“Unreal”… “Sick”… “Gnarly”…”Overwhelmingly fun”…”That’s real mountain biking”…
There were a lot of ways the 26th Annual Bell’s Beer Copper Harbor Trails Fest was described, but one quote by one of the weekend’s mouth-watering food vendors, The Burger Bus, summed it up best…”The town, the bikes, the locals, the families, the music, all the vendors and the scenery are what make this weekend so epic!”
The annual Labor Day weekend festival took place this year August 31-Sept 1. The weekend was full of friends, bikes, beer, music, and racing! It was such a joy to look into our parking lot and see the lines of cars and bike racks. Here at the Lodge, we were host to the last aid station of the long and short XC races, and registration and bib pickup for the Junior MTB races. These races in the past have been held on the trails in town. This year, however, the Junior MTB were held at the Keweenaw Mountain Lodge on the recently completed green and easy Back 9 Trails! Moose on the Loose, Little Loon, and Chipmunk Run are true beginner trails for any mountain biker just starting out and looking to advance their skills.
The Junior MTB races were the highlight of the weekend for us here at the Lodge. In collaboration with the Copper Harbor Trails Club, these trails are the result of a lot of planning and hard work by all involved, so to see their inaugural race have such a wonderful turnout really made us smile. Hoping for at least 100 participants, that number was surpassed to 123! With drinks and HUGE delicious cookies waiting for them at the finish, the racers ran from kids just starting out on Strider bikes and the tiniest of mountain bikers doing the 40 yard dash, to the more intermediate kids testing their skills on the 1.5 mile course, to the most advanced kids pushing their limits on the 3 mile course.
The one thing they all had in common were smiles as they cruised through these fun, beautiful trails.
Until next year!
