Jarrod Harris is the co-founder of Jarrod’s Place bike park in Summerville, Georgia. We’ll be diving into what it takes to open a bike park, the challenges and rewards of building trails, and we’ll talk about Trail Armor, an innovative product that was actually developed right there at Jarrod’s Place.

• What’s your background? How does someone end up starting a bike park?
• How did you learn to build trails?
• Were there any parks or trails that inspired you and your team when you were first starting out?
• Is owning and operating a bike park a good business?
• Trail Armor is a product that was developed at Jarrod’s Place. What is it, and how does it work?
• Beyond Jarrod’s Place, where is Trail Armor being used?
• Can you describe how the park is laid out? What are the most popular trails?
• What’s the mix of riders you see at the park? Are you getting many locals, or do people travel from further away?
• Is there an off-season at the bike park?
• How much of your time goes into trail maintenance versus building new stuff?
• What would you do differently if you were to open another bike park today?
• What’s next for the bike park?

Learn more and buy a pass to Jarrod’s Place at jarrodsplacebikepark.com.

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Automated transcript

Jeff Barber 0:01
Hey everybody, welcome to the Singletracks podcast. My name is Jeff, and today we’re talking with Jarrod Harris, co founder of Jarrod’s Place bike park in Somerville, Georgia. We’ll be diving into what it takes to open a bike park, the challenges and rewards of building trails. And we’ll talk about trail armor, which is an innovative product that was actually designed right there at Jarrod’s place. So Jarrod, thanks for joining me.

Jeff Barber 0:27
Yeah, thanks for having me. Well, let’s start at the beginning. Tell us a little bit about your background. How does somebody end up becoming a co-founder of a bike park?

Jarrod Harris 0:39
Well, depends on how you define co-found. I mean, I’ve been doing this since 2012. Hence the name. I never really named it Jarrod’s Place, that’s just what everybody called it. They were like, “we’ll go ride at Jarrod’s Place.” So yeah 2012, that’s when I started. I raced BMX from 1990 like 1998 and I was a comic stand up comic from like 2001 to like, the last show I did was like 2019 so big diversion there.

And you know, my passion has always been riding, ever since 1990 is like when I first started building my first dirt jumps. And, yeah, so I kind of got out of riding, just because I don’t know, I was worried about, like, accomplishing something in life. And then, yeah, started stand up comedy and did all the things, you know, moved to New York, moved to LA and had a big web series called Action Figure Therapy that I was part of that was a pretty big impact on my life. And then, yeah, just kind of stayed in the comedy world, like chasing little carrots. You know,

Jeff Barber 2:23
Were you riding at all at that time? Or was riding just…

Jarrod Harris 2:27
I didn’t ride like, I didn’t touch a bike until from 1998 till, like 2009. But I, I was constantly looking at magazines and stuff. And, you know, it was cool, because I would see mountain biking, like, become this, like, really cool sport and just evolving, whereas, like BMX was just kind of like stagnant. The racing scene was, anyway, street riding and all that stuff was obviously, like, going to crazy levels, but I was never a street rider, so I just, you know, I wanted to race BMX and wanted big jumps, and they were building tracks for 10 year olds. So I tried to start my own sanctioning body. I mean, that was like 1998 I didn’t have the money to do it, but I had won like a contest that the NBL, the National Bicycle League had, this contest to design a track, and I won like a GT Pro Series bike for this contest to build. I think it was like the Winston Salem BMX national track, okay, so, so, yeah. Then I just started, like, kind of designing stuff on a drafting table. I started designing, like, BMX tracks, like, inside stadiums and stuff, and started designing e bikes. This was like, in the early 90s. So, yeah, 93 / 94 / 95. and back then, it was like, I didn’t know that E bikes would be on 27 inch wheels, or 27 five wheels, or 29 you know, it was everything. Was like, I was making it on 24 inch wheels, with the batteries in the downtube and so, yeah, and then, you know, motor, little motor, where the bottom bracket is. I mean literally, full suspension. I wish I still had these drawings, because they were all the way back from, like, I say, the 90s. But, um, so yeah, just that’s where my heart has always been, is just like into building and, you know, trying to make something really, really cool with BMX. But then BMX just never did do anything racing anyways, and so, and then I just had got slipped tomorrow, more into stand up comedy world. I. I actually a buddy of mine was, like, really good friends with Stephen Colbert. And Stephen Colbert was at the Daily Show at the time, and, like, and Stephen was really cool. He was, like, very helpful with me, like, trying to get into comedy. And at the time, I just, you know, it was terrible at comedy, because, you know, no one’s great at comedy. It’s like, you have to learn how to be good at stand up. So, so that was a very long, arduous process of of just chasing something and all the while. I mean, I, you know, got super distracted with that, basically chasing my own ego. And it’s, yeah, kind of like, in the in the background, it’s, there was always this thing. I just, should have just been riding, and I should have been, like, trying to build stuff or but, you know, but I didn’t have money till I started doing stand up. And then I got pretty successful at stand up. And then I started to have a little bit of money, and then, then I started to get really irritated with stand up business. So I moved, yeah, I was basically in talks with to get an animated series on FX and like, that whole deal just fell through. So then I was like, just over the business, and I was like, I’m just gonna go back to Georgia, buy some land, and then just, yeah, just dig. And I didn’t even, you know, it’s like, I felt like there could be a bike park situation in the future, but I didn’t really plan it too, too much at the time. So I did that, and then, yeah, basically just stayed in the woods. And in between my shows and my gigs, I was touring like, you know, 40 to 50 weeks out of the year almost. So in between time, I would just stay in the woods and dig. I bought some equipment and just tried to learn how to, like build stuff, and learned about drainage and just all that, right? And at that time, you know, there was no money involved at all. It was just like people would come and they would ride because they knew that I had some jumps and, you know, so kind of, just from that point on, kind of evolved. I sold that place that was Jarrod’s place. Point 1.0 that was in Canton. Then 2.0 was in Jasper, and now we’re at 3.0 up in Summerville, Georgia, where it actually got more official. I had an investor, you know, I’d worked on just kind of lining up all this stuff. I had this investor involved. And we actually tried to, we went to a land auction, tried to get this one piece of land. It didn’t happen, or whatever. And then was talking to my current partner, now, not life partner, but, you know…

Jeff Barber 7:58
Business partner.

