Migrating to Dirt

[skiezo]

I still do mainly road riding due to being able to leave from my house and not load up the bike and gear in the back of the JSW. I do a gravel/rail trail a few time a month and that is on a weekend and I start early to avoid all the family outings just out for a sunday ride and taking up the whole width of the trail with no regard to others using it at a greater pace.
I have to load up everything and drive about 30/45 mins to get to decent gravel.
Last weekend we started on Friday and drive a few hours to some great forest roads in the mtns. and camped out so that made a nice outing with only a few cars on a 5 hour ride.
Got to try out my new 70 qt Kong cooler for the first time and it lasted all weekend filled with some great food over the fire.

[Tickdoc]

You know that feeling you get when you go from dirt or gravel to smooth blacktop......yeah, I just want to feel that.

[Gummee]

Originally Posted by Nomadmax

Meh, I'm more likely to be killed in an auto accident driving a "gravel" bike two hours each way to ride it on a lightly traveled gravel road than I am riding from my door to door on public roads.

This

I'm lucky enough to live where the roads are. Out the back door and onto mostly farm roads. Some have become cut-throughs for other areas, so I avoid those.

I *can* ride to the gravel, but it takes me an hour to get there on the bike.

Between the roads right out the door, and my severe allergy to driving to go riding, I'm mostly a trail runner right now. I'm working for a VeloFix franchise, so I'm all over and coming back at random times. ...mostly during rush hour... So I stop at one of a few parks with trail systems and run for a while to let traffic die down.

Much better for my sanity.

You wouldn't think a big, very tall, very red and black Sprinter is invisible in traffic, but it must be the way people cut me off all the time!

When I have the time, I'm on the roads. These days, it's on one of my CX bikes with 32c GP4Seasons on it. Smooth ride albeit not as fast as the 23/25c tires on the road bike.

M

[redir]

Originally Posted by Lovetoclimb

I’m very fortunate where I live that traffic is low, road cyclists are plenty, and the road conditions warrant somewhat attentive drivers. Combine that with my road rides being some mixture of paved and unpaved roads. Is that still “road” biking? They are county maintained but obviously offer higher levels of peace and quiet and riding engagement over the all paved variants. That being said I do find the urge comes in most weeks to climb and descend some of the better paved mountain roads around me.

I hear ya and I am in very similar terrain. In fact I have often wondered about that. Some people think it's crazy to ride a bike on all these "twisty roads" but it's also real hard to text on one too. Not that that won't stop some idiots from trying but my guess is many don't because even they realize how dangerous it is. So in a quirky ironic way in this modern day it almost makes the roads safer when they are twisty mountain roads. Or not

[Lovetoclimb]

Originally Posted by tony_mm

Wow that sounds great indeed!
In which region/ city do you live?

About 45 mins south of Asheville NC.

[Dekonick]

Originally Posted by redir

19 people died in a city of 8.6 million. I know not all 8.6 million ride bicycles but still. About 100 pedestrians were killed in NYC last year so are we all going to only walk in the woods now?

Just trying to put a little perspective in it. I'm not running for the plastic sheeting and duct tape just yet

Yes, but how many bike hours per death to pedestrian hours per death?

(total number of cyclists and their time divided by deaths - compared with total number of pedestrians and their walking time divided by deaths) I am CERTAIN the ratios are ugly.

[EricChanning]

Originally Posted by Tickdoc

You know that feeling you get when you go from dirt or gravel to smooth blacktop......yeah, I just want to feel that.

It happens all the time on gravel rides I enjoy and yes, it's a very nice sensation.

[Jaybee]

Originally Posted by Tickdoc

You know that feeling you get when you go from dirt or gravel to smooth blacktop......yeah, I just want to feel that.

Huh, I find myself searching for the exact opposite - that point where you roll off the concrete or pavement and can hear the gravel crunch underneath your tires.

[m4rk540]

Originally Posted by Nomadmax

Meh, I'm more likely to be killed in an auto accident driving a "gravel" bike two hours each way to ride it on a lightly traveled gravel road than I am riding from my door to door on public roads.

There was a Paceline user who owned tens or hundreds of high end road bikes. I recall that he began to post that he was strictly into mtb due to acquaintances being injured or killed on the road. Search is failing me but this individual, it was alluded to, died from falling down the stairs or some type of household incident.

[fellowpicker]

You may be speaking of Jack Brunk. Never met him but miss his posts.

[simplemind]

A recent ride on a normally low volume rural paved road with decent shoulder, no on-coming traffic, a semi tractor trailer refused to move to the center and passed by about 2'-3' (probably legal) from my shoulder. This triggered a 35 mph death wobble right beside the trailer portion. Pulled out of it but had to stop to clean up !

This is such a scenic and smooth ride and I was lured again to do this ride. Been riding gravel for several years and have never had that scary of a situation. Just saying.

[notsew]

I get where this is coming from, but honestly, I know way more people that have been seriously injured riding their mountain bikes. I'm lucky to also live in a place with nice roads and nice drivers (and nice trails, and nice-ish gravel).

But at the end of the day, bike riding is dangerous on dirt and pavement. That's just the way it is. I guess you could ride the trainer if you don't want risk in your life.

Road biking is losing popularity, nothing new there. I'm not so sure it has anything to do with safety.

[simplemind]

Originally Posted by notsew

I get where this is coming from, but honestly, I know way more people that have been seriously injured riding their mountain bikes. I'm lucky to also live in a place with nice roads and nice drivers (and nice trails, and nice-ish gravel).

But at the end of the day, bike riding is dangerous on dirt and pavement. That's just the way it is. I guess you could ride the trainer if you don't want risk in your life.

Road biking is losing popularity, nothing new there. I'm not so sure it has anything to do with safety.

MTB accident= injury
Road accident = death or near death.

[rain dogs]

I've certainly been migrating more to dirt just simply because the newer wide-volume tires, disc-brake bikes are awesome. People can say "it's marketing" but they are awesome. Don't think I'll ever buy a traditional road racing bike again, cause I don't road race.

Also, going offroad that isn't mountain biking suddenly opens up maybe nearly twice as many route options that I wouldn't have done on my road bike before. You can build a routes around gravel connecting paths/climbs/descents you wouldn't do on the 25/28mm tires.

Originally Posted by notsew

But at the end of the day, bike riding is dangerous on dirt and pavement. That's just the way it is. I guess you could ride the trainer if you don't want risk in your life.

Don't want to be a "Mr. Corrector" but bike riding is not at all dangerous either on dirt or pavement. That's fiction. You choose low-risk behavior on dirt and low/risk route selection on road and stats prove that fatalities drop to almost zero.

Now, ride frequently in high traffic, high speed roads/highway zones or go all moto-cross mountain biking and sure, it gets more dangerous but it's still safer than the same behaviour on motorcycles or in cars. Problem is stats for cycling lump everything together and often with pedestrians.

Car stats have more confidence in sample size - we can see that risk taking behavior by young drivers causes fatalities to spike, way higher than "higher risk behavior/routes" on bicycles.

[2metalhips]

Riding on dirt and getting injured is pretty much always rider error. On the road, not so much.