BENTONVILLE, Ark. — When Haley Batten won her silver medal in France on Sunday in the Women’s Cross Country Mountain Biking Race. It was the highest finish ever for an American Rider.
Before competing in the Olympics, Batten and members of the Team USA mountain biking crew trained in Bentonville.
"It's so great that we can bring the team together, USA Cycling, and do training camps in Bentonville where we can prepare for the technical terrain," Batten said in a video with USA Cycling after her race. "It’s made us better to perform here and I am excited to see where we can go in the future."
In June, US Cycling announced that the road to Paris would go through Bentonville when it named its team for the 2024 Paris Olympics
"We're thrilled that Haley trained here," Gary Vernon, the director of Outdoor Recreation and Trail Innovation for the Runway Group in Bentonville said. "She's on the national stage winning a silver medal, and the announcers are talking about how she trained in Bentonville, and how the course in Paris kind of matched up to our style of riding here. We're just thrilled."
The Runway Group is a holding company that makes investments in real estate, outdoor initiatives, and businesses in Bentonville.
But what is it about the trails in the city that attract Olympians?
"We've been really fortunate to recruit the best trail designers in the nation that come here and help us build out this destination," Vernon said. "When you have an expert trail that our Olympic athletes are riding, they can be a hillside, have rocks, could be very steep, they want to train on that terrain. If you look at the Olympic course, it's got man-made features of rock. It's got flowy, rolling jumps, which we have plentiful here."
In the past decade, Vernon said the more than 200 miles of trails in the area provide an opportunity for every bike rider, which has helped expand the growth of the sport in Northwest Arkansas.
"Anywhere from a two-year-old on a balanced bike, a Strider, all the way up to an 80-plus-year-old who wants to ride a mountain bike trail for the first time," Vernon said. “The trails were developed and marked per skill level, but they're also made in a way that they're fun for everybody."
As the sport has grown in Northwest Arkansas, some have decided to move their entire lives to Bentonville because of it.
"Moving to Bentonville was definitely a strategic choice for me, as a person who's a mountain bike coach and also someone who really enjoys a work-life balance of being able to go out and access trails right out my back door," Interim Executive Director for the Women of OZ Susie Douglas said.
The Women of OZ is a non-profit organization looking to grow the sport of mountain biking with women in Northwest Arkansas. They host training programs and monthly rides for riders at all skill levels.
Douglas said seeing Batten on the podium can help inspire a new generation of women mountain bikers.
"I think it's super important for women to be able to see people actually doing things and winning in the sport that they're working through," Douglas said. "Being able to see her on the stage is like, 'Alright, she made it. I can do it.'"
Olympian or not, Douglas said the mountain biking community in Northwest Arkansas is for everyone.
"It doesn't matter if you're literally just learning how to ride a bike, or if you're ripping the trails and you're a pro, there's going to be some kind of group for you," Douglas said.
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