Jarrod Harris 7:59
Yeah. So, yeah. So Josh, he started coming out to the 2.0 and probably, like, 2018, or 19, or something like that. And just got to be good buddies with him. And, you know, it’s just fun. We just ride all, you know, the weekends and stuff, and, and then, yeah, he was wanting to open up a bike shop and and we just kind of started talking about it. We’re like, Man, if I put my resources together with your resources, we both just kind of do this together, like I knew we had enough to at least get the park open, and if we got it open, then, you know, really, at that point, it’s just a matter of, like, okay, can it stay open, right? Yeah, figure it out, yeah. So, so, you know. And it was cool, because, like, it’s not easy to find somebody to go all in, so, you know, and I was willing to go all in, I, you know, I was like, whatever. I’m gonna be doing this regardless. So, so, yeah, so, so when we, yeah, I had been hunting for land or whatever, and found the land that was, like, 2020, I think, is when I found that that property. And, so, yeah, I mean, basically, that’s kind of how that whole thing started. And, yeah, it’s, it’s a long journey. I mean, we can go all the way back to the 90s. You know what I mean, like the BMX tracks that I built, I had to file a bankruptcy when I was 22 years old because I built three BMX tracks. And, you know, the last one I built, I’d spent like, four months building it, and then the landowner was in cahoots, or not in cahoots, but he was, like, angry, like the county was pissed off at him, and they would go back and forth. And like, I remember the last day I was out. There had been out there for three or four months, however long. It was a long time building this downhill BMX track. And it was sick and way ahead of his time talking 1998 right? Huge jumps, the whole thing. And like, I think I’m on the last straightaway, the last jump, and then some guy from the county is just like, pulls me out of the machine. He’s like, Yeah, you’re gonna stop, you know, so and so’s got to get permits for blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. I was just like, so that whole thing, and then I’m in the whole, like, 10s of 1000s of dollars to try to create this thing, which I had no money anyway, so what little money I had, and I borrowed all this money from the NBL, and they used to do a thing where, you know, they would loan you money to start your track, and you pretty much, you know, you had to be profitable after that point. So I yeah, I just had to file bankruptcy because I yeah, just was wise when you take chances in life, you know,

Jeff Barber 10:55
Well, so, I mean, I think that’s, maybe that’s something that’s a little different about Jarrod’s place, about your bike park, is that you and your partners investors own the land there? Is that, right?

Jarrod Harris 11:09
Well, we don’t have any investors. It’s just, it’s literally just me and Josh,

Jeff Barber 11:14
Okay, yeah, yeah. And so, right, not having the investors and owning your own land really gives you, hopefully, a lot more flexibility and stability as well. So what, what year were you first open for riders to come out?

Jarrod Harris 11:31
I guess 2021 I believe just the first official year. Yeah, because we were there for like, a year, and there was, like, some sort of title issue, we hadn’t even officially, like, closed, and we’d already been building for like, a year, so just spending money, yeah, not even knowing for sure. I mean, I could write a book on how crazy life has been, and that’s just a tiny portion of it, but, you know, that would make most people, yeah, I don’t know. A lot of people can’t handle that kind of stress, right, right?

Jeff Barber 12:03
Well, right? And as a rider, as a BMX rider, and now as a, you know, downhill rider, obviously, you’re you’re okay with taking risks, and you’ve been doing that, sounds like your whole life. I’m curious when you were kind of on the road, like you’re still doing your stand up comedy, and, you know, you said you had this land, I guess it was Jarrod’s Place 1.0 yeah. And you’re kind of thinking, and you’re building, like, were you checking out other bike parks or trails or places around the country, like, as you were touring or like, how did you kind of get inspired?

Jarrod Harris 12:40
I never went to a bike park while I was touring. But I think the first time I went to a bike park was technically, I guess it would have been Windrock, have been the first one. And that probably was like 2017, I don’t know, 2018, somewhere in there, it was right, like it had been dormant for a while, and it just had to, like, reopen, not I forgot what year it was Bailey. I went to Bailey a couple times and and then 2019, I went to bike park Wales because I went to go watch rebel hard line. Oh, yeah. So that was cool. And bike park Wales really kind of like inspired me, because I was like, man, it was like a Tuesday, and there was like nine shuttles running on a Tuesday. Wow, wow. I was just like, what? Wow. Okay, so, yeah, I mean, that was kind of cool, and I kind of opened my eyes up to the fact that, like, Okay. And, you know, there’s a lot of people that ride in the area now, you know, I’m starting to see, like, a bigger picture, I would say, probably around. It’s funny. I was going through notes the other day. I mean, I literally had all the expenses broken down into, like, 2012 2013 about opening up a bike park. Oh, wow. But it just is kind of just, it just takes a it just takes a while to, you know, it’s like, you set the intent, and then you follow in that path. And if you if it’s your true intent, and that’s exactly what you want to do, then you’ll figure out a way to do it. And you know, it’s kind of like I’ve always believed, like you’re always going to do whatever it is you intend on doing, and whatever you fear, those are your hurdles in life. So if you fear stuff, then, yeah, those are going to be hurdles to get over that fear, you know, and I think that’s what blocks most people from doing anything, is their fear of failure or their fear, whatever your fears are, essentially, I think that’s literally the the cheat code for the matrix that we live in, or whatever you want to call it, you. I think it’s a holographic simulation, but that’s my own personal out of body experiences, non drug induced. We can debate that all day long, but, yeah,

Jeff Barber 15:08
but no, you’re right. You know, even when we’re on the bike, right, like, if you’re, if you’re staring at that tree that you don’t want to hit a lot of times, you’re gonna end up hitting it. Right? Yeah, yeah. Makes sense. Well, you know, so for folks who aren’t from Georgia, aren’t, you know, familiar with this part of the country, you know, obviously there’s, there are mountains here, right? And but before your bike park, there really wasn’t, I mean, there wasn’t a bike park, there definitely wasn’t a shuttle served bike park. So did you like, see that as an opportunity? Like, I mean, it kind of sounds like you’re gonna do this regardless, but, but did you see, like, the need for this kind of riding experience in Georgia?

