Mountain Cog
Hosted by an enthusiast and a mountain bike industry expert featuring laughter and passionate guests.
Mountain Cog
083 – Sunrise Park Resort is AZ’s only lift-assisted bike park and it’s getting rad. (Colby Landin, Trail & Track Builder)
In this episode you’ll learn about two things…
#1. Sunrise Park Resort (which is outside of Greer, AZ.)
#2. Colby Landin (seasoned trail & track builder)
We kept hearing that Sunrise Park Resort was making great progress in improving their bike park. Then we ran across Colby’s Instagram Page and saw what he was doing up there. We reached out to Colby and last weekend drove up and spent a couple days riding the park and recording this episode with Colby.
First and foremost, shoutout to the White Mountain Apache Tribe, who owns and operates the Sunrise Park Resort. We love to recreate on your mountains in the winter and summer and we appreciate you sharing them with us and working to make the trails even better.
Secondly, we couldn’t talk about Sunrise without shouting out the Tonto Gravity Riders. They’ve been advocating for and working on trails throughout the state (including Sunrise and with a focus on the Pinal Mountains) since 2010.
Sunrise Park Resort Summer Activities
- Bike Park: 31 trails (8 x green, 4 x blue, 10 x black, 8 x double black). 2 lifts.
- Alpine Coaster (3000’ of track, up to 25mph)
- High Flier Zipline (tandem lines, 2100’ of elevation, up to 50 mph)
- Tubing Hill (magic carpet ride up, 300’ hill)
- Airbag Jump (18’ & 32’)
- Rock Climbing Wall (42’)
- 3d Archery Course (15 target course)
- Disc Golf (lift accessed).
eMTBs are allowed at Sunrise Park Resort.
Note: Other than letting us record this episode at the resort, we have received no compensation or perks from Sunrise. We bought our tickets full price.
Links to accompany this episode…
Colby Landin
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/colbys_bike_tracks/
YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@skillsandbuilds3987
Sunrise Bike Park
Web: https://www.sunrise.ski/summer/downhill-mountain-biking/
Trail Map: https://www.sunrise.ski/wp-content/uploads/2024/05/Trail-Map-Sunrise-Park-Resort-Summer-2024-VistaMap-large.jpg
Tonto Gravity Riders
https://www.tontogravityriders.org/
Ollies Cacti (Colby’s Home Grown Nursery of desert plants)
https://www.instagram.com/ollies_cacti/
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hey dane, yeah, uh. After an unsuccessful harvest, why did the farmer decide to try a career in music?
Dane:Man, I wish I was smart enough to know these. Like I should be able to get this.
Josh:It's because he had a ton of sick beats.
Dane:Oh God, I would have never gotten that. It's not good. I didn't even know beats came from farms, I thought they just appeared Appeared.
Josh:Yeah. No All right, we're up here just outside of Show, low Arizona, yep, kind of northeast part of, was it northeast?
Dane:Yeah.
Josh:Yep Kind of northeast part of Arizona, at Sunrise Ski Park Resort Park.
Dane:Resort, but it's Park Resort yeah.
Josh:And they've been building out a ton of shit and some great mountain bike trails and we happen to have with us today Mr Colby. You want to introduce yourself, man?
Colby Landin:Hey, I'm Colby Landon, Mostly a backyard kind of track builder, but the last three summers I've been up at Sunrise building lots of jumps and big turns. So, they got me up here with my tractor and we've just been going to town.
Josh:What's the tractor that you use? I?
Colby Landin:have a Kubota sk to town. What's the tractor that you use? I have a Kubota skid steer. It's the midsize one with wide tracks and an extra wide bucket.
Josh:Wow, okay. So how wide is it? Is it like six foot? Seven foot, seven foot.
Dane:What's a skid steer? Is that because it has tracks on it, or is it that, like the bobcat looking one, it's the style of tractor.
Colby Landin:So there's excavators, backhoes and skid steers for that size equipment and they look like those Bobcats. Yeah, it's a Bobcat with tracks.
Dane:Okay, cool, awesome, can I drive it?
Colby Landin:Yeah, you can drive it. I want to drive it so bad. Yeah, man, it's sitting right over there, I just want to do it. Can I do a donut with it? Can you do?
Josh:donuts in that, oh yeah, oh, my God, we're getting in deep shit now. I want one right now. Careful, though.
Dane:Yeah, so you are building most of the bigger jump features.
Colby Landin:Yeah, is that about right? Yeah, we got another crew up here, the Tonto Gravity Riders.
Dane:That's Chris, and James.
Josh:I'm sure we'll talk about them, them a bit. Yeah, we ran into them down in mount graham.
Colby Landin:When we were working down on mount graham, those guys were down there they're essential part of this um building process, along with, uh, brian zonker, the main bike park manager here, and he's got a couple other ski patrol kids that kind of help him out and he's the main guy cutting most of the hand cut trails. And then chris and james have been up here for 20 plus years helping on trails and stuff, so I'm the newbie.
Colby Landin:But, um, they, uh, they got a excavator, which is, you know the one like a little claw in front of you that scoops in front of you and push it off to the side or build with it Um skid steer is like a typical Bobcat, which I'm sure every mountain biker knows what that is oh yeah, that's what you build a backyard with.
Dane:Yeah.
Josh:I've rented one several times Totally different.
Colby Landin:His is great. They're fantastic at going down and cutting an awesome trail and they know what they're doing. And then I was hired to build Slalom Course and then a couple jump lines and this Skills Park kind of jump park thing that is going to keep expanding which is huge.
Dane:Yeah, it's big, it's big, it's.
Colby Landin:I don't think people know about it because, uh, from the parking lot you can see kind of like just one, one run and there's actually a kind of five runs side by side yeah up to five or six runs, actually six different lips, so yeah, it's pretty awesome.
Dane:We did ride it that one day that it was we got rained out, yeah, and it's. It's hard for me to get speed to hit those jumps. I'm not a good jumper. And uh, man, it's so well built, like the lips were just manicured, like it was just great.
Colby Landin:In fact.
Dane:Uh, so you built a new line. What do you call the new line under the lift?
Colby Landin:Oh yeah, we don't even have a name for that.
Dane:Oh, can you name? It can you call it dame. How about, dane?
Josh:let's wait no, let's come up with a name. How about dane sucks? How about? No? I was thinking. I was thinking like dane's taint call it dane's taint, oh my god, I'll have to have the tribe approve it.
Colby Landin:Yeah, I don't think they're gonna approve dane's taint, come on, just push for me. Try, I'm going to adjust your mic a little bit. I'm sorry about that.
Josh:No, no, you're all good, it's dropping on you.
Dane:I did not hit those, even from the chair. The gaps looked big and I saw a guy hit them and it didn't look like he needed a lot of speed.
Josh:Oh, that's the new one, the new line.
Colby Landin:Yeah, they got gaps, really long lips and takeoffs.
Dane:They look like floaters. They totally look like floaters, they're definitely floaters.
Colby Landin:I haven't seen anyone crash on it yet, so that's good.
Josh:It's cool being under the lift too, because you can see the shredders come down and just crush it.
Colby Landin:I think that made the park a lot more fun having people hoot and holler.
Dane:Yes, big time yeah that, and there was a bear today. Did you see a bear?
Josh:Yeah, there was a bear right by that. You know, as you're going up the lift, there's a little lodge right there.
Dane:Yeah, a little black bear in there.
Colby Landin:No way. Oh, that's awesome, I missed that Is that a common thing here? Oh, for me it is. I've been living up here, so everybody leaves around 5, which is about right now. And then the animals really do take over the park up here, that's cool. It is cool because as soon as the lift stops, I mean I think they know that when the lift stops, or maybe they're on a schedule or whatnot?
Josh:The people are gone yeah.
Colby Landin:The turkeys take over, then the deer and elk.
Dane:Oh yeah, we saw a ton of turkeys. Yeah, anyways, I've seen a bunch of bears. You've seen a bunch of bears. I've seen a bunch of bears. Yeah, you've seen a bunch of bears. Don't tell my wife that, because she won't want to come out, never when the park's running.
Colby Landin:You got lucky.
Josh:Hey, so how'd you get started? Tell us a little bit about your backstory. How'd you get started doing this?
Colby Landin:Specifically the mountain bike stuff yeah yeah, yeah, or just building trail in general or building features or building parks in general. So this is my first ski resort I've worked at and that's been a dream of mine since I was little. I started building bike tracks, bmx, specifically in the neighborhood. I had one at my house when I turned eight and it was basic and as neighbors built pools, I collected more dirt and built bigger stuff and my dad had a little Bobcat.
Josh:That's awesome.
Colby Landin:So, I was always keeping an eye out for pools getting built.
Josh:Yeah.
Colby Landin:And then I got phone numbers.
Josh:So you're just building like BMX jump, basically yeah.
