Glentress Freeride Park

Glentress Freeride Park Stats

Grade: Orange - Extreme

Packed full of advanced level features, the Freeride Park is an ideal spot for riders looking to push their skill levels, style it up, learn new tricks or just hang out and ride with friends. It's located right next to the Buzzards Nest Car Park.

The park is graded ‘orange bike park’ (see trail grades for details of this grade) with a great range of features, small and large. Check out the info panels on site before riding. In addition to helmet and gloves, body armour is strongly recommended!

Getting to the park

From the car park, riders either take the forest road that runs along the edge of the park or push up through the park itself on a network of paths. Doing the latter means you can also check out the features (recommended) and other riders on your way up. Both ways only take about 5 minutes.

Riders tend to practise ('session') short sections rather than riding a whole trail in one go. 'Sessioning' is positively encouraged, but please use the push up paths rather than the actual trails to push back up.

The Freeride trails

Teenage Kicks

Packing 23 jumps into its 650m length this trail is a veritable jump-fest! Featuring mostly 'tabletops’, these medium-sized jumps have fairly steep up-ramps and sharp lips that ping you into the air. If you're new to this type of jump, check out the ‘Essentials’ trail first.

Down the start ramp, a couple of pedal strokes and you're on the first jump. The next two come straight after but being through a left turn are trickier to negotiate. Keeping low through these sets you up nicely for two more tabletops then a sweet 180º berm.

Exiting this, you're straight into two more tabletops then a hip jump dropping away into sweeping left-hander, which leads into two slightly bigger tabletops. Onto the brakes for a tricky set of rock steps through a tight right-hander and you’re into a tightly spaced set of five tabletops, then two smaller jumps.

The trail now drops away steeply, firing you into another set of five tabletops. After these, the trail flattens, giving time for a quick breather before two final tabletops and the option of hitting the Funbox.

This trail takes a more direct route down the hill and starts as it means to go on with three log ‘skinnies’ in quick succession. Each is no more than 2-3 feet off the ground, but with less than 10 inches of riding surface to play with, there’s not much room for error.

Next comes a wide ramped drop with a long run out – roll it or launch it and clear the ramp completely! Scrub a little speed for a left hand berm and you’re at the Hucks – three timber ladder drops (small, medium and large). The small one can be rolled off, the other two definitely have to be jumped! Land on the wide, steep run out and set up for a right hand berm that fires you onto the first wall ride. Off this one and you’re straight onto a second one. These are tricky (not to mention flippin’ slippy in the wet), as you have to jump onto and off both. Here speed, skill and a healthy dose of courage are what’s needed.

Merging with Teenage Kicks, the trail then hits two final small tabletops, setting you up for the final feature – a Funbox. At 8ft high, 6ft wide and over 15ft long, it’s a beast, though on and off ramps mean it can be rolled or jumped at both ends.

Essentials

Whereas the two trails above have mainly medium-sized features, this trail, built with novice freeriders in mind, is a little mellower and incorporates a wide range of small features (with some optional medium lines to improve those skills). The trails are super wide and smooth, with soft fall areas and plenty of spots to catch a breather.

The trail is split up into a series of short sections, each with different types of feature and dedicated push up paths. These sections can be ridden individually or linked up into one longer trail.

Sections include: easy split-size tabletop and step up jumps; low raised timber ‘north shore’ trails linking between large rocks; a split step down jump and small and medium sized tabletop sets.