“Not as Grousey as Grouse”
After teasing us with glimpses of it the past couple seasons, town’s newest downhill-only trail on Emerald Mountain is expected to be ready to ride late this summer.
Built by Routt Country Riders as part of the 2A Trails initiative, the trail takes riders down from the top of Emerald Mountain to the base of Howelsen in a series of banks, berms, rollers and more, while serving up some of the best views of the valley in town (if you can ever take your eyes off the trail). Designed by FlowRide Concepts, which also helped design the NPR trail, the 3.2-mile-long advanced-level trail includes 27 berms, 11 step-up jumps, 27 rock drops and about 20,000 square feet of rock armoring.
But it does have some technical sections that you either have to hit with confidence or bypass. “It’s awesome and is going to be super fun,” says Routt Country Riders president Craig Frithsen, adding the city is overseeing its still-to-be-determined name. “It has it all—chunk, flow, fast, airs, bermy and tech.”
