Reflections: Learning to Ride a "pegger" Ski Bike

When is a downhill mountain bike not a downhill mountain bike? When you take the wheels off and replace them with skis. It's now a ski bike.

At the beginning of the 08/09 season a new kind of ski bike joined the rental fleet at Winter Park Resort. This wasn't your goofy-looking traditional sit-down "foot ski" snow bike. It was very much a modern technical wonder. One look and most people's reaction is "OMG, what is that????" That was my reaction. I was scared and apprehensive but some invisible force drew me to it. I had to learn to ride one. It was a Lenz Sport Alpine Brawler Pro ski bike.

That's how I found myself sitting on a ski bike outside West Portal Rentals at the Winter Park base area waiting for my clinic to start. Talking to the other instructors in the clinic, I found that we were all on the same page - excited but nervous. Was it as much fun as it looked? And the ever present - I don't want to look bad while riding this thing in uniform. Falling down while in uniform is frowned upon in ski school.

While waiting for the clinic to start, I ran into Don Koski the owner of a competing brand of ski bike. He was coming along on the clinic, as was Devin Lenz the owner and manufacturer of Lenz Sport ski bikes. Don brought along one of his prototype ski bikes that mostly resembled a low rider motorcycle. Upon inquiry, I found out that it was indeed a motorcycle frame and it was headed to the Winter X Games in Aspen the following week.

Winter X Games??? I'm not even ready for that on a snowboard!

The Lenz Sport Alpine Brawler is derived from a mountain bike model that Lenz Sport produces. It has a full-suspension shock absorber system, footpegs to stand on, and a long seat to sit on. The handlebars were padded. I had a helmet on but wished I had a full-face helmet on. I like my teeth just where they are.

Our clinic leader appeared and off we went to the Gemini lift. At the lift, he gave instructions and a demo on how to get on and off the lift. I was unsure of the directions so I went up the lift with Devin. He gave lift pointers on the ride up. Getting on and off the lift - check.

At the top, our clinic leader gave some basic instructions. To stop while going slow we could use the Fred Flintstone technique. Just sit on the seat and put our feet down in the snow. Yabba dabba doo!

Riding a "pegger" ski bike is different than the traditional snow bikes. Traditionals are lower to the ground and have two additional points of contact with the snow. They are just like riding a bicycle. Pegger ski bikes are not ridden like a bicycle. At least not at first - something our then inexperienced ski bike clinic leader failed to teach us.

We took a rather fast lap on the bunny hill trying to accomplish the instructions given to us. On the bunny hill it wasn't too scary but I never felt in control. I couldn't control my speed. We then loaded on another lift accessing intermediate terrain.

At the top we were given some more coaching by our clinic leader. He still gave instructions that work for the foot ski bikes. They didn't work. All of us were crashing and gaining much more speed than we were comfortable with. I think I felt like some of my students do on their first day on a snowboard. Why can't I get this? What am I doing wrong? About this time another snowboard instructor crashed into a tree. None of us felt safe. We did manage to make it down to the lift. The clinic leader then had to leave and go teach a private.

Unwilling to have a bunch of frustrated instructors who wanted to learn to ride the ski bike and be able to teach others how to safely ride it, Devin Lenz really stepped up to the plate. He said "Guys now you know how your students could feel. Let's go back up the lift and learn a different method".

True to his word, Devin gave a completely different lesson. Ski biking is much more like learning to ski or snowboard. We first had to learn how to not get the skis on edge by tilting the handlebars downhill. This made the bike skis perform skidded traverses instead of fast carved-traverses. Oooo, instant speed control. We then moved on to skidded J-turns. More speed control! Then the mother lode - skidded turns!!! Within two runs we were making controlled linked skidded turns with speed control. What fun!

Now that we had all the tools, we were ready for some action. Problem was - it was 4:30 and all the lifts had shut down. The place was deserted. We rode to the bottom of the mountain in triumph. We had learned how to ski bike in control and feel safe. We thanked Devin and celebrated later with some adult beverages.

Since that first day out, I've gone on to learn carved turns, jumps, powder, and tree riding. I've also turned others onto it. It's the only thing I know that will get snowboarders off their boards.

If you need to get a winter mountain bike fix, I know just the prescription - ski biking.