Jarrod Harris 15:55
Definitely, yeah. I mean, you know, it was cool, you know, like, Kanuga opened up. I forgot what year that was when that one opened up, but I’m going there and just kind of realizing, like, okay, there’s like a there’s a scene, there’s like a built in scene, you know, there’s a lot of riders. And so I was like, All right, well, I need to cultivate this here, because there was a small base of people. But like, you know, now we’re really starting to cultivate a scene, and now we’re starting to, you know, people are coming to the park, families are coming to the park. Kids are getting really good because there’s all these steps, all these progressive steps for them to take at a park, or even just an older guy or a woman who maybe used to ride and hasn’t rode forever, they can come to the park and they can get back into it as safely as you can, and then within a month or two, they’re riding probably better than they ever did before, you know. So it’s having places, right? I think is crucial, you know, and having access to places, right? I mean, my life was completely changed. I would have been in jail or dead or whatever, if I wouldn’t have had a BMX track near my house where I lived in Powder Springs, Georgia, I just there’s no telling what would happen. So having access to stuff like that is super important. So I’m super big on like just building trails or supporting any trail systems that are going in, because it’s all about proximity. You know, especially when you’re a kid, and let’s say you do come from a turd family or no family, if you have access to something, then that’ll keep you out of trouble. So, yeah, I knew it was doable to answer your question. I’m getting sidetracked, but, and I think going to, like, North Carolina and just kind of seeing, like, the fact that, okay, yeah, there’s, there’s kind of a thriving scene here. And I just knew it’s just a matter of time we can do the exact same thing. We can build a scene.

Jeff Barber 18:11
Yeah, yeah. And all the trails you know that have existed, particularly like North Georgia, a lot of that is like national forests, and there are big descents, but you got to, you got to work to get those and climb some of them. You know, you could be climbing for hours. You’re climbing all day just to get one big descent in. And I’m curious about, you know, the fact that you are, you own, your own land, your your private bike park. I mean, what are you able to do with your trails that you know hasn’t been done or can’t be done, you know, on public land?

Jarrod Harris 18:47
Well, I mean, I’ve just never, I always knew, like I had to own the property. I mean, that’s kind of a it’s a non negotiable, like, I’m not going to put sweat equity into somebody else’s property, and then just seems,

Jeff Barber 19:03
well, like Kanuga is on they don’t own the land, as far as I know, right, like they they are leasing it from the organization that owns the land there. And then I think a similar thing happened with this bike park in Texas recently, where the land ownership was questionable, or they had a lease or whatever, and it was expensive. So, so, yeah, that seems like that makes a huge difference.

Jarrod Harris 19:29
Well, I don’t want to be at anybody else’s mercy, you know, if I’m going to mess up, I’m gonna, I’m gonna be the one that messed up, and I’m willing to put my name on it, you know. So it’s like, I’m not gonna let somebody else like, I’ve already had this issue. I had, you know, intellectual property stolen from me, you know, worth a lot of money and like, I was, like, I’m not gonna do that again ever. Like, you get burned enough times and you just. No, like no, so you got to do everything yourself. Now, yeah, you can have a good team, and I have a really good team of people behind me, but you know, no one’s gonna everyone will revel in your success after, you know you’re successful, but in the intermediary process, or like, the beginning process, it’s like, it’s just all a bunch of words and no one cares. And, you know, people just roll their eyes. So, you know, it takes a lot to get to that point. You just have to take chances. But, yeah, I think that we’re on our other thing. I think we’re in a good, good place now. I think the scenes growing. Yeah, sorry, I’m getting sidetracked, but

Jeff Barber 20:43
Yeah, no, no worries. But so, so the the trails that you’re able to build there, I mean, these, these are like, much bigger jumps. They’re like faster trails. They’re steeper than anything that I’ve seen, you know, elsewhere in the state. And so it seems like, yeah, you’re in a good place where you’re able to kind of build the way that you want to, because you do own the land there.

Jarrod Harris 21:10
Well, that’s just from years of testing stuff too, and just kind of understanding and watching people ride. I mean, it’s you have to think of every literally, foot by foot by foot. Transitions have to be a certain way, and, and, you know, I’m really, I can be a real pain in the, in the, you know, you know what? You know when it comes to that kind of stuff, like, I literally am like a hawk. I’m just like, every, every transition has to be a certain way every and it’s…

Jeff Barber 21:42
Can you tell by do you, like, go right in you’re like, No, that’s not it?

Jarrod Harris 21:46
yeah, I can look at stuff and just know, like, it’s not that’s gonna be too Poppy for the speed or whatever, blah, blah, blah, you know 99% of time. I say 99% of time, I mean most of the time. Every once in a while I might misjudge, like, okay, yeah, you, you can, you know, this is right spacing. You can’t get it right every single time, but you it’s just so it’s, you know, it’s different. And I understand, like, the young guys that are wanting to just go build and, you know, everybody wants to be a trail builder, yeah, it’s like it’s a totally different thing when all of your assets and everything you own are on the line, right? You know, there’s not a lot of investment involved when you get paid to go build trails every day, it’s like, what do you have to lose? Yeah, okay, go get another trail building job. You know, my whole life is on the line. So it’s a different, you know? So, yeah, I can be, I can be a real pain, and whatever it’s I have to be that way, right? I don’t apologize for it. It’s just, it’s just how it’s going to have to be. So I know, you know, the key with the bike park is you got to build stuff that people who have the money to come ride, want to come ride. And if you can make an older guy or an older woman feel like they’re 20 years old again, and they can feel pretty safe about it, and give them challenges, incremental challenges, then that’s your business model, right there. I mean, it’s really not that complicated.

