A women-powered trail building project designed to empower wrapped-up last week as the trail debuted at the 24 Hours of Light Mountain Bike Festival.

Magnusson Pink, a short connector trail off Magnusson Red was the brain child of Sierra van der Meer. The Whitehorse cyclist was inspired by a four-kilometre stretch of single track near Chadburn Lake called ‘Girlfriend.’

“And I always thought, boy wouldn’t it be fun to have ‘My Boyfriend,’” she said.

While the potential couple hasn’t yet been built, Magnusson Pink was born.

“We had this little trail that needed to be built and it was off Magnusson Red and I just thought what if we made Magnusson Pink – a bit as a joke, because it’s pink – but also to try to see if we could empower this huge group of women,” said van der Meer. “If we can empower them to go out and instead of just riding the trails, seeing that there’s this landscape of opportunity to make the trails that they want to make.”

The first trail building night was in May, when the women started building the corridor.

Catherine Forest attended the session with her daughters, after reading about it on the CMBC Dirt Girls Facebook page.

“I wanted my daughters, who love mountain biking to be involved in that project,” said Forest. “We’re always riding the trail and wanted to know what the process was.”

The trail was flagged that first night and a team of about a dozen ladies set to work clearing the corridor for the trail.

Meagan Wilson, a member of the City of Whitehorse’s trail crew manned the chainsaw.

“And our job was to put away the chopped wood far away in the forest,” said Forest.

When the night was over, the magic of a woman wielding a chainsaw had sunk into her 10-year-old daughter, who later told her she wanted to be like Wilson when she was older, on the trail crew.

More sessions followed as the tread was created and finally, berms were built. The Forests attended once more.

“I’m never going to look at a trail the same way. I know how it’s built,” she said. “It’s so empowering. There’s so many mountain bikers in the Yukon. I think it’s the only place in Canada where there’s more women mountain bikers, than men.”

Van der Meer, a new mom herself, thinks that male and female trail builders have different mental approaches when building the trails.

“I feel like I’m going to come off as being super old-fashioned or something, but in a lot of ways, I think women really tend to think about the future and I think there’s a piece about women trail builders that are thinking about trails for their kids, and trails for their families,” she said. “Not that men don’t.”

As always there are exceptions to every rule and of course there are men out there who build with families in mind and women who build difficult technical trails. Each trail builder is important in a network of symbiotic trails like Whitehorse’s more than 700 kilometres of trail.

Magnusson Pink was about giving women the tools and the voice to dictate the trails they may want to ride.

Van der Meer said that in the past, she’s sat back and watched her husband build trails and wanted to tell him how to build it so she’d like it.

“If I want the trail, I should go build it and if he doesn’t like it, that’s tough for him.”

The project was also about giving credit to some of the women who work behind the scenes in the local trail building community, like Carrie Burbidge. She was one of the women on Magnusson Pink sharing her expertise with others.

Magnusson Pink will be heavily used, said van der Meer as it can be ridden now instead of going onto the road.

“I think it’s a great chance for people who worked on it can easily go ride it after and have that sense of pride,” she said.

“It’s really the first step in a larger dream,” said van der Meer.

She hopes to spark interest and empower women by giving them the tools and the knowledge to go out and build their own trails.

After being part of the Magnusson Pink project, Forest is inspired to go out and create more, to give back to the community that has provided so many trails for her and her daughters to ride on.

“I’m really excited to be part of more trail work,” she said. “It feels like we’re growing our network of trails together.”