We all need a place to play. For dirt jumpers, that place is simple: a few giant piles of soil are the key to a good time.
The modern dirt jump scene has evolved from motocross to BMX to specifically designed mountain bikes. It relies on a few factors to keep kids (and adventurous elders) in the air: space to build (preferably with permission), a healthy amount of creativity to design the series of jumps (called sets or lines), and the digging, done by either shovel or machine.
In the Comox Valley, one man currently oversees the scene, albeit with a lot of help from the community. His name is Stéphane Pelletier, his domain is the dirt jump park in Cumberland’s Village Park, and he is far from alone in keeping this church of dirt ready for service.
A trail-building legend
Squamish’s iconic trail-building legend Big Red Ted (Ted Tempany) and his Dream Wizards team broke ground on the project in 2017. Most of the original funding came from the Village of Cumberland, with additional funding from United Riders of Cumberland and the Cumberland Community School. Since then, a small stipend has kept a couple of different people covering maintenance, from re-shaping old jumps to creating new lines and keeping the place clean.
Pelletier—who works at Forbidden Bike Company—has been in charge for two years. “It’s a constant evolution,” he says. “There was a lot of work done by Dylan King before me. He was a very good builder and he transformed the Dream Wizards’ park into what the Cumberland Park is today.”
King created steep jumps for a more aggressive style of riding: big, tall “tombstones” that intimidate but, if ridden correctly, launch riders much higher. “It translated into dirt jumps that were quite technical to ride,” says Pelletier. As a former competitor on the Freeride Mountain Bike (FMB) slopestyle circuit, he had no problem with the loftier trajectories, but acknowledges they were “hard for beginners and intermediates.” When King left to start a Reiki healing facility in Tofino, he approached Pelletier to take over.
Making the jumps more inclusive
Pelletier and his team “wanted to make it a bit more inclusive and try to build up the dirt community.” The rebuild they unveiled in spring 2024 features fresh designs and a new mulch jump that lessens the impact of landing to encourage trying new tricks: “We made the jumps more inviting and a bit safer for a wider variety of people to ride.”
Pelletier is a perfect fit for the gig. Like many riders, he spent a lot of time building dirt jumps where they shouldn’t be while growing up in Calgary. Over the past two years, he’s dug deep from his experience competing on the FMB tour, and building trails, jumps, and pump tracks for Alpine Bike Parks, the company that built the celebrated Stevie Smith Bike Park in Nanaimo. He says, “It’s a bit of a childhood dream come true. When I was a kid, I’d always think, ‘If only the city would let us, we’d build these awesome dirt jumps.’ And that’s what I got to do.”
Help from the community
Perceptions about danger and injury persist around the sport of dirt jumping, and it’s rare that a community approves a place like this; Pelletier knows how special the park is. He also knows he’s not alone and is quick to praise the work of others. “I believe Curtis Saunders at Cumberland Earthworks has done the machine work for every rebuild,” he notes. “He donates a ton of machine time and a ton of personal time to help that happen. He’s just a total local legend. And big thanks to Tyler Farley at the Village who’s allowed us to do this. Liam Gould is the main guy that helps me with all the labour. Clem Loveless, too. Mark Matthews comes out and helps. The end goal is to build this community so the maintenance contract becomes less of an effort for only a couple of people and the whole community can kind of take ownership. It’s a work in progress.”
The brightest evidence of the community’s health was the inclusion of a FMB Bronze Event during Stokefest in spring 2024. “It’s the first time we’ve been recognized by an international league,” says Pelletier. “It’s pretty cool that little Cumberland has a slopestyle stop, and we’re working with Stevie Smith Bike Park and the Jordie Lunn Park [in Langford] to create a Vancouver Island slopestyle series to really give young riders the opportunity to strut their stuff and take their riding to that next level.”