Colby Landin:BMX track like a pump track and I've had all different styles and stuff and a lot of them didn't work out that well.
Josh:That's how you learn right yeah.
Colby Landin:So eventually I got hired for my first track build when I was 12. Seriously yeah, and then I probably got hired for two or three that year in the neighborhood and then it was kind of crazy my whole neighborhood had a bunch of good expert level BMXers after a few years.
Dane:Yeah, because they got a place to practice.
Josh:Yeah, and it was really competitive. Where did you grow up? Where?
Colby Landin:was it In Scottsdale. I've shared in the one-on-one Okay Um that's. That's a suburb of Phoenix for we've got listeners from all over the world, so for international listeners.
Josh:Phoenix is a is the biggest city in Arizona.
Dane:Yep.
Colby Landin:And one of the biggest Yep. So we moved over to. We had a you know basic house on acre horse property and the goal was to have a BMX track. So it slowly built over the years. But I got hired to build ones for the neighbors and then I kept getting better at it. So I got hired every year since I was 12 to do it.
Colby Landin:And I had other ideas for jobs, but I just ended up coaching for BMX racing as well as building, you know, three to five tracks a year. Now I build more like 10 tracks a year and come up here in the summer.
Dane:I got a good question what? What do you think is the biggest difference between building for BMXers versus mountain bikers?
Colby Landin:BMX has to be way more dialed in and the turns got to be a lot steeper. It has to work a lot more perfect. You can have a loose corner for mountain biking and people love it, and you could have it all slippery and slidey and people still can like it. In BMX you can't get away with anything being off. You'll definitely hear people talk about it.
Dane:So it's like the radius tighter on the on the burn.
Colby Landin:Yeah and that's the other thing is like a mountain bike stuff I can build very well with the tractor because it doesn't have to be near as vertical as a tight bmx turn yeah and then the other thing is to think about is with a tractor you want to be able to work every angle of a jump, so it helps a lot if you have space, and often when I'm working in backyards next to grass or gravel or just fitting it. It's very difficult to pack the crap out of it from every angle right.
Colby Landin:So the mountain bikes overall, you can work stuff from more angles and the dirt doesn't have to be near as clean. It's definitely um 50 easier, and then motocross is even 50 easier than that. So I built a lot of pit bike and suron tracks. It's actually my main source of building income these days right now.
Josh:Now the surons are getting serious man, those guys do big stuff my next three builds are suron tracks yeah, so you literally just started building them in your neighborhood as a kid, yep. And then you got good at it. You know, trial and error screwed some up, figured it out, got better. Dad had a Bobcat and then you just fell into it, man.
Colby Landin:I guess so yeah.
Dane:Yeah, that's pretty awesome. Is the dirt that you do you have to bring that dirt in for here at Sunrise, or can you use local dirt or do you have to sift it?
Colby Landin:Here at Sunrise, at least my. The other guys have to use whatever they come across on the trail.
Dane:Yeah.
Colby Landin:And every part of this mountain is different, like, I imagine, most mountains.
Dane:Yeah, it's like cindery in one spot and loamy in another.
Colby Landin:I think overall we have fantastic dirt, but we get a ton of rain up here at Sunnys. I've never been anywhere that rains this much. More than half the days I'm here it rains Probably more than three quarters, not usually a ton, but in years past, my first year here, it rained like crazy.
Dane:A ton yeah.
Colby Landin:It's kind of cool.
Dane:Yeah, the trails are better, so that helps.
Colby Landin:It helps 90% of the time, and then there's those gnarly rains that really like degrade, yeah you'll. Every trail will go down several notches like it'll be so good, and then it'll all disappear. However, this year this park's pretty new as far as all the stuff we've been building yeah that's why you guys are talking to us, but uh but we got a ton of drainage work done this year. That was a big plan, so it's made a big difference in sustainability, sustainability and maintenance.
Dane:So so I so. I've been riding here for decades, and I'm not joking like 20 to 30 years, and I'm not kidding when I say that yeah and some of these trails are the same trails but eroded, and that's what we always talk about with sunrises.
Dane:It's natural terrain. It's chunky, it's nasty. You'll get stuck in a rut. There'll be big rocks in the rut, you know, and you just have to. You know, it's a skill level and we trained here. You know, back in the day and and now it's like it's. We were talking about how fungus is the upper trail yeah, and that used to be the easiest trail. They built that to be the easiest trail. At one point.
Josh:That's a pretty. We brought a bunch of kids up with us this trip, so we got all these like 10 and 11 12-year-old ripping kids, yep, and we took them down fungus and it was a little rough for them.
Colby Landin:Yeah.
Dane:Evidently Turner almost fell off the mountain. He did rough for them, yeah yeah, evidently turner almost fell off the mountain. He did yeah, yeah, I didn't even know it, I was ripping with lacy or something, but uh, but, uh, but yeah, it's uh. So it's crazy, because now you can see, like sticks and stones, that's pretty much the same, they go and work on a little bit but slippery rock, I don't even know, like I won't ride that anymore. It's so hard, you know. And then, uh, what was the other?
Josh:chutes and ladders chutes and ladders, yard sale yard sale so, since we're jumping into the trails, why don't you, can you tell us, just like kind of, take us through the park here and give us a feel for?
Dane:well, first, what's your favorite?
Colby Landin:yeah, we'll start with that um well, um me being a coming from a little more expert pro level I like chutes and ladders. Uh, it's, it's so fast. I got to build up a ton of turns on it as well as um the bike park guy, manager brian, built up some turns with an excavator.
Josh:Um, so that trail is just such a high average speed yeah and I love going fast yeah um, that's a black trail or double black trail you know it was labeled double black, but all the work we've done on it, it's easier. It's a black now. Yeah, it's a black.
Colby Landin:If not, like you know, it's almost like an easy black.
Dane:And then there's maybe two or three sections where you got to look at them, you know, and like the first drop, you got to really look at that. Yeah, first drop in, and then you get into the corners, which are awesome. Yeah, it was really low me.
Colby Landin:We cut in like 20 new corners at the top and it's super loamy and we've actually like pushed tons more loam on there. I've actually the logs up there. Some of them will just turn into mulch, like literally can kick them and they'll just float apart. So we spent a while actually adding tons of mulch and loam and cleaning it out.
Dane:So it's super fun. There used to be a bunch of old pallets that they had like a. They had made a um, like a a skinny yeah skinny and had chicken wire on for a while and they just the the wood that they were on just disintegrated.
Colby Landin:Every year they got worse and worse. It is so rainy up here there's just mushrooms everywhere you look for half the summer. So, yeah, so okay.
Josh:So let's okay, let's talk about the trail rating. That's one thing I want to talk about Okay, because like we've been. We rode Durango this year Yep, we just came back last week in From Angel Fire came out here and I got to tell you like your blues are blacks at other mountains. Oh, we know, we know, oh, we know. I'm like all right, that's a sunrise blue, yeah, yeah. So if you come here and you red, blue.
Dane:it's going to be a black who gets to decide that.
Colby Landin:That's a good question. I mean, like they are blue based off of how gnarly everything else is. Yeah, but they're not a normal blue, they're relative to this park, it's a blue, but yeah.
Dane:Yeah.
Colby Landin:Everything is one step gnarlier here. For now, we're working hard on getting some more and more easier trails Are you going to have like pink trails or something, something below green.
Josh:Well, I think there is actually a couple.
Colby Landin:There's two lifts going here. I don't know if you ever taken the other lift. We didn't take the one. No, we didn't take the one. No, where's the other lift? It's on the right-hand side.
Josh:It only goes kind of halfway up the mountain or whatever.
Colby Landin:Yes, it goes to Midway and there's a fantastic new trail Chris and James Tonto guys built underneath that line. Easy Peasy.
Josh:Yes, we took that. We took that with the kids, okay, and I would agree with you.
Colby Landin:That is a real great trail. Yeah, it's a brand-new trail, so all I could say is I'm sure it needs a fresh rake out. It's first rake out ever.
Dane:That's where Julie got a flat, perfect green. I think that's a perfect green for us. I missed that. That's the second weekend I missed that.
Colby Landin:Yeah, the road gets a little too gnarly, in my opinion, for most of the time. But the road actually is here at Sunrise.
Josh:we actually have something like 30 trails, but some of them are kind of hard to find like we're still uh working on our signage and our connectors and we did run into a few trails like oh, what the hell is this?
Colby Landin:yeah, you hop on the map you hop on a road anywhere out here, you're gonna find a trail.
Dane:Yeah, there's so many, it's really cool, like I did see some signs, some new signs since last time we were here and and uh, i't even know the names. Half of them, everybody calls the one that we finish on to base.
Colby Landin:To base yeah.
Dane:And I think that's Pinedale.
Colby Landin:Pinedale, but it says to base as you enter it.
Dane:So, that's what all Turner and Jilly call it to base. We're going to ride to base.
