Cranksgiving 2022
It finally happened! Remember how it rained a bunch prior to the original Cranksgiving date in November? It seems so long ago already.
Milton Reimer’s Ranch is beautiful parkland managed by Travis County, and Austin Ridge Riders have stewardship of the mountain bike trails there. This is where ARR hosts the Crankgiving weekend which consists of an 8 mile loop and a few trail work stations along the way. Riders earn raffle tickets for each lap, and each 15 minute work station stop.
There were so many prizes from sponsors to give away; in fact, by the end of the afternoon everyone still in attendance had won a prize! There were burgers, dogs and snacks, and the weather was just right. It was a little overcast in the morning which is nice because there is not a whole lot of shade at Reimers.
I registered as a volunteer for the event to assist at a work station - in this case the first one on the route where we were busy building a berm to give a new line option to a smal technical challenge on an uphill grade. Park staff were kind enough to facilitate the event by placing fill material and water jugs at each of the work stations.
There were over 160 registered for the event and tons of people stopped to assist with trail work; we finished up at the first station early and moved to the last one to help there. This is where we were filling in a deep erosion rut and bringing it back to grade. We also added a few grade reversals - what we might call a “roller” - to prevent water accelerating down the hill and digging the rut back out. Functional, and fun.
It was a successful day which is great. The ARR board and volunteers put in a lot of effort to make it work and days like these make a positive impression with the community and the park officials. If you have not had a chance to visit Reimer’s Ranch you are missing out. Please consider joining Austin Ridge Riders and supporting trails and events like these.
