I've had allot of folks tell me that they'd like to attend this Rally, but are concerned they will get bored with its relatively small sand area...
Walden is small in comparison to most duning areas for sure. 800 acres of sand isn't large by anyone’s standards. However, Walden has more challenges per square acre than most also.
TREESHOTS:Treeshots vary from mild to wild at Walden, and I have never been there when the shots were exactly the same as the time before. Some years (Like 2011), the spring runoff ate away very sharp climbs that required a good amount of technical skill to overcome. In that same breath, there were also plenty of easier shots open to those who didn't want to taste their bar pad anytime soon. Other years, lack of snowfall doesn't create the major spring runoff and results in more less challenging shots. This is where we Walden locals start to get imaginative, and create our own shots, or combine them by crossing shots mid climb. Either way, if you like challenge, follow a local to it
Treeshots have very little to do will HP also, a 3 mod or less rappy can climb anything there if the rider can hold on to it and manage the throttle and weight distribution.
Also, because Walden is smaller, anyone doing a knarly treeshot, jumping out of Dead man’s pit, or taking a line a bit more risk will draw attention. It’s not uncommon to wheelie out of a Nasty treeshot with 50 people clapping and cheering for you. That also means if you eat shit hard you’ll have ~50 people laughing at you too, so it’s a double edge sword
Drag RacingWalden has 3 separate racing areas, plus a few others depending on the sand conditions.
1st is the “Rollers”: The rollers are a long, wide (you can race 20 or more bikes at once) racing area that is defined by 4-5 rolling dunes over the area greater than or equal to an 1/8th mile. These rolling dunes can exceed 12ft or be fairly flat depending on the year. In 2011, the 3rd and forth dune was making faster bikes EXTREMELY light, and in some cases airborne when crossing above 50-60mph or more. The racing there is generally done in “There and back” cycles, whereas the racers race towards the tree line (Slightly up hill), shutdown, turn around, re line up and race back.
Most of us locals like the rollers best because if those rolling dunes are large like this year, it’s more of a challenge than who simply has the fastest bike.
2nd is the “Flats”: The Flats exists at the bottom edge (Away from the mountain side). The flats also can vary, but usually are much tamer than the rollers, as their name dictates. The Flats are between 1/8 an ¼ mile long, to really stretch the legs of your bike, and can support at least 6 wide racing.
3rd is “Mini-Comp”: Mini-Comp is a roughly 300ft long race area up a ~20 degree grade. Because of it’s short distance and the whoops that occupy the face, wins and losses can be swapped by quads that are 10-15hp different.
Sand TrailsWalden has about 4x to 5x the amount of sand trails that LS has, they start from the camp area and head out to, and beyond the dunes, and extend up some of the mountain side. Because you cannot go over the closest mountains with sand tires, you can follow them without too much fear of getting lost. The mountain range runs north/south with the dunes area, so if you can see the mountain, you can figure out where you are at.
Dirt TrailsThe trail area that Walden is part of is absolutely massive. The Colorado side goes for miles in every direction. But if you go into Wyoming on the trails (less than a 20 minute quad ride from camp), you are in one of the largest trail areas I’ve ever heard of. The riding area ranges from ~150 miles wide by ~50 miles tall, with a maze of intertwined trails through and around the continental divide and national wilderness areas.
And then there’s my favorite…
Night ridingAll of those things mentioned above are open 24 hours a day. Night trails, treeshots, and drag racing are epic in Walden. What was tame, or even lame for you during the day….gets a whole lot more fun at night. This last rally, drag racing at the rollers with 20 quads wide was fun as hell. Some of my best riding memories come from night sand trail riding with Gunz, Troy, Preddy, Nikki and others. Night tree shots can challenge the best rider, because lights don’t turn corners when you need them too
People always make these rally’s fun. And you’ll be hard pressed to find a better crew than the ones that came out last year, and plan to come out this coming year. So if your interested in a different type of “Duning”, let me our any of these folks know. We’ll be happy to answer your questions, and hopefully get the chance to meet you at 9000’ above sea level
