While Sioux Falls, South Dakota, might not be the most topographically gifted city in the nation, local MTB advocates are making the most of what they do have. Falls Area Single Track (FAST) has succeeded in building mountain bike trails on the tallest hills in the region. The Great Bear Ski Valley is now home to Sioux Falls’ newest mountain bike trails on hills boasting about 200 vertical feet.
FAST has been pushing for years to build MTB trails in the city park that houses Great Bear Ski Valley. Technically, the Ski Valley covers only about 20 acres of the 100+ acre park, and the mountain bike trails have been built on undeveloped land adjacent to the small ski area.
The breakthrough came in 2021 when the mayor approved a usage agreement. Trail planning took off in 2022 thanks to a Trail Accelerator grant from IMBA. And in 2024, they finally put shovels to dirt and got to work building trails.
Phase one of “the Great Trail Build” is now complete
FAST is all-in on IMBA Trail Solutions, hiring the org to both design and build the trail system. IMBA subcontracted a portion of the work to Benchmark Trails, a local trail building company that claims to be “the only PTBA-certified trailbuilder in the Dakotas.” With a renowned international-level company leading the charge and a certified local builder who’s invested in the community helping out, FAST had all the ingredients in place to craft top-tier singletrack in the hills above Sioux Falls.
So far, the trail development totals 4.3 miles of machine-built singletrack, with another 0.3 miles to be finished in the spring. Eventually, the trail system will boast 13-15 miles after a 3-5 year build period. FAST just hosted a grand opening for the trails on Friday, October 11, 2025.
What will riders find at Great Bear?
The first four miles are “mostly cross country, but dabbling a little bit into some downhill features as well,” according to Reva Graves, Communications Director for FAST. The vast majority of the trails consist of classic two-way cross-country singletrack built to IMBA standards, offering great swoop and flow with a relatively wide bench. The trails are also accessible to adaptive mountain bikes.
In addition to the flowing cross-country trails, “there’s a couple of downhill sections that have berms and some optional jumps that are a little bit new to the area.” Specifically, there are three downhill-only mountain bike trails: two of which are blue (intermediate), and one of which is green (beginner). Riders will need to take the XC trails to reach the one-way downhill trails. The downhills offer “rocks and roots and rock gardens. There’ll be substantially built berms [and] optional jumps,” according to Graves.
While the downhill trails are designated bike-only, the XC trails are open to foot traffic as well. These multi-use trails join about five miles of existing hiking-only trails at Great Bear.
Future trails are funding-dependent
The construction of berms and downhill-only trails has brought a totally new type of riding to the Sioux Falls mountain bike scene — and they don’t plan to stop here. FAST aims to raise $1.25 million to fund the three-phase trail development. Unfortunately, they haven’t had much luck with grant funding, according to Graves, “so all of this so far has been funded by the community.”
To date, FAST has raised almost enough money to fund phase one — about $305,000. But to get the rest of the trails built, they’ll have to raise the remaining funds, which makes the completion date a bit fluid.
Regardless of when the next phase comes online, local riders in the growing Sioux Falls MTB scene are already stoked to ride a totally new type of mountain bike trail!
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