774 views • posted 01/10/2018 • updated 04/10/2019

State Award

The State Awards recognize individuals who have made compelling and significant contributions to the trails movement in their home states.

 

Indiana: Paul Arlinghaus

Paul has been involved at nearly every level of trail development, including design, construction, and maintenance, on over 100 miles of mountain bike trails in Indiana.

Paul served as president of the Hoosier Mountain Bike Association (HMBA) from 2006 to 2015, and continues to provide leadership as their Secretary and Chair of the Trails Committee.

Under his leadership, mountain biking in central Indiana has grown immensely with HMBA becoming a top 10 International Mountain Bicycling Association chapter.

One of Paul’s biggest successes has been trail access. This year he helped open some of the first miles of mountain bike trails in Yellowwood State Forest.

Paul has not only spent hundreds of hours a year working on trails, but he maximizes the effort by leading organized workdays and training fellow volunteers on trail building techniques.

Paul’s decade of hard work on and off the trail has not only benefited current and future mountain bikers, but also a variety of other trail users, Indiana’s parks and forests, and the economy of a number of small communities as they become tourism destinations for mountain bikers.