NCWR Giving Back!

Nevada City CA

The second annual NCWR (Nevada County Woods Riders) Awards Banquet / Meeting was held in Nevada City, CA on February 1^st this year. And this wasn’t just another motorcycle club meeting.

Besides enjoying the trails and back roads of Nevada, Placer and El Dorado Counties and the surrounding Sierra mountain forests and the vast Nevada deserts, the NCWR is very involved in promoting responsible trail use, advocates off-road vehicle OHV access rights and fosters trail improvement programs with the Tahoe National Forest Service. They are a charter member of the AMA (American Motorcycle Association) and District 36 (The AMA’s regional motorcycle competition arm) 

The club works very closely with the National Forest Service in that the club helps maintain existing trails by clearing overgrowth and fallen trees, they help in laying out and the clearing of new trails. (That’s right new trails) They also work with the Equestrian clubs in helping clear fallen trees on the trails that run through the existing OHV trails in Nevada County. By helping the Equestrians we also help the bicycle riders who also use the Equestrian trails. Yes it’s a very delicate balance and can be very challenging but it’s worth the effort. The club also works very closely with the Sierra Buttes Trail Stewardship which is a Non Profit Organization that builds and maintains hundreds of miles of trails in the Sierra’s. They are also working on a project called Connected Communities (through trails) There are a lot of small communities in the Sierra’s that suffered greatly when logging in those communities all but disappeared. This project will connect fifteen of these communities by creating multi use single track trails to and through each of them, when this project is complete it will add an additional six hundred miles of trails in the Sierra’s. And this project is not a dream it is in fact very much underway.

The club easily donates 1000 plus hours per year to the Forest Service and many additional hours to the Sierra Buttes Trail Stewardship. The special part of the clubs volunteer work is The Forest Service and the Sierra Buttes Trail Stewardship receive funds from the Government based on an hourly rate for the volunteer hours, a huge win for everyone.

A brief history of the club, back in the late seventies there were a lot of trail riders from Nevada and surrounding Counties who also rode Dist 36 Enduro’s, one of those riders Pete wanted to put a club affiliation name on the entry form, so He started putting down Western Nevada County Dirt Riders (WNCDR) eventually others started doing the same until one of the riders Doug thought the name was too long and they changed it Nevada County Woods Riders (NCWR) Doug also had some T shirts made with the new Nevada County map as a logo and the new name and a club was born. Eventually the club became more organized and at first the club was basically an Enduro riders only club, but as the years went on  and more riders joined it became more like it is today, primarily focused on trail riding and maintenance but Dual Sport and Adventure bike rides are also part of what the club does.

As the club has become better known for what it does the membership has also grown and today has over two hundred fifty members. It’s very gratifying to know the vast majority of the members are members because they want to give back, help and be part of something where what they do matters, is very rewarding and positive.

The club has been drawing increased attention from other clubs and organizations from a regional to the national level, because of its success in working hand in hand with the US Forest Service and other local groups and organizations that have a shared interest in what happens in the forest. There are few if any other clubs who have this kind of success and commitment and other clubs and organizations want to know how the club does it, well one thing is certain it has taken years of hard work, flexibility and continued commitment is a key.

This meeting drew some 200 members and family plus key note speakers from the Deputy Director of the CA state OHV (CA State off Highway Program) who brought us up to date on what’s going on in the OHV world. They also announced a new program whereby they are looking for input on opportunities to expand current OHV locations or where there might be new opportunities to create new OHV sites.  The US Forest Service brought us up to date on current and future projects in the Tahoe National Forest.  And a long time advocate for the rights to off highway recreation also spoke to us about the progress this club has made and continues to make and what a difference they have made and has become and inspiration for other clubs to follow. The director of the Sierra Buttes Trail Stewardship spoke to us about the continued commitment to maintaining a vast network of single track trails and their current and future plans of expanding the trails. There were regional as well as national representatives from a number of manufactures who have supported the club for years and several others who have expressed an interest in supporting the club in its efforts.

Awards were given out to members for reaching twenty plus and forty plus hours of volunteer service for 2022. Special Service Award and Volunteer of the Year awards were presented to two of the NCWR club members by the AMA (American Motorcyclists Association) along with a few surprise awards and gifts. And one of the big surprises of the evening was the NCWR (Nevada County Woods Riders) a nonprofit club presented to the Sierra Buttes Trail Stewardship also a nonprofit org. a check for $5000 to help in their continued efforts to create trail systems in the Sierra’s.

All in all it was a great evening and it’s amazing what can happen when you bring together a large group of diverse but like minded people who share in a common goal. 

Doug 21J