Portraits of Adventure / Vultures Knob / Addie
Addie
Vultures Knob, Wooster OH
May | 2026
Addie Slutz was six years old when she started riding at Vultures Knob, but her connection to the place goes back further than that. She used to come as a young girl to watch her father race, catching the mountain bike bug from the sideline before she ever had a bike of her own. From there it was kids' camps, overnight mountain bike camps at VK, then riding herself, then racing. She started racing with NOMBS the year it launched, running a handful of events that first season before doing the full schedule the year after. She's 20 now.
She rides all the local trails around her home in Perry Township, between Canton and Massillon, and a closer trail system is technically minutes away. But VK has stayed her favorite, even though she's quick to admit it's more technical than most riders prefer. She likes the cradle for how it flows, and Hubcap Alley for the opposite reason, it's a fight to get through clean. Thursday night group rides are where she sees the most people she knows: friends she's ridden with for years, some who've moved away or don't ride as much anymore but still show up for a Thursday when they can.
Mountain biking is the reason she and her father are close, by her own account closer than they would be otherwise. She's an only child, and riding became a language the two of them shared; her mother comes to races too, and joins for the occasional ride. Addie turned down interest from college mountain bike programs to stay home. Racing collegiately, getting better at it competitively, sounded appealing, but not at the cost of losing what she already had: riding with her dad and her friends at the place that raised her into the sport.
She cried when VK's closure was announced. "I can't imagine this not being here," she said. "It's just been here forever, and I always remember coming and riding." What she keeps coming back to is that the trail and the community were never really separate things for her, and that showing up here changes how a person feels about it, whether or not they grew up in it. She's watched the crew that keeps the place running, out working the trail the day before a group ride. What she hopes for after September is simple: that the riding continues, that the friendships hold. "It's just sad," she said, "that they're losing this almost like home base for it."
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