Jeff Barber 23:18
Yeah, that’s cool. So you know, over the years, it looks like you and your team have learned a lot about trail building as well, and one of the products that was developed there at Jarrod’s Place is a product called Trail Armor, which I don’t know if a lot of people have seen it. So tell us a little bit about what Trail Armor is and how it works.

Jarrod Harris 23:44
Yeah, so, you know, years ago, like when I was building trails, back in the 90s, I would use, like, just scrap carpets and stuff for for trail stuff. And you know, it always looked crappy, and it never, never looked good. And it was like different materials and backings and things like, some of them worked pretty good. Some of them didn’t. It just was terrible. I mean, good in a way, but then also terrible.

Jeff Barber 24:12
What were you using it for? Like, to stop erosion or…

Jarrod Harris 24:17
yeah, yeah, definitely just for just the maintenance, outside of things like you build a lip, and then you’d carpet that lip and then a landing, sometimes you carpet that landing. But it was just like, real, you know, basic, just whatever you could get your hands on and, you know, and I knew there was something there. I was like, Okay, well, I know that there could be something that could be developed specifically for this.

Jeff Barber 24:41
Yeah something that works better than carpet.

Jarrod Harris 24:45
Yeah, exactly. So, so, yeah. So, I mean, I spent two years basically just experimenting with, you know, different materials at the park. So, I mean, at this point, I guess, you know, I’m three years in on this whole thing, and I. Yeah, and it wasn’t I mean, I really, I didn’t have a choice. I mean, I I started to see how expensive it was to maintain the trails that you built. We wouldn’t be in business right now. I mean, it’s literally saved the park. That’s the reason why the park is open, because it’s not it’s too much money and it’s too much sweat equity. You’re a human being just can’t do that because it doesn’t make any sense financially or energetic, wise, like you can’t expend that much energy on something that’s just sucking every single dollar away. And, you know, other people have deals worked out with investors. And, you know, it’s not their money. So it’s like they can just lose other people’s money. I can’t lose others, but, you know, it’s my money. You know, it’s Josh’s money. So it’s like we’re neither one of us can afford to, you know, we can’t afford to do that. So I knew real quick I had to come up with something. And so that’s how that whole thing started. And I was like, Look. And I mean, I even told my team, I was like, you know, this is what we’re gonna do. And, you know, I mean, they gave me the eye roll and, like, you know, like, what you know? So I was like, whatever we’re gonna do, what we got to do. So you just, you know this, if this, if everything you’ve worked for is on the line, and you’re taking all the liability for it with your own personal assets, it’s like you just do what you gotta do, right?

Jeff Barber 26:36
Yeah, why do you think? Why do you think they were skeptical?

Jarrod Harris 26:40
Because it’s just like, anything that’s new. People don’t like things that are new and but I knew like, if I could get the combination right, if I could get the right materials together, it’s all derivative of different materials, right? And once I got that together, and I was able to work out a contract with my manufacturer to, you know, to help me develop this stuff. I knew that it would be amazing, and I knew it’d be awesome, and I knew you could ride rain or shine, you’d be able to ride when it’s moon dusty outside. I knew that it wouldn’t matter what the elements were like. And, you know, once we started getting stuff down, and then, especially once we started, like, figuring out, like, okay, all right, let’s try this. Let’s try this. And then, you know, go back to the drawing board and then bring something else back and put that down. I mean, it’s a no brainer at that point. Even the people that were riding at the park, it’s like, all the feedback, you know, they were skeptical, too. But then they would ride, they’re like, Man, I just, it just rained like three inches, and I’m riding the same trail. It’s the same rolling speed, and it’s grippy, you know, it just so, not just from a maintenance standpoint. I mean, the trail armor, it’s not only the armor of the trails, but it armor is my business. It’s, it’s literally armor my business, because I’m saving, I haven’t done the exact numbers, but probably roughly $200,000 a year in maintenance.

Jeff Barber 28:15
Wow. So yeah, I mean, what like, for example, let’s say you’ve got a lip or a jump that you would have to rebuild several times a year, once you have Trail Armor on it, like, how long are you able to go then between, like, having to rebuild

Jarrod Harris 28:33
Years. I just pulled some stuff off of a landing last week for this build that I was doing, we had to extend the jump, make it a little bit longer, a little bit bigger, pulled it off. It looked just as fresh as the day it was finished.

Jeff Barber 28:54
Wow. So so virtually you can…

Jarrod Harris 28:57
and that was for like, almost two years.

