The Chain Link

New year, same newsletter! Welcome to the Black Hills Bike Hub newsletter. We’ve been busy cooking up another year of group rides, youth events, and more!

A Note from the Board

Tire pressure dialed, freshly waxed chain, and suspension tuned, we’re ready to shred.

Black Hills Bike Hub is ready to enter year three of our work together. Over the past two years we’ve accomplished a lot of the foundational work required for long-term success as an organization. We’ll still have work to do but we’re also ready to take on some of the projects we envisioned from the start. You’ll read about trail projects, youth cycling, events and more in the articles below.

Here's where we ask for your help. If you’re not a member, please join here. If you are a member, thank you. Please share with us what you’re passionate about and where you’d be able to support our cycling community. Want to help youth get on bikes? We have a role for you. Want to maintain trails? We got you. Want to put on a race or event? Come talk to us. Our responsibility is to facilitate the wants of our membership, but we need your time, energy and maybe a few of you hard earned dollars to make any of it happen.

Please reach out to me with questions, comments, or an “I can help.” at doc@blackhillsbikehub.org . See you on trail soon.

-Doc Savage (President)

Our Events

Bevs with the Board - January 15 @ 6pm (Dakota Point Brewing)

We’ll have more trail updates and an organized youth program. Before the Bevs with the board, join Evan for the Trails Committee meeting right before from 5-6pm, also at Dakota Point!

Stay tuned for future events finalize our 2026 calendar with all your favorite events. Hold your Thursday nights for us and stand by for more information!

Committee Updates

Trails

This has been a busy year for trail efforts! We want to extend a huge thank you to all our volunteers, especially the more than 40 individuals who logged nearly 300 hours of trail work in 2025! Didn’t get a chance to dig in 2025? Don’t worry, we’ve got lots to do in 2026 including a few new pathways to get involved. We have a lot on deck for 2026:

Complete the Vision Fund bike park project
Finalize the Trail Master Plan and move into Fundraising and Implementation stages
Continue hosting Trail Maintenance Workdays and roll out our new Adopt-A-Trail program. A big item will be to remove down trees and repair trail damage from the 12/17 windstorm.
Continue to develop a relationship with the U.S. Forest Service through work on existing sanctioned trails with a goal of logging 150+ volunteer hours
Continue All American expansion

Wrapping up 2025, here is an update on our major projects:

Vision Fund Bike Park

Goal: Advance Vision Fund Bike Park to contract to provide access to youth and families.

City of Rapid City has executed the contract with Pumptraxx USA and design has been kicked off. BHBH is an active partner in the project, attending monthly meetings with Parks & Rec and working with the team at Pumptraxx to ensure design meets our community’s needs. Stay tuned for future input opportunities as design progresses.

All American Trail

Goal: Build 6 of 8 segments of the All-American Trail to provide more access for beginners and families.

All Permitting and flagging is complete for the All-American Trail Western Expansion! Sioux Park is the only remaining portion to be built, achieving our goal of building more than 6 segments of the trail. We also worked closely with RC Parks & Rec to approve and fund the first (of hopefully many) features along the trail. Keep any eye on the McDonald’s segment in the coming weeks for this exciting development.

Trail Master Plan

Goal: Publish a 5-year Trails Master Plan to solidify our focus and enable better trails.

We have been working with Rock Solid Trail Contracting since the Field Work in October to dial in mapping and put together the first draft of the plan. We will have another more opportunity for input and review before we finalize the plan. We are looking to wrap the plan up by early/mid 2026, then we will shift into fundraising and implementation! There is a lot to unpack on this topic, stay tuned for background and details through our social media and website soon.

Trail Maintenance

Goal: Host 8 trail workdays with 30+ unique volunteers to activate our building community.

Maintenance Mondays continued to be successful. Primarily through organized work days, our 40+ volunteers put in nearly 300 hours!
We are finalizing our Adopt-A-Trail Program, to empower more volunteers to work at their convenience and bring sense of stewardship and ownership towards our trails to a wider audience. Keep an eye out in early 2026 for the roll out of this program
Our Trail Committee has been developing guidelines and are working to establish a Trail Oversight Committee to assist with oversight and input to BHBH Trail efforts and allow partner organizations and community leaders the opportunity to help us shape the future of trails.

Black Hills National Forest

Goal: Build a relationship with the F.S. Mystic Ranger District to advocate for mountain bike access on National Forest lands throughout the Black Hills.

Our team has been working closely with Black Hills Trails to create agreements that would allow BHBH volunteers to work legitimately on trails within the Forest Service. We have a goal of logging 150 hours of work on Forest Service trails in 2026. Reach out if you want to help us!

Youth

We’ve been working hard to put together great youth programming for 2026. We’re looking to get families on bikes through four Family Days and foster youth progression through weekly series.

Beginning Thursday, April 30th at 5:30 p.m., we will be having weekly group rides for riders aged 18 and under who have experience on single-track trails. We'll have leveled groups to accommodate a wide range of riders, from those just getting comfortable with single track experiences to those interested in training to race. The rider should be able to navigate the Fulton Skyline switchbacks with three to five brakes to the second parking lot. If you have a rider who you believe should be in this group but are unsure, please reach out. These rides will be structured to help improve your riders’ abilities and include a dedicated warm-up, skill work, and riding stamina exercises.

Our Family Day events will be perfect for families with younger riders who are still at an entry level on singletrack. Our first Family Day is scheduled for Sunday, May 10 from 11am to 1pm at Raider Park.

Member Spotlight - Bri Goley

Bri has been shredding trails since 2016 and is an active BHBH volunteer and event attender. We love her passion for the sport and her way of encouraging and coaching those around her. Believe it or not, it was the Dakota Five-O that officially hooked her onto the sport.
Bri loves “the mix of adrenaline, focus, and flow” of mountain biking and can often be found lapping her favorite sections at Storm Mountain.
Read more about Bri’s interview **here!**

Sponsor Spotlight - Strider

Strider was born in the Black Hills and has been getting kids on bikes for nearly two decades. They have been a loud and proud supporter of our organization, and we couldn’t be more thankful to have them on board for this wild ride!

While supporting local organizations like us, they also teach kids to ride bikes through their non-profit, All Kids Bike. All Kids Bike supports nearly 200,000 students in 1,800 schools every year.

Learn more about Strider here!

Trailforks Pro

As a supporter of Black Hills Bike Hub you get 30% off your 1st year subscription and 15% off on renewal in subsequent years.

AND Black Hills Bike Hub gets $5 of the recurring subscription proceeds to help support the local trails!

Member Benefits

Did you know that your membership with BHBH gets you all the benefits of an IMBA membership? From Subarus to gear, be sure to check out all they have to offer!

Sponsorship & Donor Opportunities

The BHBH is looking to build relationships that will help our community. If you or your organization want to talk about how to make a direct difference in the Black Hills cycling community, please email Doc and Molly.

Happy New Year!