4 Reasons to be Excited for the Future of Mountain Biking in Northern Ireland

Anyone else noticed how the news has been pretty heavy lately? Well, in our small corner of the world, in our little sport, there are a few reasons to be happy. Today, we present 4 reasons why the future of mountain biking is bright here in Northern Ireland

1) This Graph

Usually we don't like to delve publicly too much into our website figures. We're quite private like that. But in this case we're happy to make an exception. The graph below shows the growth in website traffic to MountainBikeNI.com since Covid struck in 2020. All of that growth is organic and it's incredibly exciting for us.

A screenshot of web traffic to MountainBikeNI.com since the beginning of the pandemic

We all know of friends who, during Lockdown, said "Hey, what's this whole mountain biking thing like, I might give it a go." The proof, they say, is in the pudding. Trail counter figures are up, website visits are up - all that means more and more people are getting into mountain biking.

2) Compound Interest

To follow on from the previous point, hobbies like mountain biking benefit enormously from compound interest.

The more people who get interested in it, the more who will hear about it and are likely to in turn try it out, and so on. This is part of the reason why green and blue mountain bike trails are so important at new trail centres. Sure, nothing but red and blacks would be great, but without green and blues there is nowhere that new wave of mountain bikers can try out their new favourite hobby.

What helps even more with this wave of compound interest is the bike industry in Northern Ireland is fortunate to be home to the likes of Chain Reaction Cycles, one of the biggest brands in the world for mountain bikes.

Riders enjoying a breather at Blessingbourne Estate Mountain Bike Trails 

This swell of interest is what the people who are deciding where to spend public money look at; if constituents love mountain biking and those numbers keep going up, that's where political interest will lie and where ultimately, it becomes easier to secure funding for new trails. Speaking of which...

3) Plans Afoot

Everyone is likely now familiar with Northern Ireland's newest mountain bike trails, Gortin Glen Forest Park Mountain Bike Trails. If not, treat yourself to a visit and we can promise you'll be blown away by what's on offer there, especially after it's addition of trailhead provider Campbase Adventures.

Campbase Adventure offer bike hire and an uplift service for Gortin Glen Forest Park

While we're not in the loop of all the plans ahead, there is no doubt there is a trend at the minute for adding to trail centres. Davagh Forest will be having new trails added to it, there was the recent opening of trails at the GAP and as mentioned above - success for mountain bike trails tends to beget more success for mountain bike trails.

4) New found interest in our health 

It's hard to argue with the fact that Covid-19 made us all acutely aware of our overall health. The statistics continue to show that being overweight increases your chances of being seriously ill with the disease, and so society as a whole has never had a greater reason to set aside time to ensure we are exercising enough and eating healthily.

In addition to the physical element, there are copious number of studies that reflect the health benefit of being outdoors in green spaces

The benefits of mountain biking are that it offers people a non traditional way to get fit. Better still, advances in e-bike technology mean that even with injuries or despite what people might consider 'age restrictions' anyone can get into the sport and give themselves a moderate workout climbing to the top of a mountain. 

Whatever happens in the future, we're going to be here for it. Make sure to follow us on Facebook, Instagram and Twitter to be kept up to date with the latest mountain bike developments in Northern Ireland.