Strava data for the first quarter of 2016 seems to show that the Blue Derby trails and the North South track are the most popular riding trails (amongst strava users) in Tasmania followed by the Meehan Ranges and the trails in the Kate Reed NRA.  Tasmania's mountain bike trails are still a long way behind some of Victoria's and the ACT's key mountain bike parks.

The estimated number of visitors that undertook some form of mountain biking in Tasmania rose from 8,825 in 2014 to 13,196 in 2015 according to the latest release of data in the Tasmanian Visitor Survey.

For those of you who don't pour through every Tasmanian Government announcement and news article, you may have missed the article by Jessica Howard in the Mercury on January 17 announcing that the Tasmanian Government is going to release a new MTB Strategy this year to capture Tasmania's growing reputation as a mountain biking hotspot.

This commitment seems to have morphed from writing a new MTB Strategy to developing a draft Tasmanian Cycle Tourism Strategy in the Premier's recently released Plan for a Brighter Future - Agenda 2016 which states that the draft plan will be released in the July to September quarter, 2016.

The release of the Greater Hobart Mountain Bike Plan (Land Manager) updates is one of my favourite mountain biking reads as I get to see what progress is being made on various projects in my own backyard.

The City of Hobart is organising a number of volunteer working days in February-March 2016 to help build a new alignment for the Slides Track which links Knocklofty and South Hobart.

The December 2015 Tasmanian Trail Newsletter is now available (see attachments).

This is an update from Hobart City Council on Hobart's Mountain Bike Track works, including an opportunity for Trackcare to work with the #GreenArmy on the Slides project. This project will connect the two popular riding areas of Knocklofty Reserve and South Hobart.

The Tasmanian Visitor Survey data for the period October 2014 to September 2015 has been released and after several quarters of visitor numbers undertaking a bit of mountain biking going up, up and up ... this quarter they've taken a slight dip.

The Wellington Park Management Trust has approved the trial conversion of Pillinger Drive Track and the upper section of Middle Track (Reservoir Trail to Radfords Track) from single use to shared use (bicycles and walkers) for 6 months. The aim is to trial a new, off-road bicycle route between Fern Tree and The Springs. 

"We have the most incredible volunteers, diversity of terrain, rivers, and views. The Penguin Bike Park is a success beyond expectations, but now we have the unique opportunity to develop and improve close to 30km of trails in the Dial Range. Parks and Wildlife Service Tasmania has approved the project and detailed trail marking is under way.
"We need close to $400K to bring this to reality (normally this will be $2.4 Million project)
"If you know of any grant, government or private support project (or have any spare cash). Send us the information. Thanks for your time, Cradle Coast Mountain Bike Club".

Attached is a flyer from the Scottsdale Rotary Club inviting everyone to the opening of the new section of the North East Rail Trail from Scottsdale to Tonganah this Sunday 29 Nov. The old railway station in Ellenor Street will be the centre of the celebrations and will become the hub for the start of the Scottsdale based section of the Trail.

Echoing the burgeoning interest in cycle tourism in the region and the emergence of "world-class" mountain biking tracks at nearby Hollybank and Blue Derby, Launceston Airport has recently constructed its own “Bike-Port”.

The Maydena Bike Park is an ambitious project led by internationally-renowned trail company Dirt Art (www.dirtart.com.au) to re-purpose an abandoned $6.5m tourism development into a large-scale commercial mountain bike park and adventure centre. 

OK, so this update is late, real late, but there's two good excuses for that: (1) I've been busy migrating all of the events over to a new platform on the webite (yawn) and (2) there's been so many new events to add this month that it took me awhile (yay!).

The Tasmanian Visitor Survey data for the period July 2014 to June 2015 has been released and in headline news the number of visitors that undertook some form of mountain biking in Tasmania leapt 39.2%, compared to the same period last year, to just over 11,000.

Quite a few new additions to the tassie trails calendar this month, including a new Gravity Enduro series running from October through December and a four hour Trevallyn MTB race to be held on October 4 (details are still sketchy on this one, but I have seen it posted).

Jason Unwin, of the Meehan Range Trail Groomers (MRTG), has announced an exciting range of new trails to be built in the Meehan Range over the next ten weeks, here's what he had to say on facebook:

Progress continues on the Latrobe-Kentish Mountain Bike Trail Network with the release of TRC Tourism's draft Kentish Mountain Bike Trails Masterplan report.  I'm still trawling through the report myself, but it is attached below for those who want to have a look.

If you had to rank mountain biking, trout fishing, scuba diving, quad biking and golf for their popularity as tourist activites in Tasmania where you would put mountain biking?

Anyone bullish enough to place it number one?

It may be winter, but if you pick your day then the riding can still be darn fine (as per the attached photo).  Even if it is windy, cold and raining ... some of us can still find stupid reasons to go riding.

Looking at July's event updates, I'm super excited to see that the Dirt Devils MTB Club have kicked off their Cyclocross Winter Series 2015 with the next event (the State Champs) to be held on the 19th of July.  For those in the north of the State, the Launceston Mountain Bike Club is organising another round of Winter Social Rides with their first ride to Ben Lomond on the 12th of July.

Also up north, Tbug has some interesting social rides coming up including a ride up Mt Barrow on the 26th July.

Rounding out the July events, for the runners this month there's the Glenorchy Fun Run and Endorfun's Russell Falls trail run.