About us
Vision Statement
At Popkum Motor Park we strive to provide an exceptional off-road riding experience. Our still growing 100-acre facility allows us to provide tracks, trails, and riding areas for all off-road disciplines. Whether you ride motocross, trails and enduro, trials, or you are just learning and don’t know what you ride yet, Popkum Motor Park is and will continue to be the place to ride. We will always be planning and developing Popkum Motor Park until we become home to all off-road vehicles.
What we offer at Popkum:
- Junior MX track
- National MX track
- 10-acre Endurocross park
- 2 training areas
- About 30 km of trails (always growing)
- A full service shop (for bikes and vehicles)
- Motorcycle and gear rentals
- Lessons (for beginners and advanced riders)
- Insured motorcycle storage
- Motorcycle wash stations
- Camping
What Are The Track Conditions?
We get this questions a lot and the answer changes daily! Please watch the weather and highway cams suggested below in the days before your visit BEFORE YOU CALL TO ASK! Here is some helpful information………
THE WEATHER: The park is located up against the mountainside in Popkum, located just east of Bridal Falls. We get our own weather patterns that are MUCH different than Chilliwack, Agassiz, or any of the surrounding areas. Set your location on your weather app to “Popkum, BC” for the most accurate forecast. Here is a link.
HWY CAMS: There is a highway cam located at the Bridal Falls overpass that you can check too. If the road is wet, it’s probably raining here. Here is a link to the Bridal Falls highway camera which is just up the road from the park. You can replay the past day and see what the skies and road conditions have been doing.
GROOMING: We groom the main track on the weekends (Saturday & Sunday), every week, weather permitting. If it’s been to wet to groom, we will catch up with a mid-week groom when the weather permits. Please be mindful that it takes many many many hours and lots of heavy equipment to keep a track fully groomed every week. If you feel that we are not meeting your expectations and could do better, please please be mindful that equipment breaks down sometimes and time is limited. Be respectful to our staff who have dedicated all their weekends to providing you with the best conditions we can provide!
KEEP IN MIND:
1) Track conditions swing fast from mud to dust (sometimes within 24hrs). If the sun’s out, we will be busy so pre-book your spot!
2) If there has been a lot of rain in the off season we will need, minimum, a few days of sun OR WIND to dry things out. Wind actually dries things out faster than sun most of the year!
3) In the spring and summer, less than 10mm of rain is probably going to be a great day for conditions. If there hasn’t been a monsoon in the days prior, it will basically water the track and you may just hit one of those unicorn days when conditions are absolutely perfect!
4) If it’s hot and dusty, we have a water truck on site to take care of that!
5) If you call to check conditions first thing in the morning and we are busy signing in riders, we will NOT answer.
We are open rain or shine and we have riders in ALL conditions. Come ride in the rain, it will make you a better rider!!!
John “kindda looks like Santa” is the OG Popkum guy. He’s been here from the very start. He’s our #1 instructor. He’s our resident handyman. He’s full of great stories. John started out as park manager tending to the roots that were to become everything you see at the park today. A lot has changed from those first days. Although his role at the park has changed over the years, he has been an integral member of the team each step along the way. Not sure where we would be without this guy!
John has been riding since he was 13. Bought his first bike at 15 and his street licence by 16. He has owned a bike (…or two) ever since. John raced motocross for about 15 years all together; starting at age 20 in the late 70’s but that only lasted a few years before life took him in other directions. Fast forward to his early 40’s and thanks to his nephews, he caught the racing bug again and keeping at it until 53. These days, after a long day of coaching, you will often find John hoping onto his beloved Yamaha V-Star 1300 for an evening cruise to get a bite to eat.
If you’ve taken the Red Rider lessons at Popkum, there is a good chance you’ve met John. He has a passion for teaching new riders and infuses every lesson with his own style of confidence inspiring encouragement. There are no “can’ts” in John’s classes, he knows that every new rider has what it takes to be great and he will be by your side until you see it for yourself. These days John primarily teaches new riders, but don’t let the beard fool you, he knows a thing or two about moto still! There may be “cooler” instructors out there for the racers to train with, but everyone should take lessons with John to tap into his archive of experience, he will make you faster, smoother, and better!
Dex is one of our main riding instructors and the coolest guy at the track most days. You can usually find him pullin’ wheelies … pretty much everywhere he goes or posing for pre-ride candid photo ops (if it’s not posted on the Instagram, did you even ride?!?). Dex has been teaching at Popkum since 2018 working with anyone from brand new riders to aspiring racers and everything in between. Dex also helps with grooming the track and drives the water truck, bit of a jack of all trades around the park.
Dex has been racing BMX since he was 8, got on his first dirtbike about the same time, did his first stunt in a movie at age 12. He has won championships in some things….. CMA, LMMC, and Future West series.
When he’s off the dirtbike, he spends his time winning running races, and riding bicycles. He’s a regular at the local pump track & skate parks showin’ the kids all the lines they never thought to hit. He is kind, friendly, athletic, and competitive (always ahead of the pack at the local running club and especially when he gets the chance to race). He always has a smile on his face and never forgets his please’s and thank you’s.
Dex has worked with many young local racers over the years that have grown to look up to him and he earns the respect honestly. We are super happy to have Dex on the Popkum team.
Milo has had a life long passion for motorcycles involving motocross, road racing, and trials. Milo stood alongside John in the first days of Popkum, before there were buildings, lessons or rentals, just dudes coming out to ride a track. Since then, Milo has spent his time having a day job and watching his daughter grow up into a lovely and accomplished young lady.
