Fat Bike Birkie

The first year of the Fat Bike Birkie race was met with mixed emotions from the skiing crowd.  So many skiers were worried that there may be damage caused to the trails and therefore were worried about having fat bike riders going on the Birkie.  Organizers would soon find that there was nothing to be worried about as the trail held up beautifully.  The conditions were perfect.  In fact, there was some snow that fell the night before.  I went up and stayed with a group of bike riders, staying with a friend of ours who had a cabin within miles of the start of the ride.  The field limit was left to be 300 riders, but will certainly be increased in future years.  The use of fat bikes has exploded over the last few years amongst people anxious to ride bikes during the winter season.  Kelly Randolph is a photographer living in Drummond, Wisconsin, and took some photos he allowed me to use to report on this event.

 

I am the biker in the yellow jersey in the background on the left side (immediately behind the biker in the foreground who also has a yellow jersey).  I finished the race in 2:47:01.  I was 108th out of 155 for the 46 K race.  I can see this event becoming a major event in the future and look forward to seeing what happens with registration.  I agree with several other bikers who feel the race does not appear to have drastically impact the conditions of the Birkie trail, but this will have to be evaluated by experts of the trail to see what type of impact was noticed.