Then came Barbro. A whirlwind of a lady, twisting and jumping her way down the local mountain…sorry, hill…and seducing every man and woman that happened to cross her path.

She, if we can talk about a bike trail as a ‘she’, was the first trail to be carved out of the dirt on the eastern side of Ojeberget in Jarvso, and the beginning of what would soon become the Jarvso bike park. The trail is named after Swedish 60’s superstar singer, and Jarvso resident, Barbro Svensson. Famous for her voice, stunning looks and numerous high profile marriages and relationships. The rest of the trails in Jarvso Bike Park are named after her daughters and a few of her most famous songs, they like to keep things local around here and put a ton of pride in their heritage.

Barbro belongs to a rare breed of machine trail where you hardly have to touch your brakes, let alone put down a single pedal stroke unless you really want to. Even though it’s an intermediate trail it fits riders of all skill levels thanks to a series of alternative hits and take–offs. My hands don’t have to worry about annoyances like braking bumps and pot holes, because there aren’t any. Barbro, once again the trail is as smooth as a lady.

For almost four minutes I indulge in some of the smoothest and flowiest riding I’ve ever experienced. A perfect berm to a series of rollers, next perfect berm into an array of table tops with perfectly shaped take–offs that shoot me into the warm Swedish summer air, again and again. I aim for the alternative hits, turning some of the easier jumps into bigger step–downs and gaps. As I exit the last series of tight berms and come to a stop at the base of the chairlift I can’t help but quietly praise the trail builders.

The story about Jarvso Bike Park started some five years ago when local entrepreneur and outdoor man Lars Loov went to the Canadian west coast to see an old friend from home, Svenne Sandahl, who at the time lived in Pemberton outside Whistler. Svenne, who already was a frequent visitor to the world famous shred Nirvana of Whistler Bike Park, told his old friend he just had to try descending a mountain on two wheels. Lars, scared by the mere sight of the activity, refused for days. When he finally gave in and rented a bike he was instantly hooked after his first run. “First, I thought I would get killed within five minutes. But, it turned to be one the most fun things I had ever done.”

An idea started to grow in his mind. Wouldn’t this be a perfect thing for Jarvso? At this time gravity mountain biking in Sweden was more or less focused on Are, a place that was at the forefront of the sport as early as the mid 90’s and with one of the biggest bike parks in Europe. On a trip there, Lars bumped into Martin Ekman and Frasse Fransson, two fellow Jarvso residents that also just had discovered riding downhill on bikes. “We told each other we just have to make this happen back home in Jarvso as well. I mean, we have it all; a mountain with a chair lift, plenty of lodging and good transportations with the railroad stopping in the middle of the village and the road from Stockholm passing right next to the hill.”

There was a minor problem though. The newly gathered crew had not a single clue on how to actually build bike trails, or creating a viable business model based around gravity biking. They needed help. Bad.

It turned out Svenne was good friends with none other than Mr Tom Pro, owner of trail building company Gravity Logic and one of the original men behind the Whistler Bike Park. On a business trip to Austria, Pro made the detour to central Sweden to check out the possibilities of building a park in Jarvso. He liked what he saw. Ojeberget, the local hill, was a blank canvas, ready to be painted by dirt art.

Within a few months, in the fall of 2009, Pro’s colleague and partner–in–dirt, master crafter Rob Cocquyt, travelled to Sweden, ready to get dirty. Then came the next hiccup in the operation, Rob hated the dirt. Completely hated it. “I called Tom and told him “I can’t do shit with this piss poor dirt.” There were rocks absolutely everywhere.”