Josh:We found one at the bottom of Yagi. You turn left right away. It's a blue trail, something identity crisis yes identity.
Dane:Yeah, that was a blast.
Colby Landin:Yeah, it's a lot of fun tanto gravity riders, they build all that stuff.
Dane:You can pop out midway and then it'll take you to the top of the jump line, or you know that.
Josh:Oh, I saw that little turn off to the right that's what, that is okay.
Dane:So the jump line did you help with that jump line?
Colby Landin:yeah, I built the whole jump yeah, they're nice man.
Dane:We just came from angel fire and some of the guys we rode with at angel fire were saying that the jumps here were better. Oh, wow, don't tell patrick that yeah I still couldn't clear the last two, so the last two are no oh, the last one's 38 feet yeah, dude, it's long ways.
Colby Landin:Oh wow, yeah, I have a video measuring them, because yeah this jump line, guys. So you know it's a unique line because it's in a straight line.
Dane:Yeah.
Colby Landin:They gave it to me and it was a wash in a straight line with very big trees on each side, and I had a big project for myself. It was how to build a base for drainage and then-.
Josh:That's on the left-hand side, right. Is that what that is on the left-hand side? Is that the drainage? No, underneath the jumps, Underneath right.
Dane:Yeah.
Colby Landin:It goes to the right and then it goes under a bridge. Under to the left. There's a pipe underneath the last set. It's the jumps Okay. Anyway, that jump line was difficult because it was so fast going in a straight line.
Dane:Yeah.
Colby Landin:And I don't know if I ever rode a jump line that was that long in a straight line.
Dane:Yeah.
Colby Landin:So it was really hard for me to figure out what speed people? Yeah, and to build jumps big enough to match the speed, cause there's no slowing down.
Josh:Yeah, there's no turn, or like did you put the whoops in the middle to help slow people down? Is that part of the?
Colby Landin:not necessarily to slow people down, but um, just to give it some here's the reason for the rhythm section. By the way, there's like 24 peaks in this rhythm section.
Dane:Really Lots of options. I think I skipped over most of them.
Colby Landin:There's a left line and a right line.
Dane:Yeah.
Colby Landin:And the left line is just, it's not really built out yet. The reason for the rhythm is it's so hard for me to get dirt in there. I have to bring a dump truck up and we've only had a little dump truck and I get about 10 scoops in my tractor, which some of those jumps have hundreds of scoops of dirt, and we brought up like um, maybe 70 dump truck loads last summer wow, that's 70 trips.
Colby Landin:Yeah, and then another 70 the first year wow and this year only about 15 wow, okay um, and we have to lower a couple jumps in the beginning to, because they're fixing a zipline course which goes above the jump line.
Josh:Yeah, I saw the cables so you don't want the zipliners to hit the jump line? Yeah, exactly yeah. I can see that I can't wait to get some cool videos. Timing it, timing it perfectly, yeah.
Colby Landin:So, anyways, the first two jumps were a little risky for the zip liners going above us Like you'd hit them. Yeah, like they hit a kick your head.
Dane:Wow, oh my gosh, I want to see that.
Colby Landin:That's awesome I mean that zip line's like 30 feet off the ground, not at the first jump. No, yeah. No, it's probably more like 20 feet, but when someone big is, on it, they'll sag a couple more feet.
Josh:Right.
Dane:And you know, with them hanging down, if you hit a jump you get 10 feet in the air. No worries here, because I get about two inches off the jumps.
Colby Landin:Yeah.
Dane:But that'd be sweet to time the zip liner with a GoPro.
Colby Landin:Yeah.
Dane:To follow, you know.
Colby Landin:Yeah, so the rhythm section was like I had a thousand feet of space, a huge flat space in the middle of this jump run and it was like kind of in the middle. It's kind of the hardest to get dirt in there because I have to drive one scoop at a time over all the jumps, messing them up, drop one scoop and then go get more and of course I scrape up all I can and dig the wash deeper or base stuff. But it's a it's a tough project. So I could either build one jump and still have 900 feet and nothing, or I could build a whole rhythm and, um, I knew I could build something fun and it's one of those sections that if you only have one one run left to do, I almost say don't do it, cause it's such a it's a little confusing until you've done it a couple of times.
Dane:Yes, right, right, right, but it's pretty safe.
Colby Landin:I've blitzed it before and stuff like that.
Dane:I go through there and it's awesome. It's like motorcycle whoops. Yeah, you know, and I'll clear the first couple and then I'll just start pumping. You know the racing stairs at the U of A that we did. That's the technique just pumping like crazy. So it's pretty cool. I like the jump line. I'm pretty impressed.
Colby Landin:That's going to keep getting better, so let's talk about.
Josh:So you've got two lifts one that goes halfway up, one that goes all the way up. There's two parts of this mountain too, right.
Colby Landin:There's the main part and then there's like a climb trail that goes up to another area. This is big news guys, yeah, I haven't written this stuff. Um, yeah, sunrise we're gonna be over probably doubling the size of the park. Um, we still gotta build out the trails, but we're gonna open up a the mountain above this. So there's actually like eight, I think, lifts that work here at sunrise yeah in the winter it's a huge park, wow. So so in the sun. So next summer we're gonna be be opening Apache Peak.
Dane:Nice.
Colby Landin:And that midway lift we were talking about with Easy Peasy. We're going to supposedly take some of those chairs and put them over there on Apache Peak so we can at least have access over there.
Dane:Oh, that's awesome, because there's like three or four runs over there.
Colby Landin:Yeah, and it goes over 11,000 feet over there. Wow, and then you yeah, we still have a lot of work to do, but that forest and uh, mountain is a is a bit different over there, even a little more um, lush and fern forests and stuff very pacific northwest vibes over there lots, of so better big mossy boulders. I'd say overall a lot better dirt.
Dane:Yeah, that's so exciting. Like I said, I've been coming here for a long, long time and we've always felt like this could outdo everything in the country if you build it and they will come. You know what I mean, and it seems like that's working.
Colby Landin:It seems like what you guys are doing is working. We're far away from big populations, but I see it as a destination kind of place. For from big populations but, I, see it as a destination kind of place, for sure. Yeah, like a come stay here for a weekend, or we're often open for up until next weekend. We've been open Wednesday through Sunday.
Josh:Yeah, and starting next weekend you guys are going to be just the weekends, right?
Dane:Yep, yep, yeah, and then how long?
Colby Landin:Is it up in the air or, I think, mid-october?
Dane:Mid-October. Okay, yeah, probably depends on the weather, don't?
Colby Landin:take my word for that. Check Sunrise Park Resortcom. Yeah, check the website.
Josh:All right, so are e-bikes allowed here.
Colby Landin:Yes, okay.
Josh:So you got a little climb trail, it'd be great for an e-bike, if you bring a good e-bike, you can get over to the other mountain and there's two or three, four trails open over there.
Colby Landin:right now there's three trails on the other mountain. They're really long, they're awesome trails, they're all pretty straight down the mountain kind of trails, and all the trails end up on this trail called Loma Zona, which goes over this really beautiful creek a few times and right now you have to pop out and ride over a hill back to this parking lot because it's a big resort. There's two parking lots Apache parking lot and this one, or I guess it's Cyclone.
Dane:Cyclone. Is this Apache over here?
Colby Landin:And this is Sunrise parking lot Sunrise.
Dane:Okay, yeah, I'm pretty sure.
Colby Landin:Anyways, you've got to ride over this big hill if you're going to ride the other mountain right now and there's no lift access to it currently. This big hill if you're going to ride the other mountain right now and there's no lift access to it currently. So next year we'll have that lift open and you can just do laps on it, and then the first trail we're trying to build is from there back to this parking lot, so you don't have to ride over a big hill on your last run.
Dane:You can take a trail down so if you got a downhill bike or something, yeah, you don't have to yeahank over a quarter mile, like it's not a big hill, but it takes 10 minutes if you're going casual, yeah, and then you got four or five green trails, I think.
Colby Landin:Yeah, I mean. The most popular trail, without a doubt, is Jage. Yeah, it means antelope in Apache.
Josh:Okay.
Colby Landin:So a lot of our names up here are Apache names for different animals.
Josh:Right on, because the resort is actually owned by the Apache Indians.
Colby Landin:Yeah, this is really cool. It's the only resort in the country, or maybe the world, I don't know. That's Native American, ran on Native American reservation.
Josh:Right.
Colby Landin:There's other Native American ran park, I guess, or parks, but this is the only one that's on like their own reservation and not like on forest service land or something like that. So what is?
Josh:that. So like we went up, like we've spent a lot of time in Angel Fire and we talk with Patrick West he's the bike park manager and Tucker Van Ormer. He's like their lead. Yeah, do you know, tucker?
Colby Landin:I know.