Jeff Barber 29:01
Wow. So basically, you can eliminate having to re work jumps, and…

Jarrod Harris 29:07
It’ll cut out 90% of your maintenance, 90% confident, we can say it’ll cut out 90% of your maintenance. Yeah, you will get here and there. You’ll get, like, people wreck, and then the pedal will, like, do a little tear. So the cool thing is, with that, like, you could just cut a little square out and patch it, you can literally just glue, you know, there’s glue that you can use and you just patch it, or you just replace the whole thing. Like it’s just a strip. You just replace the strip. Okay, so it’s, you know, it’s very, very maintenance friendly. And you know, I think what, what it’s done for us, obviously, is like, save the park, but it’s also allowed me to, like, go build other things instead. Of going back and revamping certain trails over and over and over, yeah, like, just double wide alone, like, is a very popular trail at the park, double I would be like, I don’t know, $25,000 to go revamp that you’re talking you have to do that like, every three or four months. And to be honest with you, it kind of sucks after like, the first hard month of rain, the trail is just going to be crappy, loose, marbley, rutted up. You don’t have to deal with any of that anymore. So I’m not having to do that every three or four months. And that’s just one trail. Yeah, you know, then you talk about Air Supply, you’re talking like 30, $35,000 probably to do that whole thing. Wow. You can’t do it. There’s not enough mountain bikers. You know, this isn’t gone, right? There’s, there’s not enough mountain bikers to to be able to spend that kind of money. So I think what it’s going to do is it’s going to basically because of Trail Armor as a bold statement, but just going to say it, you’re going to start seeing more places to ride, because it’s not going to kill the county or the city or the municipality, or whoever, or the organization, it’s not going to kill them to do a build. Let’s say you get a budget for, you know, $500,000 to do a build. Well, I think what’s going to start happening is, is people are just going to be like, Okay, well, the trail builders will be like, well, we’re going to go ahead and put $100,000 in here for, for this, you know, for trailer, because we know that, you know we can make money off the way that we have our stuff priced so competitive. I mean, there’s the only other thing there is that’s even remotely close to what we have, is just marine grade carpet stuff, right? But even that, like at wholesale pricing, which isn’t even what our stuff is. It’s still more expensive than what we have. So trail builders are in a situation now where they could, technically, they could make a little money off of the sale of it, but then they can also make a little money off of the installation. I know that I’ve got several trail builders that are doing that right now. They love it because they can make more money off the installation of it. And then, you know, the organizations that are getting the money. Finally, that takes years, as you know, to get money to go get a grant or something like that. It just seems crazy and preposterous to me to go get $100,000 or $500,000, a million dollar grant to go build a bunch of trails that are going to be total crap within three months, right right now, you’re doing the whole cycle all over again. And you’re like, we’re now going to spend years to try to go get money to, like, get trail builder out here, to come revamp these things. You know, it takes, takes forever.

Jeff Barber 32:38
Yeah, nobody wants to give to that. I mean, that’s the thing that clubs face too. Is like raising funds for building a new trail is much easier than raising funds to maintain a trail. And I think it’s also worth pointing out that you know, because you’re a privately operated bike park, you are open rain or shine, and so your trails are gonna, they’re gonna get beat up more than you know your local trail that maybe is going to shut down for a few days after a big rain. And so, yeah, it starts to make a lot more sense when you’re operating in that environment.

Jarrod Harris 33:12
And you know, you don’t, it’s like, we don’t use it on everything. We use it on the flow trails. We have some hybrid kind of downhill. We have a couple downhill trails that have some jumps on them and some berms, but it will just armor where we need to. You know, it’s like, you know, people see flow trails at the parks. I just think that’s all that’s at the park. But we have 20, I don’t even know how much we have, like 24, 25 trails. Now, I don’t even know how many trails we have. It’s crazy, but we have a ton of, like, just enduro trails that are really techie and loose and, you know, all the things, but for but, you know, most people are coming out to ride the flow trails. I think we do have people that do like to ride the techie stuff. But, you know…

Jeff Barber 34:04
When I visited, we rode all the trails, and for sure, everybody is on the flow trails. You know, we maybe saw like one or two riders on the more like enduro technical trails. I mean, why do you think that is because whenever you talk to riders, or at least, you know, the comments that we read online, people are always like, Oh, I love technical I love rocks. I love, you know, challenging trails. But then it doesn’t seem like many people actually ride those trails.

Jarrod Harris 34:36
I don’t know. You know that’s I don’t know. I mean, I enjoy it too, like, I like riding that stuff too, as long as my suspension is set up properly. Yeah, I get that dialed in and it’s not currently dialed in pretty good. So I do kind of like that stuff. My wrists. Don’t really like it as much, but I. Um, I think just the flow, trails are just more accessible to more people, you know, because now I’m starting to see, you know, we open the park up a little more advanced, because that’s what the area needed. We needed advanced trails. So we opened up with more advanced trails. Now we’re moving more into, like, beginner trails, and trying to build a lot of that stuff, and I’m starting to notice now, like families, and that’s what really hits me pretty hard, is like somebody who kind of grew up like without a family. You know, I love seeing a mom, dad, little kids riding together, not on their iPads, out in nature, yeah, you know, spending actual quality time with each other, and the flow trails are just they make it so much more accessible for them to actually go ride, you know, because you can’t put a four year old on a freaking, you know, Rowdy enduro trail, right? Can’t do that

Jeff Barber 35:59
That’s a great point, yeah? Yeah. Well, yeah, I want to talk a bit more about about what the visitors look like at the park and how the parks laid out before we move on from Trail Armor. Are there other bike parks that are starting to use this? Or you even seeing this you mentioned, like municipalities and places like that, like, where are you seeing people starting to use Trail Armor?

Jarrod Harris 36:23
Yeah. I mean, I don’t know that the number, but I mean, we probably sold like, 30 or 40 different orders that have gone out at this point. I know. I mean, there’s no, I can remember all the places, but like, just locally, like, Wildside has it Howler Bike Park. Not local. But, you know, just thinking of bike parks in general, we have it everywhere. Like, well, Blankets Creek has it, Big Creek has it. Altoona is gonna be getting some just locally, but like, There’s trails in Florida. You know, Mississippi, Louisiana, Alabama, Wisconsin, Arkansas. He’s got a huge order coming from Arkansas. It’s, it’s funny, because, like every time I’m at the park, people will come up to me and they’re asking me about it because they’re trying to basically sell it to their organization. They’re like, I’m, I’ve been talking about this, you know, because once they ride it, they get it, they’re like, Oh, this is amazing. Like, once we put this down, it’s, we’re, we can just build a thing, and then we’re done, you know, and then it just is gonna, then you can ride it in the rain. So it’s, I think you’re just gonna start seeing it a lot more places. And I do think that people are just gonna start budgeting it. When they’re trying to get grants or get money, you know, they’re just gonna go, Okay, well, why would we spend 500 grand and not have any trail armor, which, it doesn’t even make sense, you know, it gets to a point where just, it’s not, you know, it’s not advantageous to do that, yeah, or fiscally irresponsible. I should say.

