The fast-growing town of Ridgefield has notched a notable first for local cyclists who seek gentle yet gravity-defying thrills.

Ridgefield recently opened Clark County’s first bicycle pump track at Boyse Park . A pump track is a paved landscape packed with miniature hills (rollers) and rounded, graceful berms, all designed with a particular style of energetic riding in mind.

Rather than pumping pedals with their legs, pump-track cyclists augment gravity and momentum with nothing but the up-and-down pumping motion of their whole bodies. Adding that motion as you crest a roller or round a bending berm means adding a healthy helping of speed while also enjoying the feeling that you’ve conquered — for just a moment, anyway — the immutable laws of physics.

Pumping is intuitive but takes a

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