Josh:Yeah, he's great, you guys. You guys probably get along. Yeah, you would high five like crazy. He's a cool guy. I can introduce you if you want. But that park up in Angel Fire is private land and so if they want to go change a trail that day, they can just go do it, whereas every other park in the country they've got to go through years of approval with the Forest Service.
Dane:Is it the?
Josh:same here, what's? The process to get a new trail approved or get something changed.
Colby Landin:It's different and interesting. It's a tough question, honestly, as weird as that sounds. You know, there's the bike park manager and he has to ask approval for what he's building and then basically I'm going along with whatever Brian the bike park manager says. Now it's also like tribal approval and all that, so I don't deal with that. But lately, the last few years, so I think four years ago Sunrise got a new park manager, todd.
Josh:Right.
Colby Landin:And Todd is not a bike guy by any means.
Josh:Right.
Colby Landin:But he's him and, along with tribal leaders, have allowed us to take on biking more biking stuff than in the past. How do I say it? There's been people up here that didn't want to push for bikes in the past.
Josh:Right.
Colby Landin:And that changed about three years ago.
Colby Landin:Okay, I came up changed about three years ago. Okay, um, I came up here asking four years ago. Um, I said, so what, what can we build here? Or I said what can't we build here, can you know, is there any? Or, sorry, I was like can we build jumps, gap, jumps, wood drops, you know what rock sections and the? And um, there was a tribal leader up here and he, he said, yeah, I think we should be able to build all that. And I was like, really, what? Well, what can't we build? And he's like, I don't know, I think we could start building whatever.
Josh:And I was like well, I build jumps and tracks. Here's my number and um.
Colby Landin:I got a call the next summer. So it really was a kind of dream come true kind of job for me to like just come up here and ask questions and then have it happen.
Dane:Well, plus, getting out of the heat during the summer has got to be awesome.
Colby Landin:That's a big reason I'm up here.
Josh:I got to tell you, like you know, just I've been mountain biking for 20 years and I've heard about people coming up here and I always heard that there's kind of backcountry, real real rugged, real wild, you know, and so I had really low expectations. This weekend is the first weekend I've come and we get up there and we go on this first trail which was jog a and I was like, holy shit, this is awesome.
Colby Landin:Yeah, it just reworked that. I had nothing to do with that. All credit to James and Chris Tonto. Gravity riders. They come up here usually Friday through Sunday and sometimes Wednesday through Sunday, and they work pretty much every second that they're up here.
Dane:Yeah, that's awesome. The last couple weeks they worked their butts off to kind of redo. Oh my God, well, shout out to those guys, man. Yeah, they're pretty awesome.
Josh:We should probably get them on too.
Dane:We should Tonto Grabby Riders. They're doing stuff in Globe too, yeah.
Josh:Globe, and then I told you I saw them down at Mount Graham.
Colby Landin:They've been building trails for like 20 or 30 years. I don't want to get the numbers wrong.
Josh:Yeah, for a long time, yeah, their whole life. They know what they're doing. Yep, if you haven't been down to Mount Graham, you should go check it out.
Colby Landin:Oh, they've told me about it.
Dane:Yeah, they told me that that list place to go.
Josh:Yeah, that should be his uh bucket list as kind of like um, what's the moab ride the? Oh uh, whole enchilada and it's a. It's one of those kind of places.
Colby Landin:It's 17 miles downhill, 6800 feet of decline, yeah, yeah and I hear it's just a very, very unique, uh, mountainous plants, animals all kinds of stuff, yeah, like really unique stuff.
Dane:Yeah, check out Mount Graham. That's really cool. Josh will shuttle you.
Colby Landin:It's supposed to be like the most sheer mountain in the state, like highest elevation drop.
Josh:Yeah, it's big. I mean it's a big mountain, it feels big mountain to you?
Dane:Yeah, we don't get too much of that here in.
Josh:Arizona, but it's awesome, all right, you got several black trails too, like what are your favorite black?
Dane:Yeah, yeah, you never and I probably interrupted you, but uh, you never said what your favorite trail is.
Colby Landin:I think I did. I said shoots and ladders. Oh, that's right, he did. Did you ride that one? I did, I did ride it.
Dane:And he's right the corners at the bar, kind of steep, and then you've got that skinny plank that you have to go up and over.
Josh:When Dane says kind of steep, that usually means really freaking steep. So just for our listeners, but like Lacey was telling me that skinny plank freaked her out. You know cause she doesn't, she doesn't do skinny yeah.
Dane:And but you go up and then it's a big, a big platform down to the bottom, to another corner, then to another corner.
Colby Landin:Kind of Angel Fire-esque trail, in my opinion.
Josh:They've got a Chutes and Ladders trail there as well.
Colby Landin:They do, but this one. I haven't been there in a while, but I love that place.
Dane:This one's Berms. It's Chutes and Berms.
Colby Landin:Chutes and Berms yeah. It really is Dude, it's fast.
Josh:Yeah, maybe you should change the name to Chutes and Berms.
Dane:It is a great trail to World. Cup and then East Ridge.
Colby Landin:That's a double black, at least East.
Dane:Ridge drop is no joke. You come in, there's like three lines you can hit. And the left hand one's weird, the straight over the top is like a double drop, so you drop and then you have to drop again into the middle of the trail. And then the right hand one, which is the one I do because I'm a sissy Chunky. Yeah, it's chunky, but I mean, for me it was no problem.
Colby Landin:Yeah, just to carry a little speed.
Dane:Yeah, it would slow you down on a race, though, because I think they had a race.
Josh:Dane's a downhill race.
Colby Landin:The race I was here for the race and, man, it was dry at that time, and it was a hundred people set up there just watching just, was that the big mountain girl hang on? Yeah, that's what was that yeah yeah, there was a stage down there and it was the best spot on the mountain to sit and watch yeah, because it's.
Dane:You can see some carnage oh jeez people flying off the trail.
Josh:Yeah, I think I think that double drop is where mike adams broke his hand that could be Because if you do it and you don't do, it right If there was anywhere.
Dane:Yeah.
Josh:That'd be the place. Yeah, there's lots of places, lots of places.
Dane:So that's the crazy thing about, I think, this mountain that I've always loved is it's severe. You know it's pretty severe.
Josh:What you guys have been doing is making it more accessible to more people, which I mean we had seven kind of nine to 13 year old kids with us that are that are. They're good, but they're. They're beginners.
Dane:Yeah, they're kids and they loved it.
Josh:I mean they were like like the lift was closing and they were like all crying Like, oh, come on yeah.
Colby Landin:So, um, anyways, I got hired for these jumps and stuff and, um, I've been, I, I I don't get to necessarily take the lift down to hit all my stuff. So I've been wanting to, I had been wanting to finish all my jumps so that I could go work on all these trails like chutes and ladders, and stuff but.
Colby Landin:I don't know if the park here doesn't fully understand how important like raking out a trail is, because these trails are like, seriously, in my opinion, like a nine out of 10, I've been in a lot of places when they're clean but then a few weeks later they don't get taken care of.
Josh:They go down to a 6 or a 5. So what's the process? Who's actually maintaining the trails? Is it the Tonto guys?
Colby Landin:No, I don't actually know. They maintain their trails, jage Cartoon Forest Easy Peasy. I'm sure I'm forgetting some. They even help build fungus and chutes and ladders, old stuff and yard sales.
Colby Landin:They've helped with everything. So, anyways, they don't help too much with maintenance. They're more on the build crew now. They're trying to build stuff and rebuild stuff Same with me, but I finished my project. So I was trying to show the bike park manager and the ski patrol people here help with the trails and I'm really thankful they do. And I had a meeting. I'm sure I would love to talk about it. I had a meeting with the park manager and bike park manager the other day or we went to dinner but I was telling them how important raking these trails out are and next year we should have a full-time guy, one full-time guy, for trail maintenance. I know it's nothing special, no, it's good. And then the ski patrol people also help in their free time and they just love to help out. Sometimes our bike shop people come and help out. This whole park is ran. Every employee, except for some of us builders, is Apache and yeah, lately we've had kind of meetings about who could help.
Dane:So a long time ago, James used to organize.
Colby Landin:So we're trying to teach people.
Dane:Yeah.
Colby Landin:It's in that process. We're in the beginning, yeah, beginning out here.
Dane:So a long time ago when they really weren't building stuff, they were just maintaining. James would organize volunteers and a lot would come up and they would basically I think the park would say look, we're going to cover your lift ticket.
Colby Landin:Yeah.
Dane:And they would come up early for two hours and walk down and like clean up a trail. I built one of the drops on project trail. There's a log drop. I helped build that Like I I love going over it Cause I go I built that Like it was a log and and built it up and now you drop off of it and it's little, it's not a big deal but, it's still kind of fun. I wonder if that is something that would work out, or do you have to have highly trained people?
Colby Landin:No, I think we mainly need, even like the rakes they had, weren't the?
Dane:right rakes I grew up landscaping.
