2026 Arkansas MTB March Madness Champion
Northwoods/Cedar Glades Trail System in Hot Springs captures the state’s most coveted crown, outlasting 31 challengers in a month-long battle decided by the people who ride.
Final Standings
- Northwoods / Cedar Glades (Hot Springs): Champion
- Mount Nebo State Park (Dardanelle): Runner Up
- Lakewoods Trails (Monticello): Third Place
- Devil’s Den State Park (Fayetteville): Fourth Place
Once More, Northwoods Stands Alone
The votes have been tallied, the bracket has spoken, and the mountain biking community of Arkansas has rendered its verdict: Hot Springs’ Northwoods and Cedar Glades Trail System is, again, the best trail system in the state. The 2026 Arkansas Mountain Biking March Madness Bracket Arkansas Outside’s wildly popular annual public vote concluded at the end of March with Northwoods claiming the championship over a formidable field of 32 trail systems spanning every corner of The Natural State.
The path to the championship was anything but a formality. Beginning in early March with 32 of Arkansas’s finest trail systems seeded into the bracket, riders across the state spent the entire month debating, voting, and making the case for their home trails. Round by round, popular systems fell. Regional favorites were upset. Consensus was hard-fought and hard-won. When the dust settled on the championship matchup, it was Northwoods purpose-built for mountain biking, maintained with world-class care, and woven into the identity of the Spa City facing the surging, elevation-blessed Mount Nebo State Park in one of the most compelling finals the bracket has ever produced.
Northwoods carried the day, cementing what has become something of a dynasty in Arkansas mountain biking recognition but not before Mount Nebo made an undeniable statement about the depth and breadth of trail excellence that now exists across the state.
Northwoods / Cedar Glades By the Numbers
- 32.7: Miles of Trail
- 51: Individual Trails
- 4: Trailheads
- 2,000: Acres of Wilderness
- 6+: State & National Wins (The trails are recognized as an IMBA Flagship Trail System & Hot Springs is an IMBA Ride Center)
- 5 min: Distance from Downtown Hot Springs
A Bracket for the Ages
Thirty-two trail systems entered. Only one could leave with the title. The 2026 bracket was constructed to be both representative of Arkansas’s staggering mountain bike landscape and punishing enough to reveal a true champion. Systems that have earned loyal regional followings trails that riders will drive hours to access were eliminated before the final weekend.
The semifinal matchups were particularly dramatic. Northwoods survived a bruising Elite Eight matchup against the Lake Ouachita Vista Trail an IMBA Epic in its own right, beloved for its shoreline and ridgeline riding before advancing to the Final Four. Mount Nebo, meanwhile, knocked off Pinnacle Mountain, then dismantled Devil’s Den State Park to reach the championship. That path deserves respect; Devil’s Den is not a system that folds easily.
Northwoods’ Path to the Championship
- Round of 32: Northwoods defeated Iron Mountain Trails
- Round of 16: Northwoods defeated Womble Trail
- Elite Eight: Northwoods defeated Lake Ouachita Vista Trail (LOViT)
- Final Four: Northwoods defeated Lakewoods Trail
- Championship: Northwoods defeated Mount Nebo State Park
Not a Fluke: A Dynasty
To understand what Northwoods’ 2026 championship means, you have to understand what came before it. This is not a system that stumbled into recognition. Arkansas Outside’s readers have now voted Northwoods the top mountain bike trail system in the state six times, the most recent being this championship a record of sustained excellence that is, frankly, extraordinary given the pace at which Arkansas has developed new trail infrastructure over the past decade.
The wins began early, in 2019 and 2020, when Arkansas Times and Arkansas Outside both recognized Northwoods as the state’s best trail system. Those early votes came in the wake of Phase One construction, when IMBA Trail Solutions had freshly carved 15.7 miles of purpose-built trail into the rolling, lake-dotted terrain north of downtown Hot Springs. The system was new, ambitious, and immediately world-class. Readers noticed.
What is remarkable is that the recognition has not faded as competitors have grown stronger. In 2023, another Arkansas Outside survey this one inviting readers to pick their three favorites from a long and excellent list again returned Northwoods at the top, with Mount Nebo second, the Slaughter Pen trails in Bentonville third, and Iron Mountain at Lake DeGray fourth. By 2025, when Arkansas Outside shifted to the March Madness bracket format, Northwoods won that inaugural bracket field too, making it five titles in six years. The 2026 championship is the sixth.
An Premier Event Center
Beyond its daily appeal for local riders, the Northwoods and Cedar Glades system serves as a premier venue for major outdoor events that bring the community together. The annual Gudrun Northwoods Mountain Bike Festival, which moves to late October in 2026, has grown into a cornerstone of the regional biking scene. This multi day celebration includes high energy enduro and cross country races like the Attila the Hun XC, alongside family friendly slow rolls and a vibrant bike expo.
For those who prefer to explore the trails on foot, the Northwoods Mullet Trail Run in May offers a unique experience with 25k and 10k distances. True to its name, the event is described as having a serious trail run in the front and a legendary party in the back. It even features a special dog division, allowing runners to tackle the scenic terrain of Cedar Glades Park alongside their canine companions.
