It seemed like a good idea at the time, I rented a snow bike. The first uphill was fun, 5 inches of fresh snow on top of a nice 2 foot base. The XC Ski/Snowshoe trail was packed below. But then the downhill came. I knew the rental was a bad idea. I ended up buying one.
It really is just an amazingly fun time out on snow covered trails riding a mountain bike. The uphills are fun, but on anything flat, rolling or descending then you will smile the whole time like an idiot.
The Neck Romancer Puglsey is a modified Pugsley with a larger fork that uses 135mm hubs, different shifty bits, Surly MWOD cranks and larger rims for a bigger foot print. The parts choice is a great.
For instance, Avid BB7 front and rear.
A 22/36 chain ring combo with a chain guard. The chain guard is great for keeping baggy pants (I wear goretex bibs mostly) out of the chain.
Out in the back you have a Deore rear with an 11/34 cassette.
And a favorite part, thumb shifters! They are great for shifting with cold hands in giant mittens.
Oh and when you ride, every person you run in to will comment on how awesome the tires are.
This bike is ridiculously fun to ride. And I can’t see why if it snows where you are living to not buy one. So much more fun than slogging up roads for training!
What is kind of crazy too, I can go out riding and my wife can go XC skiing on the same trail at the same time. Which has finally made XC skiing fun for me, since I am not actually skiing but riding this monster truck of a bike.
Surly Says: http://surlybikes.com/bikes/neck_romancer_pug
A bigger footed, much blacker version of a standard Pugsley. Where the standard Pugsley sports 65mm-wide Large Marge double-wall rims, the Neck Romancer utilizes our 82mm-wide single-wall Rolling Darryl rims to expand its tireprint, thereby increasing its traction and snowshoe-like float over all sorts of terrain. The increase in rim width does put the tire closer to the chain, so to avoid chain rub we spec’d this bike with our MWOD rings on a Mr. Whirly crankset. This provides all the chain/tire clearance necessary while retaining low- and mid-range gearing for crawling through the sticky and flying under the radar.