Colby Landin:I have an obsession with tools I got $1,000 in rakes or more, so I actually ordered them the right rakes.
Josh:What are the best rakes? What are the best rakes to get Home Depot right? Home Depot right.
Colby Landin:Actually, yeah, you could get a True Temper like just a hard metal leaf rake. You don't want the long. They're called tines the little things.
Dane:You don't want the soft ones.
Colby Landin:No, you want a hard metal tined rake. Um a hard metal leaf rake. You know, the home depot ones are about 15 to 20 bucks, if I remember, and um, my favorite ones I get from a landscape supply store or you can order them online. I ordered a couple for them. Up here is a corona leaf rake okay. Corona makes tools, all kinds of trimming tool, you know landscaping tools.
Josh:Yeah, that's good quality stuff.
Colby Landin:But I order a Corona leaf rake. I find it after having bought five different hard metal leaf rakes. I find that one to be the stiffest and be able to scoop the heaviest rocks and flick the rocks the furthest.
Josh:Yeah.
Colby Landin:I bought some other, many different brands okay, I found ones that uh, where we're too wide, I'd get too many rocks in my shoes oh, I'm uh raking, because you're raking really fast, yeah, so anyways, I prefer uh corona do you ever use the mcleods, the the trail building tools I don't know, I don't. I have my own little secret trail in Payson, but I don't do a ton of trail building. You know, I'm mostly building tracks all year.
Dane:Yeah.
Colby Landin:Big tracks with my tractor moving thousands of tons of dirt.
Dane:Yeah, I think if I could get a bobcat from Home Depot, I would.
Josh:So when you build a jump, how much of it can you do actually with the machine and how much do you have to do with handwork?
Colby Landin:Like for this whole 100% up here by machine.
Josh:Really yeah, so you're not finishing it with.
Colby Landin:Aside from the slalom course where there are very steep corners, which that's a lot of handwork, every other jump I've built is 100% machine, wow, yeah.
Josh:You must be like really good with that machine Well, and the edges are so sharp and precise on them Like it's pretty cool I've been in a skid steer since I was seven. Oh wow, it's been my only job, so you're like a skid steer wizard, yeah.
Colby Landin:Nice, I probably drove 100 different skid steers. Wow, I drove 100 different skid steers.
Dane:Wow, you're making me so jealous right now.
Colby Landin:Yeah, I did some grading work on the side, but nowadays I tell people mostly I just build tracks.
Dane:I own a bike shop and people are like when I retire I want to work in a bike shop. And I'm like when I retire, I want to get a skid steer and just drive around.
Josh:Yeah, just scoop up dirt, yeah.
Dane:Seriously.
Josh:We'll swap jobs. So what are you most excited about that's coming up here.
Colby Landin:Oh, the lift for Apache.
Josh:So you think that'll be next year.
Colby Landin:Yes, so that was when I had dinner with the park manager and bike park manager, todd and Brian, three nights ago. Three nights ago we went out, and a big reason for these improvements, too, we should mention, is this mountain coaster we got.
Josh:Yes.
Colby Landin:Got a three million plus dollar mountain coaster up here, which is actually really fun. I rode it four or five times in a row. One day they were wanting us to test it.
Josh:So you were the test dummy.
Colby Landin:Yeah, but a few days after.
Josh:You let them try it first.
Colby Landin:Yeah, but they built it really really well. They went over the top to make sure it's awesome and then it is. You have a tough time on your first run or two not hitting the brakes. It'll pull some Gs on you and surprise you, I'm an adrenaline junkie and I thought it'd be lame, but it's not, so bring your family up if you want. Now there's something for the whole family to do, which is awesome, so you got to get the airbag jumps airbag jump.
Colby Landin:That's what hurts the most people out here. Go ahead and hit that and then they have this airbag we have is like massive.
Josh:I mean it's 100 feet wide by 100 feet. Yeah, it's like an R Willey airbag.
Colby Landin:And then you jump off the rock climbing wall, like there's a building with the rock climbing wall that's 60 feet tall and there's levels to it so you can pick however high you want to go. And then there's a zip line course which is going to be back up and running. It hasn't been running in five years.
Josh:We saw some people on it today.
Colby Landin:No just the last one.
Dane:There's a six of them, oh, six of them. So they were only doing a short, short distance down to the base. It's amazing course.
Colby Landin:Like it's to do, six zip lines and you take the lift up and zip line course down and so it's like a real adventure and like it's beautiful through the trees and stuff.
Josh:So what is it? Are they going like to Midway now? And then what they're doing right now? Midway, okay, yeah.
Colby Landin:And six. Don't quote me on that. I guess I was six. I think it's still six. They just redid a bunch of it. Yeah, anyways, that's why I got to cut down the jump on the jump line. Nando's jump line has got to get cut down the first jump who's Nando? Nando is a guy who's been up here. I don't know how many years he actually lives on. This lives very, very close to here Right over here, he's been here like 20-plus years.
Colby Landin:Really cool. Native guy, Apache guy. I talk to him for hours all the time.
Dane:Right.
Colby Landin:Yeah, their culture up here is wildly, wildly different in the way they think and the way they communicate and treat each other, and everything is like visiting a different country.
Dane:Honestly, Right, yeah, that's pretty awesome, yeah, so it's cool to get that exposure.
Colby Landin:Yeah, and I think that's the most misunderstood thing about this park.
Dane:Yeah.
Colby Landin:As you know, it's all about them.
Josh:This park's built for them to have you know, awesome place to work, a source of income.
Colby Landin:And a source of income and all that stuff and they don't need to do the mountain bike stuff. It can actually disappear at any moment if the next park manager is like hey, I don't feel like it. It's not a normal park in that sense, so that's tough for a lot of people. Everybody has their opinions.
Josh:Right, but if they see the economics, yeah.
Colby Landin:And that's what us white people all worry about is economics, but it's all about them having a good time and like a good workplace, and they want to be treated well and have, you know, everybody else be happy. They want everyone to be happy, so um well, we're super happy as much as they the money is important. They make sure to let you know that's not what they care about. It's that there's a good workplace and a good place for people to come have fun.
Dane:It's cool. You come up here for as many years as I have and it's the same faces. Like I see the same people and I got to tell you I feel a little guilty that I don't know their names but every time it's the same people and you get to say hi and you get to see them and thank you and be cordial to them and be cordial to them. But it's not just a rotation of random people, they're real people that are up here.
Colby Landin:Yeah and there's multiple generations of families that have worked here and you can't just be some white guy coming in and having all these opinions. It doesn't settle well with people.
Josh:You've got to be really respectful.
Colby Landin:It's not a normal park in that sense.
Josh:So what would you recommend as a mountain biker when you come to this park? Yeah, what's the attitude or vibe or what should you bring with you to have the best experience and make sure that you're being respectful of what they have here?
Colby Landin:Well, first of all, bring a rain jacket if you come here You'd be shocked. This is very much like visiting Washington or something up here. I've been up here my three summers and it rains a lot. Anyways, just say hi to these people, are? They keep to themselves, but they're so friendly If you they're not going to go out of their way to.
Josh:Strike up a conversation.
Colby Landin:No, not really, but if you do, they will talk to you for as long as you want. They're very, very nice people. So I just say you know, be very friendly. And I've only had great experiences so well, that's awesome, just be cool.
Josh:That applies anywhere. It does.
Dane:They're a little more reserved until you say hi, and then they're the nicest people in the world yeah they're not gonna um not too bad not too bad mouth angel fire, but every time we got our bikes at angel fire we would say thank you to the people who unload them for us and they got headphones on. Yeah, they, they had very zero, zero personality every time today that I did that.
Josh:The guys are like hey, no problem yeah, I said, I always say thank you very much.
Colby Landin:There's Angel Fire. I've had the word. And I love Angel Fire, I've been to so many bike parks and I try to do a big. I didn't this year, but the last six years I did a big mountain bike trip up California, oregon, washington, wyoming, colorado, back around. I went to Bentonville for three weeks last summer or more, and anyways, I still tell people Angel Fire is my favorite park to ride. I love going fast. Yeah, and that place is just you're in the zone.
Dane:Yeah.
Colby Landin:And I rode some other places like that, but Angel Fire has the most like good trails.
Josh:Yeah.
Colby Landin:But I will say it's sad to say this, but it is what it is. I've seen uh like one of a gnarly bar fight last I was there um, that sounds fun. Yeah, I had horror. I've had just bad service over and over. If I'm going to dinner or something and you're like in a nice ski resort town, it's just my experience. I know other people have different experiences. But, the attitude in the town is not the greatest.
Dane:in my opinion it's a little more fun up here. I gotta tell you, my wife loves it up here much better they got way better trails.
Colby Landin:They're way ahead of us.
Dane:I gotta tell you Some people love the rawness up here. Do you think that this mountain can take out Angel Fire if you guys keep doing what you're doing?
