Learn to Bike events teach kids the basics of mountain biking

Duluth Parks and Recreation has a wide variety of activities for kids to do this summer, including Learn to Ride events.

“This is a grant funded program that we just are putting in action as of this summer, where the goal is to really get more kids biking and developing biking skills with the hopes of progressing on to some of our trail resources that we have so many up in town,” said Recreation Specialist Sam Werle. 

Each Learn to Ride event is at a different park in Duluth, with bikes brought by the city. The free event is for kids ages six to sixteen. Certified mountain bike instructors teach kids based on their current skill set. 

“When we get kids that are brand new and we get to kind of help them experience biking in a different way or start to build some skills for the first time,” said Werle. “But it’s also really fun to have folks that are coming back week after week or session after session. When we have returners in our group, we know kind of where they were at the end of the last class and we can kind of base the activities of the day on ability level for a variety of kids to make sure that beginners are really getting really, really good solid beginner skills built, but those returners are also learning new things that can challenge them.” 

With the skills learned, kids will be able to safely enjoy the city’s many mountain bike trails. 

“We have all these trails and things like that, but don’t really know what that means or how to get involved,” said Werle. “This is really just a great square zero to square one of getting involved, coming to learn about what kind of skills it takes and provide a safe place for those kids to learn those skills, develop those skills with certified instructors so that if you do down the line, get a chance to go on the trails.”

The last Learn to Bike event for the summer will be on August 22 at Gary New Duluth Park, 801 101st Ave. W. There will be two sessions, one from 4 pm to 5:30 pm and the other from 5:30 pm to 7 pm.

The maximum enrollment is 12 per group. More information about Learn to Ride, can be found at this link.