It was a great start to the season for the Penticton BMX club, who held an open house, barbecue and bike/gear swap on Sunday.
“At the end of 2017 season we moved to this new track so we are trying to get lots of new people — both new to BMX and from other tracks to come out,” said Kirsten MacLean. “Every week we seem to have a couple new riders, always looking for more, and as we warm up through season a lot of other tracks are coming down to support us from Kelowna, Kamloops and Vernon mostly.”
The group continues to fundraise to make more improvements on their new track at Munson Mountain. While the old BMX track, located at Parkway School, was short and technical, the Munson Mountain location is long and wide giving riders more speed once all the build is settled in.
“We are miles ahead of where we were in years past because we have a full size track to deal with instead of being in a tiny enclosure like we use to be,” said Al Box, who has been racing for about 17 years. “So we will have bigger jumps for the spectators, higher speeds and a lot more excitement for people watching.”
Box said once the track gets settled and smoothed out as they continue to ride and work on it, the area will be on par with other major tracks in the province.
“Before a lot of youth would predominately lose interest because the jumps were so small at the old facility and you never got over 25 kilmiatres an hour now we are going to be approaching 50 km an hour and jumping 20-25 feet once things really get finished up in here,” said Box.
The Penticton BMX holds regular races on Thursday nights. The provincial series, which is four track races in four different cities over two days, comes to Penticton on the afternoon of June 10.
“That is a great event because it brings out a lot of riders for us because it is a series that they can earn plates and points on and they need a certain amount of them to do it. Today, we had nine motos and that is our highest this year which is great. On provincials we should have about 30,” said McLean.