Colby Landin:No, I mean they have Texas over there as a huge population place A mountain of trails. You have two mountains we're going to pass up tons of parks in the mountain of trails. What we're allowed to build, you know, we just had a trail open yesterday Ridge West. It's under the lift to the left but, awesome, awesome new trail. You enter this boulder field underneath the lift where there's a steep drop off this ridge. We're building several trails through this ridge.
Josh:You can see it from the lift. It's a gnarly thing, people, right now.
Dane:Well, the one under the lift I've seen that's been there forever where you can get that In the trees to the left.
Colby Landin:It's like a little Narnia land over there.
Dane:Oh, that's cool.
Colby Landin:You wouldn't believe it. There's literally like little tunnels and stuff, but there's 30, 40 foot boulders just caked in moss and there's ferns growing in there and you're like you don't realize it's just right over there.
Dane:Is this on the left If you're coming down or on the left when you're going on?
Colby Landin:the right coming down you know I built those. Jumps under the lift yeah. You pass that and then there. So there's bonita, and then you would pass bonita and east ridge. Yeah, and go a couple hundred more feet and down the hill and um underneath the lift yeah and then there's a new trail, like they just trimmed through the grass. I mean, it's, it's, we're working on our signage yeah, there is some signs there.
Dane:I'm bummed, I didn't get to ride that you didn't see it I didn't, I didn, didn't.
Colby Landin:And there's like three or four different runs down this ridge and you guys should look up some videos right now, because there's some cool lines where you're literally like 15-foot boulder on each side and you're going down this awesome chute.
Dane:Maybe we will come back tomorrow. Anyways, it's really wet in there. That sounds awesome. Yeah, I feel like this mountain could rival Angel Fire. I really do.
Colby Landin:It's stunningly beautiful and there's a lot of cool unique spots.
Colby Landin:That's one thing. This year I've got to do a lot more because in the last couple years I got stuck on a slalom course or a jump line the whole time I was here. So this year I got to really ride and explore a bit. I did a little in the past, but man, I found so much cool stuff this year. I couldn't believe how diverse this place is. And then Apache is totally different. That mountain up there is above this mountain and it's a wonderful place.
Dane:I can't wait for everyone to ride it, you get to the top of this and you think you're on top of the world and then, you look over and there's a bigger mountain right there what the heck?
Josh:yeah, how many people go over and ride it? Is that getting a lot of riders right now?
Colby Landin:yeah, especially e-bikers, you know if you got an e-bike, you can get to those trails in 10 minutes um if you're pushing up, it's 25 probably how's the signage for that, if you're? Pushing up, it's 25 probably. How's the signage for that? I mean not very good, but you can't get lost on them, like there's only three trails and they all merge into one trail, so there's no like side trails that you might like get lost on or anything.
Josh:I'll just go down bro.
Dane:Yeah, Maybe I'll come, you know if you can make any suggestions to them. There's two things that I would like you to bring up when you're talking, here we go. One is half day pass, okay, and two is kid pricing. Oh okay, you know, like 12 and under, 13 and under. Yeah, do 13, because I have a 13-year-old Do, 13 and under. Yeah, those are the two things that-.
Josh:That would drive more traffic.
Dane:Well, not just drive traffic, but make it more family friendly.
Colby Landin:And that grows everything.
Josh:So, that was the only thing that I think I've ever and the kids all want to do the other stuff too, right, they want to do the mountain coaster, oh yeah, and the airbag. They want to do the zip line, the trail that feeds into the-.
Dane:Tubing slide.
Colby Landin:Oh, is there a tube slide as well? Yeah, it's right over here, okay.
Dane:They have all kinds. It's crazy.
Josh:How much stuff?
Dane:They have a jumping castle that they put up.
Colby Landin:Yeah, a couple of blow-up stuff down low if you're hanging out with your kids.
Dane:There's a volleyball net and they always have balls and stuff. They have cornhole yeah.
Colby Landin:Your whole family can be hanging out playing and doing a picnic in the base while I'm riding, you know? And uh yeah, we got a new restaurant this year yeah, great food, um yeah, and there's two restaurants one up top.
Josh:You can have dinner or lunch up top and have like oh, at the top 300 degree view.
Colby Landin:Yeah, yeah, it's actually one of the best spots to eat lunch.
Dane:Yeah, they have fry bread, but then they do like a fry bread taco. Yeah, yeah.
Colby Landin:There's different food at the restaurant up top than down low.
Josh:Yep Okay.
Colby Landin:If you come here. Yeah, if you want to get Indian fry bread, you have to go up to the top.
Dane:Yeah, it's pretty awesome yeah. I was riding the Lyft with a couple who could not decide if they were going to get the sweet fried bread or they were going to get the taco fried bread.
Colby Landin:We should probably explain to our listeners what fried bread is. It's bread that's fried. I mean, this is Arizona stuff. It's like a sopapilla. Yeah, mexico stuff Very fluffy, delicious bread. It's traditionally, from what I know, a lot of honey and powdered sugar on top, but you can eat it with savory meals as well. It's sweet and savory you can even use the fry bread to make a burger. They sell fry bread burgers.
Josh:It's Apache Burger. That'd be good, that'd be really good, it's so good.
Colby Landin:Yeah, the Apache Burger is actually very good.
Dane:And you can sit up on the patio and look at, like most of northern Arizona.
Josh:It's amazing, you know it's awesome, amazing views up there, for sure I'd say, my favorite part up here it sounds silly is the clouds.
Colby Landin:I mean with how many rainstorms come through and whatnot. It's kind of a bummer. The park closes at 4, 4. You've got to be out of here by 5 because in the summer I've seen so many unbelievable sunsets up here.
Dane:Oh really.
Colby Landin:And throughout the day the clouds look magical all the time.
Dane:Yeah, they should do like a sunset sightseeing lift.
Colby Landin:Yeah, there's a few days a year that you that you can take the lift down um in the evening and stuff and it's really cool.
Colby Landin:Yeah, that's another thing we didn't talk about is I saw a lot of people hiking, so a lot of people, yeah, kind of yeah, so lift up and then hike down, yeah, I should mention that is, um up until very recently, maybe even this weekend kind of thing is, uh, the scenic lift rides and, you know, hiking down as part of that just that lift ticket is spend. The biggest source of income for sunrise, um, throughout the summer? Yeah, we've never. They've. Sunrise has never historically been profitable up here in the summer.
Colby Landin:They make money in the winter yeah, they do huge money in the winter, but the summer has never really made money up here, so just now. But mountain bikes are about to pass, or we're kind of in that zone where we're starting to pass the scenic lift riders for the first time in sunrise history that's awesome.
Josh:I'll tell you when, with the episode we do with angel fire. Yeah, patrick told us the same thing yeah, we're about.
Colby Landin:Even they do more, they do more scenic yeah than they do mountain bikes, bikes.
Josh:I wouldn't, have guessed that at Angel Fire I wouldn't have either.
Colby Landin:We're battling with that. That's been me and Tonto Gravity guys' goal is to have more mountain bikers than scenic lift riders.
Dane:You guys are doing a great job of that, by the way.
Colby Landin:Yeah, I remember I think the first year we came up, we had like a 15% increase, um, and then another 15. And then this year has been like a 20 something.
Dane:Yeah, it's I. I love it Cause I again, I keep saying this I've been up here so much. I've seen it evolve, I've seen it devolve. There was a couple of years where it went backwards and they did nothing. And there was one year, in fact, they just closed and they just would not open. Yeah, and for mountain bikers, for mountain bikers, yeah, and so like to see this, that what you guys are doing and everything I, I hope that the tribe likes it. I know that their motivation isn't money, but, um, I hope they know that partial, you know.
Colby Landin:Obviously they're creating happiness. Yeah, I hope they know their, how much happiness they're creating yeah, that's the big thing is they need to see that this is worth it going forward. That's why I've put in a lot of tons of extra time from what they hired me for is hopefully I have a job for the future and hopefully we have a spot to ride for the future.
Dane:Yeah.
Colby Landin:Sick.
Josh:Yeah, I tell you what, man? I don't think that many people know about this place the way it is right now.
Dane:It's getting out there through social media and through videos and people talking this podcast.
Colby Landin:I hope people hear this and get Joe to come out. Yeah, To get people out here. I want to tell them a couple of things. Go for it One. We had our hotel mess. A water pipe blew up in there last year. They did a $2 million renovation. It got ruined. And so the last few years. That's a big part because it's kind of a far destination up here.
Josh:Yeah, for a lot of people we had to stay in Lakeside, which is about 40 minutes away or something.
Colby Landin:So their lodge up here has had a little issues and now it just hadn't. After that they put in another, another three million, getting it back and wow, or something close to that.
Dane:I shouldn't say numbers exactly but a lot in a bunch and it's an awesome, amazing building overlooking a stunning lake yeah and you can see the ski resort from the other side of the building.
