Garneau Stage 3 Date: July 25th, 2016

The Location:

New to the Singletrack 6, stage 3 will be hosted in the City of Cranbrook! After waking up in Fernie, riders will be transported approximately 1 hour to the city of Cranbrook.  Surrounded by majestic peaks on all sides, Cranbrook is emerging as the newest hot spot in the region for great mountain biking, after years of relative anonymity.  The active local cycling community has agreed to let a few of the secrets out of the bag so we can show you some of these outstanding trails.

The Cranbrook Community Forest has hosted the “Six in the Stix” mountain bike relay for a number of years, and the Wildhorse Cycling Club is actively working with the Cranbrook Community Forest Society and local landowners to sustainable develop and maintain outstanding mountain biking opportunities in the city.

The Plan:

The Cranbrook stage will start and finish at the College of the Rockies, Cranbrook Campus, just minutes from downtown Cranbrook.  This is the largest city we will visit once the event is underway, so it is a great chance to stock up on supplies.  Following the stage, riders will travel approx. half an hour to Kimberley for the evening.

The Stage:

Stage 3 consists of two loops, although each loop is completely unique.  Starting with the inner loop and rolling out from Community College the route climbs gently on road, allowing you to find your legs.  Once on loggers lane, you will be on wide singletrack, which gradually narrows as the low angle climbing continues.  Eventually, you will get into the narrower singletrack that is characteristic of the hand built trails in the Community Forest, and the flowy trail will give way to some tighter climbs and descents over the “bumps” and the high point of the day.  This pattern of short climbs followed by rewarding descents will take you a number of entertaining trails to Checkpoint 1 at Kettle Lake.  Some flat and gentle cruising will bring you to the end of the first loop where you will cross over the day’s first climb.

Beginning the second major climb of the day, you will again be on gently climbing singletrack, giving way to steeper sections of climbing and more technical riding on “Hobgoblin”.  After some high-speed, sometimes grassy descents on Migor, you will again visit the checkpoint at Kettle Lake.  From this point, you only have a couple short climbs followed by fast and fun descents.  The final high speed descent on Roller Coaster will leave you smiling as you roll back into the finish at College of the Rockies.

Distance: 42 km

Elevation Gain: 1200 m*

Timed Descent: 2km, 100m descending

Aid/CP: 17.5km, 26.5km