Riding Forest Fighters in winter.
by Anders "IceR" Nordén

First thing to accept before starting:
When people find out that you ride a bike on snow and ice, everyone take for granted that you are crazy.

Second thing:
When you have tried it yourself, don’t ever try to explain to someone who doesn’t ride a bike.
A Swedish saying goes “it isn’t worth explaining to those who don’t understand“

The feeling when approaching a bend at ”summer speed” when the road is covered with shining ice is hard to explain if you haven’t tried. First time with spike tires is a very strange and somewhat scary experience; you have no idea where the limits are.
Often paddling around with your feet like a beginner “in case” you get out of grip. At this stage you get the feeling that the front wheel slides. That depends on that the spikes don’t get into the ice at first when you correct the course, and that gives your brain the input that counter steering don’t work anymore. It feels like you have to turn the bars the way you are turning. After you discover that no one rips your wheels away you decide to give a little bit of gas.

Then all of a sudden another problem occurs, it is impossible to go sideways!! The grip that was vague, suddenly makes it impossible to storm through the bends, like when you look at pictures in articles regarding driving in the winter. Then it is VERY important to not just decide to go sideways, because then you get the classic racingtire syndrom. Out on the track, hit the gas, no problem full control, grip, grip grip, shiiit; highside!!! Not fun. Personally I prefer to go with the grip as long as the tires are new, then after a while when tires starts to wear, you can start with wider slides. Of course there is boys (girls?) that put on new tires and go both very fast and wide, but as a beginner you should try to ignore this few people as much as possible.

As the feeling for machine/tires starts to build up, a new world is opening. Suddenly it’s possible to ride like the big boys at Moto GP. In to the bend, hit the gas and the rear end works it’s way a little. More power makes the slide longer, until you should have started breaking for next turn. When you really get going you start the slide just before the bend, slide through and when apex is passed bend it up, hit the gas and accelerate all the way to the next braking point. If you still are in the ”flow” you break until you are sideways again, pass apex, hit the gas… repeat until you get out of gas/stamina. The nice thing with driving on a lake is of course that if you fuck up, you have plenty of space to use. Generally you can say that there are much bigger possibilities to correct bad judgements during winter riding.

For those who ride enduro or motards there are perfect conditions to start/train wheelies. Put on a new tire, go for closest lake (CHECK THE ICE QUALITY) and start training. The advantages with lake riding are many, you only disturb fish- (ermans), if shit happens you have nothing to hit (look out for islands), and if you get out of line you hardly run off the road.

For us users of more powerful bikes wheelies often require a passenger which makes training rarely possible.….

Have fun in the snow!

Anders from Sweden.