Auburn Magazine - Issue #9

WHY MOAB?
hy these trails?
About this time last year, Jeni and
I were sitting around talking about
dream locations for clinics or events.
My dream locations are of course my
favorite places to ride!
Moab and Whistler! Where else? Right? She responded
with,”Cool, when should we go? We should do Moab first
because it’ll probably be easier.” I think my first response
was some laughing and a big fat, yeah, NO. Not ready.
Need a couple of years. We don’t have the manpower,
money or the time to spend out on location, planning an
event like this.
Fast forward a year….here we are….permits have been
granted, routes have been planned. Major amounts of stress
have been added to shoulders. We are going to Moab with
a group of mostly never been to Moab’ers.
While planning this event we had to decide what we
wanted out of this event and in turn what we hoped our
participants would get out of this event.
Would we take people just to do a clinic there and earn a
paycheck? The No..because fact of the matter is, when it’s
all said and done, we’ll be stoked to break even. Plus, Moab
deserves better. No..for me, what I really wanted out of this
was for people to discover the Moab I know and love. The
part that will forever hold a big chunk of my heart.
To me, Moab is liberating. It’s freedom. It’s raw and
majestic. It is scary and welcoming at the same time. It’s
the most challenging, yet fun riding you’ll ever see. It
makes you feel like a superstar then makes you feel like
you’ve never ridden a bike. It is the reddest of reds, greenest
of gorgeous greens and most amazing, expansive blues. I
want others to find all the courage, self-esteem, hard work
and independence that I’ve found in Moab over the years.
I wanted them to discover strengths they didn’t know they
had. I wanted to see them smile like a kid in a candy shop
(the way my own kid did) the first time they rode Slickrock.
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WRITTEN BY PAIGE RAMSEY OF MTB EXPERIENCE