November 11, 2004 – Mountain bike groups coast-to-coast will soon receive an unprecedented boost for their volunteer trailwork projects, as a result of a financial and gear grant from Recreational Equipment, Inc. (REI), announced today by the International Mountain Bicycling Association (IMBA).

For the second consecutive year, IMBA and REI will award outdoor stewardship toolkits to select mountain bike clubs nationally for the purpose of building and maintaining trails. This year’s $45,000 REI grant nearly doubles the amount of last year’s award, and increases the number of toolkits from 50 to 100. Each toolkit contains eight components to enhance on-the-trail volunteer efforts, including:

-1 McLeod trailbuilding tool
-1 Pulaski trailbuilding tool
-1 Brunton clinometer surveying instrument
-1 IMBA “Trail Solutions” Book
-10 pairs of REI/IMBA trailwork gloves
-10 REI/IMBA trailhead education signs
-12 REI stewardship volunteer t-shirts
-300 REI/IMBA Responsible Riding flyers

IMBA’s network of 500 affiliated clubs and 32,000 individual members perform an estimated 1 million hours of volunteer trailwork every year. These new outdoor stewardship toolkits will motivate clubs to organize even more volunteer projects.

“REI has been an Above and Beyond IMBA corporate supporter since 1993, and is one of IMBA’s best partners,” said IMBA development director Pete Burhop. “These 100 toolkits are a huge donation that will really spark some great volunteer projects.”