Checking in with the Motown Scrub Club

It’s early spring, and the dirt in northern West Virginia is still malleable. The Motown Scrub Club— a group of friends with a shared interest in gravity— is seizing this exact moment. 

If you haven’t been through yourself, Morgantown is the little cycling community that could. I can probably name every single self-declaring cyclist in town, most of whom are at least above-average in ability to shred, and all of whom are ambassadors of their preferred corner of the sport. Without Morgantown’s dynamic cycling milieu, there's a slim chance the Scrub Club would even exist, let alone that my roadie self would ever come into contact with them.

I spent years dunking on downhill sports. I find the most pleasure in traversing difficult terrain, creating big loops and making point-to-point connections at increased speeds. On the hammer-to-shred continuum, I’d say I’m heavily hammer-leaning. I certainly enjoy mountain biking and hitting the features I can handle, but if a ride isn’t twenty continuous miles I often feel unsatisfied.

One weekend last year, my friend and bike shop coworker invited me down to his homeland in central West Virginia. He and his crew had plans to hit Snowshoe’s bike park, and he suggested I could go on a long-range road ride in what is arguably the most rural part of the most rural state. It sounded cool, so I packed up some lycra and loaded my ‘cross bike into the bed of his truck, dwarfing it beside the big-travel full-squishes.

In the hunting lodge above his parents’ closed-down restaurant in Bergoo, WV, the homies rolled in one by one. It quickly became apparent that there was an extra bike for me, and that if I wanted to get a lift pass and rent a full-face I could join for lift service laps. With rain in the following day’s forecast and a few beers down the hatch, I resolved to feel it out the following morning.

I woke up pretty hung over and knew I had to bunt on the 80-mile route I’d penned. Next thing I knew, I was at Snowshoe’s misty peak in a thrown-together kit of rental armor, borrowed pants (my cut-offs were deemed inappropriate) and skate shoes. After picking my way through the chunder-y stuff and gapping a couple table tops, I was a more downhill-pilled than I anticipated. A little while later, a full-suspension mountain bike is still missing in my arsenal, but I won’t ever forget that day of riding. The group that got me out there— which would go on to unite under the Scrub Club banner— was simply stoked that I took them up on the offer.

Besides trips to Snowshoe, the crew holds it down locally too. I recently checked in with them during a dig day at the local bootleg trails. Behind one of the high schools in town is a steep face that goes clear down to the rail trail. If you can get three or more people together, it makes for the perfect urban shuttle run, and the guys are hard at work to make riding there more than just a local alternative.

The trails are rowdy. Some of the features preexisted the Scrub Club, but many had fallen into disrepair after seasons of no work being done. The Scrub Club has rehabilitated much of what already existed, while building up their own jumps and berms too. The dig sesh was really just a leveled-up version finding the perfect place to put the neighborhood’s communal plastic X-Factor ramp. There were no excavators or blueprints in sight. The heaviest piece of machinery was the Sawzall wrapped in a hoodie in one of the dudes’ backpacks. To dial in a new jump, riders simply take turns hitting it at increasing speeds to determine whether it needs more lip or a bigger catch-berm. It's a breath of fresh air.

From my pavement perspective, the current zeitgeist surrounding trail building seems to involve going overboard with the engineering. This is possibly a microcosm for the entire cycling industry, too. I understand that there are huge incentives in place to invite beginner riders and casuals. Cycling needs to grow outwards, but I think greater depth is just as important. We can get infinite butts on bikes, but something cutty, fun and grassroots is what made a lot of us lifers. 

The Scrub Club hosts downhill nights most Wednesdays at 5:00PM. Check in with them on Instagram @motownscrubclub.