On 02/23/2019 I’m going to be attempting a 12 hour Fat Bike Ride at the Cadillac Winter Sports Trail to raise money for an 11 Miles of BRAND NEW at trail the Cadillac Pathway!

Why does the pathway need more trail?

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The Cadillac pathway was built as a cross country ski trail approximately 40 years. The trail, like many biking routes that follow a XC path, involves lots of short, steep descents with punchy or long climbs. While, this formula is great for a good workout, it lacks flow and interesting features that really make a trail enjoyable to ride for everyone. For example, all of the fun, short sections of singletrack winding through the trees on the Bear Claw Epic Course are unmarked and unregulated trail. If we removed these pieces of trail from the equation then the Bear Claw would not be nearly as exciting to race.

What is the new trail going to look like?

The Northern Michigan Mountain Bike Association (NMMBA) – Cadillac Pathway committee wrote a trail proposal to the Michigan Department of Natural Resources to build this trail.  After two years and 17 signatures they have the green light to proceed.  The committee has been working diligently with potential professional builders along with some local experts on how they will go about doing this.  Their goal is to have professionally built trail which has a sizable price tag on it which is why I am trying to help their endeavor. 

The new trail will be built to be sustainable and to last for years to come.  It will be built so that when the rain falls it will not erode our trail away to sand and roots.  The trail will be flowing in and out of trees with a potential of having some technical features built in.  There will always be a re-route around those features.  

Expectations about the ride?

The Cadillac Winter Sports Trail has a good helping of elevation each lap so it will be very important to pace myself through the hills, however there are a few long descents which will allow me to rest when needed. My goal is to reach 8 laps, with each lap being about 12 miles, this would mean about 90ish Miles. This being said if I’m really close I’ll probably finish the job and ride a full 100 miles. This is a very ambitious goal and will require limited downtime during the ride so I’ve already done a 6 hour ride to test nutrition and some pacing. Most of the entire ride will be in daylight so don’t have to worry too much about maintain light batteries.

How can you make this a reality?

While I’m riding I will track donations live through GoFundMe. All donations will be submitted the NMMBA, a non-profit organization. You can also donate your time or knowledge to help this mission by contacting Michele Andrews via email at cadillacpathway@gmail.com.

Also, I’d like to find a way where my progress can can be checked live, but the only option I can think of is Strava. The only issue is stava only allows a max of three people to view a ride live. So, if anyone has a program or idea let me know to solve this please let me know. Lastly, I don’t have the equipment to deal with -10 temperatures so if the temps are cold enough, or if it is too warm to be on the trails I will be rescheduling. I will keep you posted as we get closer to the date so stay tuned for more info!

Please share or post this document so we can gain more support for the cause!

Campaign at GoFundMe: https://www.gofundme.com/new-trail-system-for-the-cadillac-pathway&rcid=r01-154913863681-628618a08a044bd4&pc=ot_co_campmgmt_w

-Jared