BRECKENRIDGE — As soon as we rolled out of the bike shop’s back door and turned the corner onto Main Street in Breckenridge, I heard a surprised onlooker say:
“Whoa, look at those tires.”
Ten seconds into my first fat-bike ride, I understood that bikes with 4.7-inch tires are still a spectacle. Maybe they’re also noteworthy because of the season — it was a sunny Saturday in January, and here I was, not shouldering skis, but riding a bike through the heart of Breck, along with my husband and Sydney Fox, co-owner of .
For some skiers and snowboarders, riding a fat bike is a rest-day activity. But Fox says many of her clients are cyclists looking for a fun new way to ride.
A fat bike is a puffed-up version of a mountain bike, with a frame wide enough to accommodate 4-inch-plus knobby tires. To me, fat bikes look like a two-wheeled version of a monster truck — the tires are absurdly large and can roll over anything (except powder). But unlike monster trucks, fat bikes don’t leave a path of destruction in their wake. In fact, the whole point of them is quite the opposite: When properly inflated at low pressure, fat-bike tires are low-impact on packed snow. If the conditions are right, you’ll leave only light tracks.
Riding over patches of snow on Brec-kenridge’s streets felt secure, but as Fox turned us onto the trail to the sledding hill, a mental disconnect hit me, because snow is something cyclists generally avoid. But as I rolled the enormous tires over the curb and pedaled around the bottom of the sledding hill, then up the far edge of it, I was sticking just fine, as if my tires were gripping packed dirt rather than packed snow.
I was doing great on a short stretch of singletrack in the trees until I wob-bled, then dabbed a foot down, off the packed snow the fat tires were float-ing upon. My foot sank a couple of feet into the powder, and I was off the bike.
That’s why Fox had told us to wear waterproof pants.
Since fat bikes do so well on packed trails, some Colorado Nordic centers are picking up on the trend. , in the Fraser Valley, now rents fat bikes out of its Nordic center and has dedicated trails for fat biking; launched fat bike rentals last winter, but it has taken off this winter, says spokeswoman Holly Johnson. Having ridden one, this makes sense — the pace is steady, more Nordic than Alpine. Pedal too hard and your rear wheel will slip, not grip. There’s time to smile and say hello to a passing snowshoer, or pause to take in the views.
Fox, who started renting fat bikes out of her Breckenridge shop in November, says they were a little slow to jump on the trend there. Leadville, she pointed out, has had a winter fat-bike race series for several years. ( in Leadville also rents fat bikes.)
They’re not new. But their popularity is on the rise.
“They’re the fastest- growing part of the bike industry — the market is basically doubling in size every year,” says Gary Sjoquist, the advocacy director for bike wholesaler Quality Bicycle Products.
Fat biking started in Alaska, he says, with cyclists hand-crafting fat-bike frames and parts to handle the snow. In 2005, Surly Bikes made the first mass-produced fat bikes, but the industry took a wait-and-see attitude on them until recently, he says. Now, Trek and Specialized, the biggest bike companies in the U.S., are making fat bikes. You can even buy fat bikes for kids.
The Midwest is the hot-spot for fat bikes, but the West is catching up, he says. Access is tricky in some places; you can’t just ride a fat bike anywhere. That’s a good reason to try the sport at a Nordic area, where you’ll know you’re riding fat-bike-approved trails, or check in with the local bike shop about where to ride. (And as a Nordic skier myself, I get the mixed feelings some of you have about this. But getting out there and riding a fat bike — again, in the right snow conditions and with the correct tire pressure — put some of my fears to rest.)
But as land managers become more aware of fat biking, and as more communities see it as a wintertime economic boon, Sjoquist says, the access is improving. He cited Wyoming’s , between Cheyenne and Laramie, as an example of progressive use — the park grooms trails just for fat bikes.
Meanwhile, in Breckenridge, we had ideal conditions for fat biking without the grooming. It hadn’t snowed recently, so the trails were perfectly packed. With temps in the 20s, the snow was just soft enough for our tires to bite in for climbs uphill and quick, soft descents. At the end of the day, I was tired from the cold and from the effort of riding uphill at altitude, but not completely spent. Still, I didn’t turn down a sugary cup of instant hot chocolate back at the bike shop, where I sank satisfied onto a bench with a warm mug and Fox’s dog, Sam, curled up next to me, ready for a nap.
Jenn Fields: 303-954-1599, jfields@denverpost.com or twitter.com/jennfields
Breck bike guides
411 S. Main St. #12, Breckenridge
970-846-0921
Fat bike rentals: $40 for a half-day, $50 for full day. Guided tours from $35 per hour.
