching for locations in the Colby community that would be able to accommodate a mountain biking course. His search led him to Kyle Lindberg, Colby’s Parks Foreman. Lindberg guided Williams to West Side Park, a forgotten park of Colby on the Northwest side of town.
At the North end of the park is a large area that slopes toward the railroad tracks with lots of trees. It’s a great location for some natural surface trails, it's not just for bikes, it's for hiking, people can walk their dogs out there. It’ll be accessible for wheelchairs or baby carriers, it's going to be for the entire community, not just the biking team.
The city council decided to move forward with a study and begin the designing phase, afterwards they will reconvene on whether to allow permission to the bike team. Williams has a vision for the future of building a pump track on the Southwest end of the park, but it would require more designing, and funding.
“We'll have to raise money for signage, a trail map, purchasing of chemicals to keep weeds, bugs to a minimum, and then if we look at future projects,” said Williams.
If things work out as Williams envisions, then Colby could become a hub for the biking community, not just in this region but throughout the country. Colby sits nicely between Bentonville, Arkansas and the Rocky Mountains; thousands of cyclists pass through here on the way. Colby could join a growing list of Kansas communities taking advantage of this sport.
Palen Farms is a private farm that has held NICA races. They do Cruise of Blues in the fall, they bring in food trucks, competitions, kid competitions, and live music. Wilson State Park has 30 miles of single-track trails, it's got jumps and pumps. It's a single-track weaving around with some climbs and hill.
Unbound Gravel race is sponsored by lifetime fitness, and it's the biggest gravel race in the country in Emporia, Kansas. There are teams in Wichita, Manhattan, Lawrence, Kansas City, and Great Bend is getting a team this year.
“Mountain biking is exploding in Eastern Kansas, Manhattan, Johnson County, Lawrence, and Emporia. It’s working its way Westward with North Central and Great Bend, and soon to be Colby.
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