Where mountain bikers once joined vehicles on a busy road to reach a beloved lake in Colorado, now they have a trail of their own.

Builders with Crested Butte Mountain Bike Association (CBMA) recently finished the Lake Irwin Trail — a new, 2-mile stretch of singletrack roughly paralleling the dirt road to the scenic destination for picnicking, camping and more riding.

More riding, for example, to the famed Dyke Trail or Lilly Lake. Those were two possible connections mentioned by Paul Mack, CBMA's board president.

"It's a small trail ... but at the same time it's the connectivity thing that's super important to us," Mack said.

Small in length, but he described the trail to Lake Irwin as significant in other ways.

"It's just killer good," he said.

He went on: "To get to the lake befor

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