Colby Landin:Um, but this awesome lodge that's so fun for mountain bikers. It has a pool in the center of it. It's like a very like um interesting building it's like a 70s fun.
Josh:Yeah, it's super fun.
Colby Landin:There's a pool in the middle with a, the bar and the pool tables next to it you could.
Josh:So it's all.
Colby Landin:So it's all open and fully functional now no, it's all open, functional and they're literally like just putting door numbers on the doors. It's so fresh and fully functional now. No, it's all open and functional and they're literally just putting numbers on the doors.
Josh:It's so fresh and new. Oh, wow, okay.
Colby Landin:I helped my friends move into their room. We couldn't figure out what number it was because they hadn't even put the numbers up.
Dane:That's how fresh and new, all this stuff is so next year that will be or next weekend, or next weekend.
Colby Landin:Yeah, so next year like that, or next weekend, or next weekend, yeah, yeah.
Josh:So anyways, all this stuff is two weeks because it's coming along well. I might put this one out earlier. Okay, I'll talk to carlos. Make sure he's okay with it just because so that it lines up.
Dane:Carlos doesn't listen, he won't know.
Josh:He won't know but it lines up better with their season.
Colby Landin:So if we can get out earlier, yeah and then, uh, the trailer park that we have up here um is awesome and improving, and there'll be more and more places for people to come with their RVs right in the years past, up until just recently, it's been really hard for hardcore mountain bikers who travel with a trailer, like you guys and all this stuff, to have a place to park nearby and facilities and dump sites and power and all this stuff. It's all coming.
Dane:Oh, that's awesome. That's great. Yeah, we need that. You're getting me so psyched, dude, you really are.
Colby Landin:Yeah, they sound like they're in it for the long term up here, so I'm pumped on that.
Dane:It's so good to hear because again I've said this multiple times. I've been here, I've seen it so long and it's just so much different and so much better than it has been.
Josh:So if you're listening to this, you need to get your ass out of here. Yeah, you really do, and it's family.
Dane:now I mean truthfully, this was a hard mountain to ride. You had to come out with some serious cojones to hit it before, and now we're bringing six and eight-year-olds and nine-year-olds.
Colby Landin:Geesh. Up until last year there was basically double black, so it's almost eight, yeah, and now we have 15 other trails that are definitely less than a double black.
Dane:Yeah.
Colby Landin:Now, from the top there's about seven trails and that splits into a total of over 30, you know, with all the options. So that gets a little confusing. It's not 30 from the top.
Dane:Yeah.
Colby Landin:But from Midway there's gotta be 20 different trails you could choose at Midway.
Josh:That's awesome With the kids. We pretty much went down Yage every time.
Dane:And then we would just join different things, denny.
Colby Landin:Crisis or the cartoon forest. You can even ride down the jump line. It's very rideable. It totally is rideable.
Josh:We took the kids down there, it's rollable. That one section's got. The gap jumps underneath the lift.
Colby Landin:That's a different line, yeah, yeah. So they told me I could build little kickers over the wash.
Dane:Yeah, yeah.
Colby Landin:That's what I built. Those are little kickers. They look, they, they look totally doable.
Josh:They were like holy shit.
Colby Landin:There's a couple of those washes that are wide, but there is like what is there Got to be like seven jumps in a row under the lift and maybe the last big jump is close. 38 feet probably in that 35 foot plus that rock kicker over. I made it so you could double it now.
Dane:I like the rock kicker because you don't have to double it. It's not a gap. You can land short, which I do all the time, you know and so I can hit that one. And then there's another one on the side. There's little ones, you know, that people don't even know about, like I was jumping down Yagi and there's little jumps that jump you into these descents and it was so, so much fun.
Josh:I couldn't believe how many times, going up to lift, we saw big groups of guys like 10 or 12, or, in women, groups like 10 or 12. Just just shredders.
Dane:Yeah.
Josh:Just hauling ass down. Like we saw them, we had to have been the Northern Arizona mountain bike team. Yeah, cause they all had Northern Arizona.
Dane:Yeah, yeah, there's, I mean, there's so many Tucsonans.
Colby Landin:So we've come up. Yes, that's us. Yeah, yeah, phoenix flagstaff, you have people from new mexico.
Dane:Uh-huh, um did you know mexico too, tons of mexicans.
Colby Landin:Yeah, yeah, dude I rode with uh 20 mexicans today for three runs.
Dane:I rode with uh roberto today and he was new his first time, and so he followed turn they're the most fun.
Josh:Oh, that's, that's who was up there.
Dane:Okay, yeah and turn and turner's like telling him where to go. Okay, you go this way. You know, my nine-year-old is like okay, buddy, you go this way and you'll hit it this way. So I was so proud and kind of scared. That kid's going to be faster than me.
Colby Landin:Mexico is a huge market for us out here. We're really the closest park for a lot of Mexico.
Dane:Yeah.
Colby Landin:And one day hey, everybody listening put your Facebook marketplace location in Sonora or anywhere in Mexico. You'll be shocked how many mountain bikes downhill bikes, enduro bikes, You're like where they ride a lot.
Josh:They got a big scene down there. Big scene, big money in bikes.
Dane:We talked to.
Colby Landin:Hayseed. They got a lot of nice bikes over there.
Dane:There's a park A lot of people ride, called Capital Flow, which is pretty awesome, which you gotta hit up if one one of your travels it's down south armacillo.
Colby Landin:Okay, yeah, I think so. Yeah, I just was hanging out with those guys.
Dane:They're like, yeah, you gotta come up to armacillo and ride with us yeah, they're awesome, and if you don't have somebody to, let me know, because these guys are great and they want more people.
Colby Landin:Yeah, they want a lot of friends over there. Yeah, they want more people. I spend a lot of time in Mexico.
Dane:Yeah, Mexico's pretty awesome.
Josh:Yeah, that's amazing.
Dane:Where's your other? Where's your? Where's a bike park Like? What's your favorite bike park other than this one? I mean this one obviously has got to be your favorite. This is the best right, but what's the second best?
Colby Landin:I've always been a rider, ride all different kinds of bikes, yeah, so it's a tough question because, um, I mean yeah, and having traveled to most of them across the west, um, overall, if I'm hitting a big mountain bike trail, I like oregon and washington, I really love how much descent you can get and the backcountry shuttling has been the coolest thing I ever did, like. Some of them are like over 20 miles and it's two and a half hour shuttle because there, you know, elevation might start at 2000 and finish at seven and it's a much bigger descent than most places I've been.
Colby Landin:Oh, that sounds like here you know you go nine to 10 or 11. Yeah, Yep. Yeah, it's not that much compared to 5,000 feet of descent.
Josh:So I got to hit mount graham man. Yeah, I love just being in the zone for a while, and not being deep into nature yeah so that's been amazing.
Colby Landin:I love that stuff and I love the, the dirt quality in oregon, washington in springtime. Go there in july, it's the best. Um, so I have this loop, I figured it out, and you go to California, oregon and Washington in July and you work your way to Montana.
Josh:So you're just like chasing the dirt quality.
Colby Landin:Dirt quality, yes, based on the time of year and then here in fall is the best in Arizona, colorado and New Mexico. So you hit springtime in California, oregon, washington and you work your way through Colorado and Montana and stuff in the middle of summer and then work your way to Colorado, and Colorado is the gnarliest Like as far as if you want to go to the state with the gnarliest trails, colorado.
Dane:Yeah.
Colby Landin:The most fun flowy trails oregon, washington, california, um, and then here in arizona, I think sunrise is uh, is uh unique. It's um, it rains a lot. It's it's different than anywhere you've ever been. It's so mossy and um, wet and uh for peeing out here in. Arizona you'll never forget it. It's different than anywhere, but Angel Fire has been my favorite as far as everywhere I've been. It's just raw fast. I love that kind of stuff for me.
Dane:I just had this vision of Colby driving and getting out of his truck. My minivan, your minivan Minivan yes, getting open the door. What kind of minivan I have? My truck for pulling my tractor. Truck for pulling tractor in a toyota sienna.
Colby Landin:oh, love the sienna okay, so I can totally picture I'm picturing. Is it white? It's a champagne, gold champagne. Okay, he's in a champagne. You know, my bike has more than that. Your bike's inside, right, yeah?
Dane:yeah, yeah.
Josh:So he opens the door and I just see him like lean over and and grab a handful of no, grab a handful of dirt and just kind of sniff it and like, just kind of like, and then and then, if it's not right, he just gets back in the car and keeps going, you know, until he gets out and it's like perfect. And then he's oh yeah, For the record, this is the first time anyone's ever mentioned a moisture probe.
Dane:I feel like everybody should have a moisture probe.
Colby Landin:I have a cactus nursery.
Dane:Oh, that's cool. That's where I invest my money into. Do you do succulents?
