Why the last?
I always enjoyed the DS rides I did. Ohio and western PA though.
Here is the letter of explanation.
Fellow Dual Sport Riders,
We probably should have anticipated the questions we’re getting about why this is the last year for the Michaux Dual Sport. The fact is, there are plenty of reasons.
We’re doing this voluntarily, not as the result of pressure from an agency or other user group. It’s worth stating that we enjoy our relationship with the folks from Forestry in Fayetteville who manage Michaux State Forest and the Rangers who patrol it. We thank them for their cooperation through the years.
Michaux State Forest has changed—is changing—and Michaux Off Road Enthusiasts (MORE) are proud of the role we have played. Besides motorcycles, we like to think we helped plenty of other users get to know and love this forest as we do.
The original ATV trails were laid out by Mark Williams, MORE President and Dual Sport originator.
MORE hosted the Iron Master’s Classic for 10 years; a mountain bike race that became the largest single day event of its kind on the East Coast. MORE continues that tradition, providing support for the Volvo Michaux Endurance Series.
MORE participated in and supported equestrian and orienteering events and MORE promoted the first adventure race in Michaux State Forest.
You can see where this is headed. Over time, lots of people with a wide range of interests have found their way to Michaux and are having fun pursuing their pastime. Michaux is, in fact, the busiest forest in the entire state. So busy that there are more events in Michaux each year than in all of the other State Forests combined.
We spend a lot of our time in Michaux throughout the year and we’ve watched and witnessed this growth.
Because of this recreational influx, our colleagues in Fayetteville are doing everything they can to understand and begin to manage something they were never intended to manage: people coming to the forest to have fun. Hunters have been there for decades but when MORE first came to be, it was rare to encounter other people out and about in the forest. No more. It is now rare NOT to bump into someone on the trails or in the parking lot.
So it’s a busy place but that’s not the only reason we’re stopping.
About 5 years ago, some folks in Harrisburg handed down a set of guidelines for motorized events on State Forest lands that have forever impacted happenings like our Dual Sport. In sum, those guidelines imposed some very stringent and potentially expensive requirements on clubs like MORE. Neither we nor the people in the District Forestry offices had any say—at least initially—in what those guidelines dictated. We here need to recognize the efforts of Denny Mann, Steve Bottiger and several others who brought Harrisburg back to the table and got them to amend the guidelines with input from clubs like the South Penn Enduro Riders, PA Trail Riders Association and MORE. Without those changes we’d have stopped this event a long time ago.
Most significantly, the requirements around trail remediation became more stringent and had much tighter time frames for completion.
In an event where the appeal is riding trails that are otherwise off-limits and where we try to offer as much trail as possible and with as broad an appeal as possible, this becomes a significant burden for a club like MORE.
MORE is a small club. Like 5 people small. On purpose. We’ve kept it that way because it’s been easier to manage an event like this when you only need to check with one or two others before you act and because everyone knows and does their jobs and we only have ourselves to blame if something goes amiss. And because only a bare handful of people know their way around the forest as well as we do. Sorry, but we had to brag.
Understand that the amount of actual trail work we do isn’t that bad but we have to check every inch of every trail we use to make sure they are OK post-event. And that takes time. Forestry’s network of approved trails continues to grow and they are happy to have us use them so long as we return them to the condition they were prior to our event. And that bar continues to go up.
And finally, we’re going in different directions, literally. Some of us are ending careers and leaving the area. Some are looking to spend more of their time pursuing other interests—or those of our kids. While we love the event, our lives, much like the forest, continue to evolve and it’s time to put a bow on this and move on to the next chapter.
We think 30 is a nice round number and we look forward to seeing you this August for one more ride in the rocks.
With warmest regards,
The MORE Club
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