"Vato" Steve Vogel stands in a barn Nov. 7 on his property in rural Bellingham. He is the owner of The Bike Ranch, an undercover pump track he built out of an old dressage arena. ( Finn Wendt /Cascadia Daily News) Age: 53
City: Bellingham
Lived here for: On and off for five decades
Originally from: Bellingham
Notable: Builder and owner of The Bike Ranch, a covered public pump track
What’s up with "Vato," your nickname?
Most know me by a nickname, Vato Steve, or just Vato. It means dude. It’s because I grew up in Mexico and I build lowrider cars. How did The Bike Ranch come to be? My wife and I bought the property eight years ago. It was a mess, it was a foreclosure. It was Ski to Sea weekend and me and the boys were headed up to Glacier to go riding. And I said, ‘Guys, I got to show you this property.’So we come in here and bust into the barn, looking at some of the buildings. And I’m like, ‘Look at this arena. We can build jumps in here.’ They think I’m pipe dreaming. They don’t realize that if I’ve got a focus, it’s happening. So we were in here by my birthday, July, and by Halloween, this was built and running.I drew up about five different plans, did a lot of measuring and a lot of research online, because pump track design is quite the science. And I […]
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