Apparently Parks & recreation are destroying one of the most awesome technical trails in SoCal! Has anyone been there lately who can chime in on the trail condition, and if it's still worth riding? http://www.mountainbikebill.com/blog/?p=1109
Holy Crap! That really sux!!! I rode it a few years ago and it was chunkarific. Seriously, why do K-huntz like Bob Hahn exist? I hate how pu$$ies would rather have a trail sanitized than to challenge themselves. Why do they feel like they have the right to ruin a technical trail just so they can make it? why don't they just build an escalator?
people are pathetic. i used to ride it all the time. it had some great chunk, plus ellie lane is even chunkier.
According to Mtn Bike Bill, Ellie lane is still untouched, but maybe not for long! Although I've been to Iron mountain three times, I've yet to try Ellie, but I hear it can be confusing trying to find it, and getting to it takes a while. But I plan to check it out if it's not too hot.
It's pretty sanitized. I hiked it last Saturday with my wife and it's just sad. MTBBikeBill covered it all, so not much to add. I rode Ellie Lane three weeks ago for the first time - that was a challenge to say the least, but definitely worth it so ride it while you can. There's been quite a bit of talk on the forbidden SD MTB site about this. Quite a few people have gotten in touch with Bob Hahn or his office about this. From those conversations, Bob is taking orders from the city of Poway to make the trail more accessible and at this time there is not much that can be done to stop their progress. A buddy of mine made first contact with Bob's office on this latest rash of trail work, and speaking with one of Bob's underlings (Mark) the idea of leaving Ellie Lane alone was brought up and he repled, "with user input, it may be possible to leave Ellie as the more rugged of the two systems". Don't hold your breath though. It sounds like Poway wants a MILF path and a MILF path they'll get.
So are the tech sections (iron mtn) totally snmoothed out, or just "pruned" a bit? Is it even worth riding at all? The pics shown in the article don't look all that different from what I remember. A little different, but still technical looking.
Sections that were previously chunky are now just bumpy. They removed a lot of the rock from the trail and made it smoother. I would still ride it because I live in SD, and I imagine a lot of SD riders will, but the fun factor is definitely deminished with the removal of a lot of the chunk. If it meant a two hour round trip for me, I don't know if it would be worth it (for me) - you're on a uni so I don't know how the techy sections translate from two to one wheel. Also, keep in mind they've only worked on Iron Mountain trail. Ellie Lane, at this time, is still untouched and chunky as ever. You could always do a "lollipop" loop, up Iron Moutain, then taking the cut over to Ellie Lane on the way back down.
I was there this morning and decided to turn left at the Ellie lane junction and bypass the rest of Iron, mostly because of what I read about it, and because I never had seen or ridden Ellie before. Let me just say for the record....HOLY S##T! Ellie literally ROCKS! Unfortunately I had a bad fall while holding my camera for some pov footage, didn't see a big-ass rock sticking up and ran smack into it, sending me flying about 5 feet and landing hard on my shoulder and also palm planting, leaving a nice little hematoma. But since I was still a couple miles in, I just pushed on and limited myself to the "easier" sections. Lol, nothing "easy" about Ellie! Anyway, I got some decent footage and some good still shots and the video are in the pub under "Mountain Unicycling at Ellie Lane trail".
Good on ya for tackling that trail with one wheel! That trail is not forgiving at all, and if you're unlucky enough to go down in the chunky stuff...ouch. Heal up dude. Looking forward to your footage.
