The Truckee Bike Park will take center stage this weekend as hundreds of riders and spectators gather to take part in the seventh annual Little Big Bike Festival & Skills Clinics.

This year’s two-day event takes place this Saturday and Sunday, and features several competitions along with a women’s only clinic and a children’s clinic.

For the first time at the Little Big, the Truckee Bike Park will host a Freeride Mountain Bike event. The dirt jump world tour stop is a bronze level competition, which has looser restrictions in terms of who can compete in the event. There will be men and women’s divisions for pros, amateurs, and rookies (ages 11-17). This season of competition on the tour also marks the first year the Freeride Mountain Bike Association has sanctioned rookie competitions for boys and girls.

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Riders will hit the bike park for dirt jump pre-qualification at 10 a.m. on Saturday. The jump competition will take place the following day at 1 p.m. Pros take to the course at 3:30 p.m. Riders in the event, according to Truckee Bike Park co-founder Cortney Knudson, will be judged on fluidity, amplitude, tricks, and their line down the course.

The Little Big will also serve as the final stop of the inaugural Women’s Slopestyle Tour. The festival, which has traditionally taken place in May, was initially supposed to host the first competition of the slopestyle tour, but a heavy winter forced Knudson and bike park co-founder Brooks McMullin to move the Little Big to this weekend.

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“I’m excited,” said Knudson on hosting the last stop of the tour. “It would have been fun to do the first one, but doing the last you get to see how the other events went and correct stuff that went wrong or make things better. I’m hoping the girls will show up and support it.”

Other competitions this weekend include amateur and pro dual slalom races, and amateur and pro dual pump track races, which begin at 12:30 p.m. Saturday.

A children’s strider jam, a pumptrack jam, and a jump jam will all take place the following day, beginning at 11 a.m.

Pros expected to be at the Little Big this weekend include Austin “Bubba” Warren, Kialani Hines, Cameron Zink, and Paul Bass.

Skills clinics

The annual women’s skills clinic will begin at 8:30 a.m. Saturday, and will be led by coaches from around the country and Canada, including Knudson.

The children’s skills clinic will get underway at 10:30 a.m. on Saturday.

The annual Little Big Bike Festival & Skills Clinics caters to all ages, disciplines, and skill levels of riders. Online registration is closed, but day-of registration will be available on event day for clinics and competitions that haven’t sold out. For more information, visit TruckeeBikePark.org or email truckeebikepark@gmail.com.

Proceeds from the event go directly into the Truckee Bike Park.

“I’m excited to have everyone support the bike park,” said Knudson. “And have a party on two wheels.”

Justin Scacco is a reporter for the Sierra Sun. Contact him at jscacco@sierrasun.com.