February Groundhog rides

[north woods gal]

NWG, do you have any studded tires for riding on ice?

Oh, yeah. In fact, in the winter I keep two fat bikes setup with studded tires. One has shallow lugs for riding fast on hardpack/ice and one has a very aggressive, deep tread for working through the deep stuff when there's ice underneath. Crazy expensive tires, but the studs allow me to ride in just about any day in the winter, any conditions and do provide a big margin of safety, but you do take a hit on speed and performance. Nevertheless, studded tires are no guarantee. I have gone down with the studded tires on the trails. Ice on the trails is a devil to figure. Hard to read and even see, sometimes. So very different than riding on a level road or even out on the lake ice. Perfectly smooth, clean lake ice is actually very easy to ride even with non-studded fat bike tires.

Much prefer riding my one of my other three fat bikes without studded tires to get my hour plus of riding done, every day. (Yeah, I have five fat bikes.) Much easier and faster ride without studs and regular fat bike tires do a great job in any kind of snow as long as there's no ice in the equation.

Tires and tire design are such a big deal for winter trail riding. Choosing which bike and tire combo to use on any given day is very much like trying to predict the best wax/skis for snow conditions when XC skiing. Have learned a ton about snow biking, thanks to having my own personal test track out my backdoor. Love it, but, yeah, I am looking forward to spring.