In 1977, young Milo got his CMA license and lined up his XR75 (#67) next to Brent Worrall (Author of Motocross Saved my Life) at Mission Raceway. If you raced motocross in BC thru the 80’s , 90’s and until 2007 you would remember the calm, cool collective Milo consistently battling for the lead of the 250 two stroke class (now the 450 class). A 2007 crash and coma at Mission unfortunately sidelined him from the sport until the opportunity of opening Popkum lured him back.
Since the 2021 season, Milo has been back at Popkum on the regular, this time as one of our Saturday instructors! Working with kids and adults, new riders and experienced riders alike. He enjoys teaching others to improve their riding techniques with a wholistic approach to riding. Milo is a friendly, soft spoken, and patient instructor who has a very gentle approach to teaching.
Joel is a former pro-level Motocross racer and has been an instructor at Popkum Motor Park since it opened. He brings with him 40+ years of experience racing motocross and over 50 years of riding motorcycles. During his time on a bike, he has had 40+ wins over a variety of riding disciplines including MX, ice and quad classes. He was a nationally ranked Bad Ass ice racer, and put in 10+ years as a Pro-level motocross racer. Needless to say, he knows some things about riding a bike.
Joel works full-time as a teacher and brings his teaching knowledge and experience in the classroom to the racetrack. Joel has two wonderful daughters who also share his passion for riding, He is friendly and approachable, and he enjoys sharing knowledge and answering any questions riders have, be it about riding techniques to suspension setups.
Joel was one of Popkum’s original instructors to train with Honda Canada to be a Red Rider Intro lesson instructor, then along with Christy, developed the Red Rider Evolution lesson curriculums also offered at Popkum which are the building blocks to a strong foundation for new rider’s just starting out. Despite the long history of racing, Joel loves teaching our Dirt101 lesson, showing street riders how to transfer their skills to the dirt!
If you see the big red #6 Honda at the track, do not hesitate to stop by and say hello.
Christy hekcin’ loves trials. Starting national competition in 1998, when the AMA/NATC created a women’s class, Christy has been competing at the top of the game for over 25 years. When she proved to be a powerhouse at the North American level (she has won 11 US championships and 4 Canadian ones) Christy began competing overseas as well. She was on the Canadian Trials des Nations team for 9 years, and competed in the world championships, placing as high as 5th, from 2000-2009.
When Christy took a break from riding trials, she ventured into EnduroX, and spent 3 years competing in the indoor EnduroX series, finishing second place in her second year. However, trials is her true love, and she came out of retirement to compete in the US Nationals in 2016 (winning the women’s championship) and 2017 (coming in second place in the championship).
Since then, Christy has worked more in the behind-the-scenes aspects of trials, mostly coaching. But she was also the Director of the Super Trial Series in Texas, and the Trials Team Manager for Sherco/Factory One (both endeavors cut short by 2020). Since 2019, she has worked with the Canadian Trials Initiative, promoting trials (especially women in trials) in Canada. She hosted the first ever (soon-to-be annual) women’s only trials weekend in 2022, with 24 lady trials riders, and in 2023 will be one of the minder/mechanics for the Women’s TdN team.
Christy has a degree in Kinesiology (Sports Science) and uses her fitness knowledge to train for riding competition and applies science to the sport of off-road motorcycles when breaking down moves. She loves working at Popkum Motor Park, teaching trials skills, enduro and obstacle riding, intro to off road motorcycling, and ladies’ courses. In 2015 Christy was certified by the Motorcycle Safety Foundation to coach off-road motorcycling. She is excited to be breaking new ground at Popkum Motor Park by helping to develop the Red Rider Evolution lessons, creating the trials park, teaching trials, Enduro, beginner MX and trail riding. By working with Popkum she has encourage more women to get involved in off road motorcycling and given them the tools and confidence to fall in love with and excel at the sport.
Oli is our youngest instructor and has been riding since she was 12. With a third of her life on a bike under her be-… wait. Dirt bike pants don’t need belts. Oh well. She loves racing in hard enduros and hare scrambles, and she thinks that getting into 4th gear is kind of scary. She is going to university as an Education major, and teaches our Learn To Ride program at Popkum, while also helping in the office and gear room.
Oli was born and raised on Vancouver Island, and raced the VIHSS there, winning the Women’s intermediate class in 2022. Some of you might have heard about this group Oli is also a part of …..the Muddhunniez! She loves going to events that are made by and for women on dirt bikes, and teaches or trail rides at the events. Also on the island- yes this is a shameless plug for that race series- are kids races on the day before the main competition. Since there’s toddlers falling down everywhere, Oli gets to ride after them and make sure they all have a good time. Some awesome races Oli has gone to include Odessa 100 in Washington, all the cool island hare scrambles, and – for two years in a row – Redbull Outliers, which was apart of the Enduro World Series.
Oli is used to riding with groups of middle aged men, including her dad, so if anyone would like to ride hard trails, feel free to text her at oli_fell_again on Instagram! If you check that out, they’ll also be tons of cool fail videos, if the name didn’t give it away. A dream of Oli’s is to one day race Romaniacs, or as a sponsored rider in the Enduro World series. Some proud supporters of hers are Kenco Motorcycle in Sooke, Hermoto gear, and of course, her mom and dad 🙂
If you are interested, come by and talk to one of our staff about getting a tour of the whole park so you know where everything is and don’t miss out on any fun riding. We are more than just a motocross track, and much more than you can see from the highway.
Before visiting, check out the latest Covid updates and make sure to read our rules and regulations.
Contact us below to book your visit!