Down Hill Biking on Mt. Moosilauke

I spoke with some folks at the DOC - no changes in policy planned. Bikes aren't allowed on the AT (Glenncliff Junction to the summit) no matter what so that removes some of the draw. While they wouldn't cause erosion problems on the snow, as the lower sections of the Carriage Road melt out things would get dicey. It's a hard enough policy to enforce as it, not sure anyone has any appetite to make it more complex.

Some meat (or texturized vegetable protein, if you prefer) for the pot: FAT BIKES: TOURING CENTERS MULL NEW FAT-TIRED FAD

sardog1 said:

Some meat (or texturized vegetable protein, if you prefer) for the pot: FAT BIKES: TOURING CENTERS MULL NEW FAT-TIRED FAD

Click to expand...

Interesting article--I was curious about what kind of damage fat bike tires do on XC trails. Seems like a lot of Nordic areas are not keen on adding them to the mix of options. Personally I've never seen them in use. Interesting also that there is a defined etiquette, see https://www.imba.com/resources/land-protection/fat-bikes. Fat bikes are expressly forbidden on classic tracks. Phew. I thought I was going to have to go off on a rant vis a vis "don't wreck my trails." ; )

I was at Great Glens this Sunday. It was the day of a race via nordic skis or snowshoes on a loop of the trails (4K) then up the auto road for (6K). The snowshoes were the racing variety. Small, no flotation (not needed for this use) with lots of articulation of the foot. You basically ran the same as you would without snowshoes. The groomed skate track looked like horses ran on it after the snowshoers went through. The impact of the foot and the push off put large divots into the hard packed groomed trail. A fat tire mtn bike could not do anywhere near this kind of damage. Great Glens rents fat tire bikes so clearly they realize this as well. The low tire pressure prevents them from damaging these kinds of trail. Soft snow would leave tire grooves.

“A lot of people have expressed concerns that these are fast bikes, but even a strong rider never attains speeds faster than 5 mph. They're designed to go pretty much over everything.”

That's crap. Even the weakest rider can easily exceed 5 mph going downhill on a green XC trail. A recent race had the expert winner at 11.5-13MPH (7-8 miles (odd, IMO, to not have an exact distance, but I wanted to give a concrete and verifiable example rather than just the opinion of one cyclist) in 36 minutes)

Tim

We saw a fat bike on the Zealand Trail Saturday. He was not going fast, but still faster than us! I was envious. I would guess he was going 6 or 7 mph down the trail.

I have seen the damage done to a soft XC track by fat tire bikes. The profile of the trail became "dished" (ie like a small half-pipe). This resulted in my skis sliding unpredictably under me (toward the center of the track) causing a number of near falls. It wasn't pleasant...

A hard-packed trail would presumably suffer no significant damage.

Doug

In my neck of the woods, Kingdom Trails in East Burke, VT, designates specific trails for fat biking, skiing, and snowshoeing. They pack about 30k of trails for fat bikes. Some info and guidelines on their website:

http://www.kingdomtrails.org/trails/winter-bike-trails/

It can't be long before the generals are gathered in the bunker to hear a rant on this topic …

There were fat bike tracks on the summit of Moosilauke last weekend. https://www.facebook.com/photo.php?...21802128.1073741997.1450265390&type=3&theater

Thanks for the photographic evidence - it's been forwarded to the appropriate people. Mechanized travel in the AT corridor is illegal, but I have no idea how you would enforce that sort of thing.