From a Closed Landfill to World-Class Singletrack
The story of Northwoods and Cedar Glades is, at its core, a story of vision applied to overlooked land. Cedar Glades Park, the eastern anchor of the combined trail system, occupies what was once the buffer zone surrounding a county landfill. When that landfill closed, Garland County transformed the perimeter into a park, eventually building 10 miles of multi-use trail. Local Hot Springs riders built their skills there for years before anyone imagined what the area could become.
In 2016, Steve Arrison, CEO of Visit Hot Springs, made a call that changed everything. He reached out to AJ Johnson, Cedar Glades Park Director, about expanding the trail system. What followed was a collaboration between the Walton Family Foundation, IMBA Trail Solutions, Visit Hot Springs, and local stakeholders to identify the ideal canvas for a world-class, purpose-built system. Joey Klein, the IMBA trail designer who toured the potential sites, zeroed in on the Waterworks area rocky ridges, slopes wrapping three nearly pristine lakes, minutes from downtown but feeling wild and scenic and called it the perfect canvas.
“In 2016, when we started thinking about creating a trail system in the city-owned area in the northern section of Hot Springs, we knew that the beautiful wooded hills embracing a series of small lakes would prove to be a wonderful amenity for our citizens and that it might also prove attractive to a segment of our millions of annual visitors.” said Arrison.
There is more history of early mountain bike trails in the Northwoods area but that is a whole other story.
Construction on Phase One began in November 2017. Fifteen months later, 15.7 miles of progressive singletrack were open for riding. The Northwoods system spanning green flow trails for beginners, blue intermediate singletrack, and black diamond technical terrain including the notorious Lucky 13 jump lines connected seamlessly to the existing Cedar Glades trails, instantly creating a combined system of more than 25 miles. Today that number exceeds 31.5 miles across more than 54 individual trails.
Arrison concluded, “It didn’t occur to us then that the Northwoods Trail System would be combined with the existing Cedar Glades trails and become the favorite mountain biking destination among bikers from Arkansas and beyond. Thanks to Traci Berry and her dedicated crew the Northwoods/Cedar Glades trails have been voted the MTB March Madness Champion yet again. Ride on!”
Not Resting on their Laurels
Building on this success, the Northwoods system is poised for a significant expansion thanks to a 350,000 dollar grant from the Oaklawn Foundation. This funding will facilitate the construction of six miles of new trail around Sanderson Lake, which is the final lake on the property to receive substantial development. The project includes two miles of green trail and four miles of blue trail, effectively increasing the Waterworks section to nearly 30 miles.
Beyond the dirt, this expansion will introduce non motorized water recreation to the property for the first time, opening two upper lakes for kayaking, canoeing, and paddleboarding. Planned infrastructure includes a 65 foot bridge for the Ragnarok connector, rock step entry zones for water access, and a kayak rental kiosk. Once completed, the total combined network between Northwoods and Cedar Glades will offer roughly 40 miles of world class trails just minutes from downtown Hot Springs.
The Real Champions: The People Behind the Trails
No bracket, no championship, no reader vote exists without the trails themselves. And no trail exists without the people who imagined, funded, built, and maintained it. The 2026 Arkansas Mountain Biking March Madness bracket was, in many ways, a month-long celebration of exactly those people.
The real winners of this championship are the land managers who had the foresight to set aside the acreage, navigate the jurisdictional complexities, and commit to the vision of world-class recreation infrastructure. At Northwoods, that means city, county, National Park, and Forest Service land all coming together in a rare alignment of public will.
The real winners are the trail builders the IMBA Trail Solutions crews who sweat through Arkansas summers and mud seasons to hand-cut and machine-shape masterpieces from the Ouachita rock and soil, and the volunteer hours donated by organizations like TACO (Trail Advocacy Coalition of the Ouachitas). These trails do not maintain themselves.
And the real winners, most of all, are the riders. The ones who drive hours on a Saturday morning, park at the Waterworks trailhead with Bethel Lake glittering behind them, and drop into a flow trail that feels like it was sculpted specifically for the joy of two wheels on dirt.
“Wow! What an honor for Hot Springs, its citizens and our visitors! We work hard every day to make the Northwoods/Cedar Glades experience one that our riders, hikers and others will remember for a long time, said Traci Berry, Visit Hot Springs Trails Coordinator. “The Cedar Glades/Northwoods team is dedicated to not only keeping our trails the Arkansas MTB favorite but also to looking forward to making it even better next year and in years to come.”
Congratulations, Northwoods
2026 Arkansas Mountain Biking March Madness Champions · Hot Springs, Arkansas
About the Bracket
The 2026 Arkansas Mountain Biking March Madness Bracket, organized by Arkansas Outside, opened at the beginning of March with 32 of the state’s mountain bike trail systems seeded into a single-elimination bracket structure. Voting was open to the public throughout the month, with each successive round narrowing the field. The championship matchup between Northwoods and Mount Nebo State Park concluded the bracket at the end of March, with Northwoods emerging as the 2026 champion.
The Northwoods/Cedar Glades Trail System is open daily from 6 a.m. to 10 p.m., weather permitting. The main trailhead is located at 300 Pineland Drive, Hot Springs, Arkansas. For trail conditions and events, visit northwoodstrails.org.
This article was originally published on ArkansasOutside.com, your trusted source for outdoor news and updates in The Natural State. Unless otherwise credited, all photos included in this piece are the property of Arkansas Outside, LLC. We take pride in sharing the beauty and adventures of Arkansas through our lens—thank you for supporting our work!