Colby Landin:No, I have maybe a few, but no, I just do cactus.
Josh:My wife geeks out on succulents. What type of cactus?
Colby Landin:I got over 225 species, oh wow.
Josh:What type of cactus. I got like over 225 species. Oh wow, that's cool, like the full spectrum.
Colby Landin:Do you go all the way up to the? There's 17,500 species, so I only have a few.
Dane:Wow, oh my God, how many prickly pears do you have? Not many. I don't do many of those. I hate those.
Colby Landin:Just do stuff people want to buy.
Josh:Do you do swirls?
Colby Landin:then A little bit, but they grow too slow for the profitability.
Dane:Yeah, I totally see that you can't get them wild.
Colby Landin:I lost them you can actually like, as far as like if they were to develop a new area. Yeah, a permit for them is usually, I think, 15 bucks, but it's like whoever owns that land can get it and they have to get it, get a permit. And it's a lot more simple than you'd think, but you also have to have it approved. But it's cheap and if you're developing a new area, there's no shortage of saguaros out there. But they are expensive, very expensive, if you have a few.
Josh:Also the first time we've ever met a cactus farmer. Yeah, I could talk about that forever. That's pretty awesome. I got some goldens, some golden barrels that I planted a long time ago.
Colby Landin:I got a hole in the back of my hand where a squirrel went mountain biking. I still have cactus needles in me, oh yeah.
Josh:Down in Tucson we ride cactus.
Dane:We call them the corner marshals.
Colby Landin:Yeah, I'm obsessed with them.
Josh:We're actually starting our brush-tober to kind of back, because everything with the monsoons is growing into the trails. Actually, next weekend we're going to start doing the brushing and getting all that stuff out of there.
Dane:Yeah, if you want to stop people from cutting corners, plant some prickly pear, right yeah.
Josh:Hey, do you know? So one of the podcasts I listen to is called Trail Effect. It's spelled A-E-F-F-E-C-T. It's done by Josh Bloom. If you're a it's. It's all about trail building and it's amazing. I think he has almost 200 episodes on there.
Josh:So I've learned a ton. I've been trying to learn, learn, learn about trail stuff. I joined the trail core um with uh SDMB. It's one of the advocacy groups in Tucson snoring desert mountain bikers. So I've just been trying to talking about the loan pass. Are you familiar with this? No, it's not. So, the loan pass. I think they have 50 parks that have signed up and for it's 249 and you get two days, two full days and one half price day at 50 different parks. Wow, for 250.
Dane:So for your, for your trip, for you personally you should probably check out the Lone Pass.
Josh:Yeah, you could build your whole trip around that, but also for the park here it would be interesting if they would be interested in participating in that, because that would bring a bunch of different folks. Yeah, because if you have it already and then they work it out so they've got a podcast on Trail Effect on the Lone Pass it might be something interesting to talk to him about about next year.
Colby Landin:Yeah.
Dane:Yeah, it's really. Yeah, I'm so excited. This, this mountain, is amazing and it's just finally getting the expertise and the precision and the passion that it's needed for a long, long time, to go along with the tribe, who has got all of that, but they don't have that. Trail building, the know-how, the know-how, yeah.
Colby Landin:It's kind of funny, Like so, when I had dinner with them the other day. The beginning of next year I'm going to be training a bunch of people here on how to take care of stuff better. Cool, Because.
Josh:It's important.
Colby Landin:It's kind of fun. It's having worked on trails most of my life and having tracks and stuff you know it does take a lot of skill and like knowing what to do, what tools to use and all that. It seems basic and it is for the most part, but you'd be surprised how many people like don't do the best job or push the rocks up instead of down. Kind of simple stuff. But more so too is just like preventative maintenance and showing them how to put in more drainage and make more lines and stuff.
Dane:I like the trail technique I didn't know about is, and I couldn't figure it out why people are doing it, but they build a little bump right before the berms yeah. And I'm like what is going on? Why do they keep putting a jump into the berm, like that doesn't make any sense? But that's a water thing, to get the water to go away from the berms. It doesn't flow down it and rut it out.
Colby Landin:Yeah, that's awesome. That's like number one rule of building. Any track or trail is drainage.
Dane:Yeah, yeah.
Colby Landin:And that's sometimes the hardest part, almost always.
Josh:Do you guys actually bring water out there with you and like drop it and see where it goes?
Colby Landin:No, On the skills park over here, that belt above the parking lot, I can go turn on a pump that runs the snow making machines.
Josh:Right.
Colby Landin:And I can have like a fire hose that goes 120 feet of power.
Josh:So you can totally see where the water is going to go.
Colby Landin:It'll blow you off your feet, so I can water the holes I can water like half the park from one spot.
Josh:Oh my gosh, that's awesome. Well, hey, colby, it's been super awesome talking to you today.
Dane:Thank you so much.
Josh:Dude, it's.
Dane:Thank you so much for the work that you've done in here, and thank you to the tribe for the, for you know supporting it and the work they've done here and the Tonto Gravity Riders yeah.
Josh:Anyone that is contributing up here. This is such a wonderful resource.
Dane:Yeah.
Josh:Do you have any final thoughts for our listeners?
Colby Landin:A couple of things. Yeah, if you want to come help out, you can donate. If you donate five days or more, you get a season pass for mountain biking. Wow.
Josh:And if you donate 15 days or more.
Colby Landin:You get a full year pass with the winter stuff too. Wow.
Dane:That's awesome which is very expensive, like the winter stuff.
Colby Landin:But 15 days is a lot, but you wouldn't regret it at all. It's a pleasure being up here every day and I've worn a long sleeve shirt or a jacket for the past 100 days I've been here yeah, we're.
Josh:I've been wearing nothing but shorts because it's 120 degrees.
Colby Landin:Yeah, yeah and then, uh, the apache thing, apache peak, like we're opening another mountain next year which is like gonna double the size of this park as far as what we're allowed to use, and, um, I think we'll have some of the most trails in the country of any park I really do and then I'll be building the first jump jump line down that entire mountain next year too that's what I'll that's my, the main thing I'll be doing all summer, all summer it's building a jump line, yeah, like a big bear kind of thing I'll be doing all summer next year, all summer just building a jump line, yeah, like a big bear kind of thing, you know.
Dane:Just jumps all the way down. Party wave, yeah, yeah.
Colby Landin:So hopefully I find good dirt over there.
Dane:I'm nervous about it.
Colby Landin:They got this forest that kind of had a bark beetle kind of thing come through. So that's where they're having me build, which sounds great because this forest is dense up here yeah.
Josh:We were talking to one of the ski patrol folks about the chipper.
Dane:Yeah, yeah, I was telling them that a lot of places use a chipper with the bark beetle Dude.
Colby Landin:I told them I didn't know they did that, but I was like that might not be a bad idea.
Josh:It helps to eradicate the bark beetles, because if you cut, it down's down.
Colby Landin:I thought you were talking about adding loam to the trail. No, no, but that would work too right. That's a double thing.
Dane:but yeah, a lot of places could help with the bark beetle. Yeah, yeah, that's the chip and you. The hardest part here would be getting the chipper to a place. You go to some places and you'll see a big area. It's like a bald spot, and then there's a bunch of chipped up stuff.
Josh:Well, hey, man, on behalf of all the Arizona mountain bikers, the California mountain bikers, New Mexico mountain bikers, the Utah mountain bikers and anybody that's willing to come out dude.
Colby Landin:thank you so much. Yep, big race in a couple of weeks. Come on up.
Josh:Thanks for having me on what's.
Colby Landin:NBAA Okay.
Dane:Are they doing a downhill or are they just doing the enduro?
Colby Landin:It's an enduro race. I hear it's just as big as the BME.
Dane:Yeah, that's awesome. I hear it's massive. Yeah, they do like a three to five race. There'll be a slalom race and probably downhill.
Colby Landin:I guess that's next week or two weeks, two weeks, I think, late, september 22nd I think.
Dane:Guys at work. Check that out.
Colby Landin:MBAA race series. It's massive. There'll be hundreds, if not thousands, of people here. Oh, that's awesome. Yeah, we'll check that out.
Josh:So we'll get this episode out. It'll probably be next week. No week after next, if we can. Yeah, we'll shift, so it won't be this Tuesday, it'll be next Tuesday. We'll make sure I'll get you we that out here. Um, thank you guys. All the links will be in the show notes for all the stuff we talked about today. So just check the show notes and, uh, we'll put, we'll put Colby's uh socials in there, if he lets us.
Dane:Yeah.
Colby Landin:And uh, if you want to hire a trail builder.
Dane:We know a guy, we know a guy.
Colby Landin:You need a track bill, especially that's what I do.
Dane:Yeah, there you go.
Colby Landin:Thanks Josh, thanks Dane.
Dane:Thank you, can you dig it?
Josh:Can you dig it? Can you dig it?