Jeff Barber 38:05
It makes sense to spend up front so that you don’t have that maintenance, and your trails are running the way that they were designed to run. I mean, I think that’s, that’s the big thing too, that you’re getting out of that is the consistency and, yeah, having the trails optimized. So you talked a bit. You mentioned a couple of the popular trails, Double Wide and Air Supply. So popular one? Yeah, yeah, yeah. Tell us a little bit more about how the park is laid out and what some of the more popular trails are.

Jarrod Harris 38:42
So, I mean, obviously it’s very subjective, and it’s funny, because, like, the people’s favorite trails tend to change over time, because they might ride a trail so many times, and then they go like, Oh, I totally forgot about this other trails. Let’s go ride, you know, Backwoods, or Amish country, or 1776 or Sendy Crawford, or what, you know, Kids Eat Free, Senior Discount, Unlimited Bread.

Jeff Barber 39:12
Who comes up with these names. Is that all you or have you got…

Jarrod Harris 39:16
The food stuff, I don’t know, there’s like, food tropes, but just terrible. Like, you know, yes, definitely, I had a Cindy Crawford poster. You know, she was a model in the 90s, right? Like she did a big Pepsi commercial once. And so it just was funny, because a buddy of mine came up with that, actually, I think it was my buddy Zach, who’s on our team, like, and it’s just funny, because he’s like, Yeah, Sendy Crawford with a S, right, right?

Jeff Barber 39:49
For those who are listening, it’s a play on words…

Jarrod Harris 39:54
Yep. And then Air Supply was just because I used to, you know, I always loved air supply when I was. To, you know, make it out with my pillow in middle school, double skate, you know. But most kids, they wouldn’t, and they have no idea that that’s named after the 80s love, right? Ballad, band, Air Supply,

Jeff Barber 40:15
Yeah, that’s cool. So, so at the park, you’re obviously there, you’re running shuttles, and so you take people up to, I guess, what is like? I mean, it’s the top of the shuttle, but, but there’s actually, like, more trails above that, right?

Jarrod Harris 40:34
Yeah, I think we have another, like, I guess, like 350 feet more above that. It’s just too steep to we can’t run, we can’t drive a shuttle up there. It’s way too steep. Yeah, so that’s all that stuff is like black trails. I mean, we do have one blue trail, but it’s really not blue right now. It’s so rowdy now it’s very hard to make a blue up there. So matter of fact, I’m probably gonna change it to a black trail to be honest with you. Honest with you, because it’s just getting so rapid. Yeah. So everything above that, it’s definitely a black and it’s good, because I don’t want people going up there that don’t have a reason to go up there. And, you know, it’s a little bit of a climb too. So you have to kind of work for it. We’ve mellowed the climb out, which is nice, but still, you have to work for it to get up there to that stuff. So, yeah, I mean, but from the shuttle drop itself. I mean, if you want to probably put another freaking 10 trails in, you know? I mean, stuff would have to, like, kind of overlap each other and put some bridges in and things like that, but, but there’s already so much variety out there right now that nobody, I mean, I don’t know anybody that goes out there and rot. You can’t really ride everything in a day. Yeah, it’s just, there’s so much, you know, I don’t know that you could fit it all in, really. So I think, yeah, trail wise, like, I’m pretty happy with what we have. I definitely always want to do something new. But, you know, you can make, once you have the baseline of trails, and you can just make little changes here and there, and that’ll get people stoked up to be like, Oh, they put a new jump or a new alternate line off of whatever, you know. So there’s, there’s tons of ways to, like, get people excited about things, you know,

Jeff Barber 42:26
yeah, yeah. And so from, from the shuttle drop off, there’s, there’s beginner trails all the way through, like, black diamond stuff. Is that? Right?

Jarrod Harris 42:36
Yeah, we’ve got, let’s see, 1234, I or, I think we have five greens right now, okay, wow. And yeah, we’ve, like, two of them are, like, more beginner trails, like, even the berms and stuff are real mellow. So, you know, because that’s a big deal, like just watching people ride the trail itself might be chill, but then if you build berms too freaking peaked out, like they’re just too bowled out, they’re gonna get freaked out. They’re not gonna do them, or they’re, you know,

Jeff Barber 43:10
I mean, speaking of big berms, like when you say big berms, like you’re talking about massive berms. I mean, some of the biggest berms I’ve seen are at Jarrod’s.

Jarrod Harris
Well, not on our green trails, our green

Jeff Barber
Yeah, not the greens, but, yeah. But to put it in perspective, there’s some, there’s some very big ones out there. And yeah, are you able to do that? I mean, I was gonna ask this when we’re talking about Trail Armor, but because of the soil, it looks like, it seems like there’s a lot of clay there. There’s that, like Georgia red clay. And so does that help you or does that hurt you?

Jarrod Harris 43:47
We have pockets. We don’t have a ton of clay. Actually, we have more I don’t even know how to describe it. It’s like we have some pockets of clay, but not a ton of clay we have. I mean, there’s, you know, obviously there’s some play in it, but it’s just rocky. It’s just a lot of rock, you know, it reminds me a lot of, like Arkansas, like the stuff they have, like, out in Bentonville and stuff. It’s just not good dirt.

Jeff Barber 44:12
So you can’t build with that. So how are you, how are you doing? Are you bringing dirt in to build?

