The Contagious Mountain Bike Club has a lot of supporters with Internet connections.
The Whitehorse-based club received the most online votes in a three-week span to win the western division of the Mountain Equipment Co-op’s Dirt Search Contest, it was announced Monday.
With the win Contagious pockets a cheque for $10,000 to be put towards trail creation.
The club will donate the money to the Single Track to Success Project, a Carcross/Tagish First Nation project founded in 2005 aimed at creating an extensive trail network on Montana Mountain in Carcross.
“It came down to community”, said Contagious president Sierra van der Meer in a news release. “When our board decided to sponsor the Carcross Singletrack to Success Project for the $10,000 prize, it was because we wanted to support a worthwhile initiative.
“In retrospect, that decision probably won us the contest. What started out as a long shot at $10,000 turned into something that many Yukoners - cyclists, trail enthusiasts, First Nations, you name it - could get behind.”
Contagious topped some real mountain biking Goliaths in the western division, beating clubs from Calgary, Edmonton and mountain biking mecca Whistler, B.C.
The Whitehorse club received 6,551 votes. Mountain Equipment Co-op, which is trying to break into the mountain bike market, did not release which club placed second, but “I know we didn’t win by many votes,” added van der Meer.
The trails on Montana Mountain are already highly regarded.
In 2011 the International Mountain Bicycling Association announced it had inducted the Mountain Hero Trail on Montana Mountain into its Epic Trails category.
Outdoor Magazine declared Yukon - specifically Whitehorse and Carcross - as the world’s best mountain biking destination in the American publication’s April issue.
Contact Tom Patrick at
tomp@yukon-news.com