RIDER BY RIDER: The History and Heart of Off-Roading

Off-roading didn’t begin with apps, downloads, or printed maps. It began long before anyone thought about recording trails, selling routes, or mapping for profit. It began with people — real riders learning the land through experience, instinct, and respect. It began in the mountains, in the hollers, across ridges and valleys, where knowledge wasn’t stored in devices but carried in memories, shared at campfires, and earned the hard way.

This is the history of off-roading told the way it truly happened: rider by rider, passed from one set of hands to the next. It is the story of the ones who built the trail culture we depend on today — the mappers, the mentors, the protectors, the explorers, and the quiet giants whose names rarely appeared on signs but whose work shaped entire regions.

Before there were trail markers, there were men riding out routes by feel.
Before there were mapping apps, there were riders carving paths through mountains.
Before GPS units existed, knowledge lived in the people who rode the land every single day.

They didn’t keep that knowledge to themselves.
They didn’t hoard it.
They didn’t sell it.
They shared it — because sharing kept other riders alive.

This is the heart of off-roading.
This is the heritage that modern riders stand on.

But the world changed.

As off-roading exploded in popularity, companies began commercializing the very maps riders had built by hand. GPX files were downloaded, stripped of attribution, repackaged, and resold. The names of the original mappers disappeared, replaced by “official” digital lines created by people who’d never ridden the terrain. Heritage became product. Culture became subscription. The history of off-roading was rewritten by those who didn’t live it.

And yet — the mountains remember.
And now, so do we.

This section is dedicated to restoring that truth.

Here, the original mappers receive the honor they always deserved.
Here, the stolen history is corrected.
Here, the digital future respects the analog past.
Here, riders reclaim their place as the authors of off-road culture.

From the early pioneers like Bob Tizer, whose work built the backbone of Hatfield riding, to Mike Smiddy, whose mapping shaped Tennessee and Kentucky terrain for an entire generation, to Caleb, whose Trail X Trail platform became the modern shield protecting their legacy — this is the real story of off-roading.

The story of how the land was learned.
The story of how the trails were mapped.
The story of how the culture survived.
The story of how the heritage is being carried forward today.

This is not nostalgia.
This is not myth.
This is the truth of who built this world — and why it matters now more than ever.

This is the history and the heart of off-roading.

This is the Rider by Rider movement.

And this is where the real story begins.