Jarrod Harris 44:17
Well, we definitely have to use a lot of sifting, bucket work. I mean, we gotta, you gotta sift through a ton of rock to get the smaller stuff, you know, the finds and and then, you know, rake. A lot of raking, a lot of just finished work to get to the get a layer of good dirt, and then, but that’s what’s so great about the Trail Armor is like, once you do the finish work on the trail, build it, do the finish, work on it, put it down. You’re done. Like, you know, you know, there’s nothing to erode so. And the other thing too, like, I think is a great selling point too, is just the erosion aspect, or the lack of erosion. You know, it really is a erosion solution, because your trails aren’t going to some. Waterway or something,

Jeff Barber 45:00
You’re not losing that good stuff.

Jarrod Harris 45:03
Everything’s there, yeah. And we have a 100% recyclable. Are the toughest stuff we have is like 100% recyclable too.

Jeff Barber 45:13
Wow, that’s awesome. So, you know, being in the south, are you seeing a lot of riders coming from up north, especially like when, when temperatures are colder, like in the winter months?

Jarrod Harris 45:27
Yeah, this year is especially every weekend I’m seeing. It’s weird, because I’m seeing all these people. I don’t know. I’ve never seen these people before, ever, you know. And it’s cool, but it’s just, you know, I mean, not last weekend, but, like, there’s been, like, the past couple months. I’ll ride up there on my e-bike, and I don’t really rather shuttle that hardly ever. I just don’t like riding shuttles, but I’d rather just pedal my Well, I mean, I want to E bike. So it’s like, you know, you know, I just don’t, I don’t know. I just want to keep moving right? Like, I don’t want to stop, and then I don’t know. I don’t want to wait for a thing, because I’ll just get up there quicker on my E bike. So I just like doing that. But point I was trying to make is like, I’ve found myself many times up there, just at the shuttle drop, just feeling kind of like lonely, because no, most of these people, and they’ll cut a lot of people come up and say, hey, you know, this place is great. Thank you so much. We came from, you know, just insert I mean, just everywhere. Learning somebody from Ireland there this week. And we have people in New Zealand there. We’ve had people from, you know, Alaska, freaking California. I mean, just all over the Northeast. We get more people from out of town than we do locally. I think if I had to, like, really dig, I think it would probably be like, Yeah, we definitely get a lot of people from Tennessee, lot of people from Florida. Florida people is, I love the Florida people so much because it’s, I mean, that’s a big commitment for them to come that far, you know? And they do it. And I see a lot of these Florida people, like, once a month sometimes, sometimes twice a month long. you know, yeah. But we get, yeah, we get people from everywhere, yeah,

Jeff Barber 47:27
that’s cool. Well, is there, is there an off season? Like, what’s your high season and kind of, what’s your low season?

Jarrod Harris 47:34
Then, you know, that’s hard to say, because, like, that’s another thing. Trail Armor is really kind of changed that because, you know now when it rains, it’s like, I don’t care. I don’t I don’t have no sort of emotions to that anymore.

Jeff Barber 47:52
Were you originally like, if you’re like, checking your phone, you’re like, oh shoot, it’s gonna rain tomorrow. Would that just like, ruin your whole day?

Jarrod Harris 48:00
It’ll tear your freaking Yeah. Just like, yeah. Punch you right in the soul, you know. Because you know, like, people are just, they’re not gonna come. They’re asking about what the weather’s doing. Like, I don’t get as many people asking about weather anymore, because it’s like people just know, after a while, yeah, and,

Jeff Barber 48:20
well, they’re not going to come, or they’re going to come and they’re going to tear up your trails. I mean, yeah, you’re kind of…

Jarrod Harris 48:26
well, we don’t even care about that so much. I mean, all the enduro trails, like the all that stuff, rides better in the wet anyway, because it needs the type of dirt that we have. It just needs moisture, because it’ll get real dry and loose. So when it rains, it’s like the Enduro trails are really good. And then the other thing is, like, no one cares about the flow trails. If it rains, because the flow trails are fine, like they’re you’re still gonna be able to ride them the same so, so for us, like rain doesn’t really, it hasn’t it hasn’t. It doesn’t really affect the turnout like it did before. Just people just aren’t really that concerned about it, because they know they can ride right if it rains. Yeah? So, yeah. I think that’s helped us a lot with and we’ll see how this year goes. But you know, our numbers pick up every year, like, I think it’s, you know, we roughly are, like, 20% 20-25% up every year. So that’s great. We’ll see, we’ll see how that goes this year. And you know, it’s helped in the summer too, when it’s really moon, dusty and dry outside, you know the amount of moisture underneath the Trail Armor, it’s just the condensation, I guess it just kind of keeps everything, like, nice and tight,

Jeff Barber 49:49
Yeah.

Jarrod Harris 49:50
So it helps a lot with that too.

Jeff Barber 49:52
Yeah, that’s cool. So, I mean, you talked a lot about kind of your journey to start. Starting the bike park and then, like, the years of like, getting it up and running. I’m curious what you would do differently if you were to open another bike park today. Would you, would you do everything the same, like, or have you learned some stuff, or what? What would you think if you’re you’re starting all over again,

Jarrod Harris 50:21
Doing things differently. I don’t know if I would do anything Well, I mean, I guess there’s probably, I don’t know, not really, because kind of feel like that’s just part of life. It’s like, you’ll have experiences that are just hard, and then you just look back in retrospect. It’s like, while it’s happening, and it’s like, really stressful and really hard, it sucks. But then you look back later and you’re like, oh, this all happened perfectly.

Jeff Barber 50:49
Yeah. Well, maybe you would have invented trail armor earlier, right? And you would, you wouldn’t have wasted all that time rebuilding your trails.

