Fountain Head Regional Park

Brandon gave me a call last Saturday June 4 to see if I was up for a mountain biking extravaganza.  Of course I was, and Fountain Head was the choice track.  I've read about the track online and in lots of blogs.  It is a highly rated course and I was anxious to try it out.

Loaded up the bikes and off we went.  Weather was extremely nice for biking, a little on the hot/humid side.  We got to Fountain Head in about 20 minutes and unloaded.

The trail doesn't waste any time getting down to business.  It is serious technical riding over roots, rocks, trees, down ravines, up ravines and dodging various obstacles. Early on you're going up steep hills so the heart gets pumping early.  The track is sort of a big figure 8.  There are directional areas to prevent people from colliding head-on.  There are many points of the track that you don't want two-way traffic on.

Each of the hills has a special name.  I remember Cardiac Hill, ugh, but not too bad.  The more interesting of the hills is Shock-O-Billy.  I stopped at the top to get a good look at the hill going down.  You can't see the whole hill because it's so steep and the erosion control blocks your vision.  There was no way I was going down that hill first without surveying it more properly.   Brandon was egging me on, and I asked him how many times he's been down it.  "Never" was his reply.  After a few minutes, another rider who obviously had done the hill 50x before zipped down it.  I watched his line to get a little confidence and then let it fly.  Man, that's a steep hill.  Going over the erosion control adds some scare because it's a drop and you pick up more speed quickly.  I got down safely, then wiped out going up the next hill.

The figure 8 is pretty long.  I can see going back and riding it 2 or 3 times for a really good workout.  The more the merrier on this trip, but it's dangerous, technical and a lot of work.