Jarrod Harris 50:58
Well, it would have never been the dire need to, like, get something going, you know. I mean, if it wouldn’t have been for things being hard and stressful, there wouldn’t have been that dire need to, like, you know, make something happen quick. So, yeah, I mean, really, I don’t think there’s any, yeah. I mean, you could all day long, kind of like, go, you know? Oh, wish I wouldn’t have jumped that one jump. Now I’m, you know, now, hurt, there’s that aspect of it, but, like, but who knows, maybe in the end, everything just as works out exactly how it really should for your particular experience here in this realm, whatever you want to call this, this place we’re in. So, yeah, I don’t know. I don’t think so.

Jeff Barber 51:53
I mean, your perspective makes a lot of sense, especially when you put it in those terms of, like, you know, doing a jump and getting injured. And you know what? I mean, what? Yeah, that’s, you can’t go back and undo that. And so, yeah, I mean, I think, I think that’s the right perspective to have. That’s great. So what’s next for the bike park? What are you looking forward to doing there at Jarrod’s Place next?

Jarrod Harris 52:20
Well, always wanting to, like, obviously, just do new stuff trail wise, I think I’m really kind of focused on, I want to do some more entry level stuff. As far as park wise, like, in terms of, like, facility type stuff, I want to get our ran to all our campsites. Definitely want to build another bath house, or an actual bath house. I mean, we just have some showers and bathrooms attached to the shop right now, building a Food Food Court hangout situation so that, you know, people can just kind of chill under a covered area with either, you know, some fans on or heat or whatever, you know, just work on their computers if they want to. Expand more hiking trails. We have a bunch of art at the park, which was donated to us, which is really cool, because, I mean, it’s probably hundreds of 1000s of dollars worth of art from some really great artists, and they just have donated it. And, yeah, I mean artists by the name of Greg Mike, who’s an Atlanta guy, pretty sure he’s from Atlanta, but he’s got a pretty extensive network of artist friends. And then yeah, Josh knows him pretty well. And so like, yeah, that they got, I don’t know how many pieces we have, like 60 art pieces, which is really cool to incorporate that. So really just want to make just something more for people that, let’s say they have a wife or girlfriend or whatever, who’s somebody who doesn’t ride, but they can come out there and just like, hike, or they can, you know, just eat. Our food truck is amazing. Like, Seppe’s food truck is just awesome. I mean, he’s just, it’s amazing. Like, I’m truly, truly, truly, am blessed, but he’s just kind of out in the open right now, so we, you know, I want to get him, like, under some sort of a, you know, like a, some sort of a nice covered area, so those things are on the table, and then improvements on our road I want to build like an observation deck up at the shuttle drop. And then I started a 501.c3 as well that I’ve got approval on. Finally, from the IRS for a nonprofit that I would like to be able to use that to take a portion of my property and try to get some sort of try to get subsidized in some way to, like, build out, like a pump track, some sort of entry level free bike park for free for the public, yeah, so, and then also bikes and pads so that we can get people into the sport without that huge barrier of entry. Yeah. And you know, we’re now a Specialized dealer. And what’s been good about that is that we have access now to like small bikes, smaller bikes, which is good because, you know, when the parents come, they like they have kids. What I see in the future is that they’ll just come ride for free, try the sport out, and if they like it, then, you know, obviously they’re gonna go to the park, or they’ll go to other places to ride, and they’ll just be in the sport, you know, yeah. And so for me, I’m like, Okay, well, this is a great way to be able to, like, actually grow the sport. Because, you know, as well as I do, it’s like, it’s like, crack. I mean, once you ride and you’re like, really get into it. You’re just, it’s like, it’s a lifestyle sport, you know? It’s different than a lot of other things. I think people will be like, well, like, if the economy is really bad, then they’re just gonna be like, well, maybe I don’t need to go on vacation, because I’m definitely gonna ride my bike, you know, I’m still gonna, I’m gonna buy this, buy this new bike. Yeah, I just won’t go here or whatever, you know. So, yeah, because I can’t. I mean, there’s nothing more important to me than just this is my life, you know. So, yeah, do whatever you can to make it happen.

Jeff Barber 57:01
Yeah, that’s an incredible vision. And, you know, I think it’s, I think it’s really interesting that, of all that stuff, I mean, there is, it’s like, the trails are, are there? The trails are great. And now it’s just all about like building that community and like letting people, you know, hang out more and, like, do more while they’re at the park and, yeah, just really making that space welcoming for everybody. I think that’s awesome.

Jarrod Harris 57:26
Well, it’s the park is my surrogate family, really, I mean, it’s just, it’s, I mean, I don’t, yeah, I don’t. Everybody is dead and gone to, like, for me, like, that is my family. Those are my, my people. So it’s, you know, little selfish on my end, but like, I need some sort of like, I need, I need to be able to connect with other other people. Like, you know, we’re human, so we have to have a connection, you know, I don’t have a wife or kids or anything like that. So,

Jeff Barber 58:01
Yeah, it’s clear that you’re passionate about that, yeah, and that, that you’re building something that you love, and other people do too, and that’s, that’s why it works. That’s why it’s magic. Really awesome to see. Well, Jarrod, thanks so much for joining me and sharing your story. Where can listeners go to learn more about Jarrods and trail armor and some of your other projects,

Jarrod Harris 58:26
trail I think trail armor is like trailarmorMTB.com. I’ve got a, like, an Instagram page for it too. I think it’s just, I think it’s a @trail_armor. If you go to like, Jarrod’s place, that’s the main page. And then I always tell people, if you want to send me a message directly, like, don’t send it to the Jarrod Place page. Like, just send it to Jarrod of Jarrod place. That is my my page. But yeah, those are all good places. And then, of course, our website, Jarrodsplacebikepark.com. Yeah, that should be everything awesome, yeah.

Jeff Barber 59:09
Well, Jarrod, thanks again for joining us, and thank you to all the listeners for tuning in. If you enjoyed this episode, make sure to subscribe and check out more at Singletracks.com/podcast. We’ll catch you on the next time. Peace.