I Rode A Fat-Bike and It Was Like Driving A Tank

Last week I fulfilled everyone’s childhood dream. I drove a tank.

Kind of. I didn’t actually get to drive a tank (stand by for a future write-up), but I came pretty damn close by riding a tricked out fat-bike with enormous four-inch tires. If you don’t know anything about these relatively new mountain bikes, they're probably the closest thing to a human-powered tank, if a tank weighed 30 pounds.

Naturally, I've always wanted to be behind the wheel of a tank. There's something appealing about the ability to punch the throttle and have absolutely no concern for what's ahead of you. You drive pretty easy knowing that it will roll over anything, even if you can’t drive—maybe that’s why it appeals to kids? Driving a tank makes the roads and trails infinitely wide, smooth, flat, and extremely empty. In fact, it makes everything a trail.

Sort of like a fat-bike. It has no problem checking those first few boxes. (An unwashed pair of bike shorts can tick that last one.)

Pulling up to a park deep in Queens, New York, the size of these fat-bike tires was apparent from 50 yards away, even though I had forgotten my glasses.

In my excitement over the monster truck tires, I had forgotten that these Salsa Beargreases, top-of-the-line carbon-fiber fat-bikes, were outfitted with some other goodies that might come in handy, notably the innovative drivetrain and suspension.

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TheRockShox Bluto: A Big Fat Fork
Until recently, fat-bikes have typically been rigid, with common models like the Salsa Mukluk and the Surly Puglsey free of suspension. Since high-volume fat-bike tires can run at the insanely low pressure of 6-12 psi (normal mountain bike tires run between 30-50), they are a little more forgiving; tossing on a fat-bike fork like the impressive Bluto tames the bumps even more. Or, in my world: increases the tank factor by at least, like, seven.

I also appreciate that it was named after John Belushi in Animal House. (Obviously, I didn’t confirm this with the SRAM guy setting it up because I know enough not to ruin an awesome low-probability assumption.)

SRAM XX1
The secret weapon on these Salsa Beargreases was SRAM’s XX1 mountain drivetrain. Having just built up a do-most-of-it-all cross/travel/tiny-apartment bike with SRAM’s new Rival 22, I had stumbled across the XX1 info while searching for the guide for the quirky front derailleur setup. Essentially, the XX1 is a “one by” drivetrain, meaning it only has one chainring (gear) on the front. When running a single chainring, you don't need a front derailleur, cables, housing, and shifter; this trims weight off your bike and makes everything more simple to use and maintain.

In my singular tank mindset, I don’t care about dropping grams. I care only about TANKNESS. Just one shifter to worry about? That sounds like automatic transmission to me. That sounds like tankness to me.

Having just one gear on the front sounds like it’s just a matter of taking off the other junk, but with that setup, SRAM said they were constantly dropping their chain. To fix this, they developed some crazy teeth that grip the chain like a Great White with anger/hunger issues, using different shaped male and female links with stepped profiles.

To cope with only one chainring up front, SRAM uses a super wide cassette in the back that has an enormous granny gear to handle the climbs. You can also swap out the front chainrings to taste as well. According to one of the SRAM guys, their office hasn’t missed that derailleur one bit.

Shredding
I hit the trail with trepidation, since I haven’t regularly ridden mountain bikes in 10 years and my glasses were far from my face. Trying to thread the needle through some narrow sections of trees and shrubs, I was dabbing my face and arms like a middle-schooler after his first time shaving. Blood was everywhere. I also stopped more times than I care to admit—my shoes were caked in dirt shortly after we began. 

But after a mile or two, the tankness of the experience began to sink in, along with a six-year-old-driving-a-firetruck smile across my face. That’s the beauty of fat-bikes: you can attempt stuff you otherwise wouldn’t even consider trying. Rolling over a bunch of giant logs down a frightening steep pitch? Still terrifying for this road-centric cyclist, but when you’re not concerned with shifting and have the confidence of dirt bike tires and solid suspension, you can try to bunny hop that pile of logs or do this stuff.

And if that bunny hop really doesn’t work out, it’s no problem—you’ll probably stay on the bike. You gotta remember, these things are huge. They will roll.

TANKNESS.


Ethan Wolff-Mann was a tank commander of a Salsa Beargrease fatty for a day and loved it. Follow him on Twitter @ewolffmann.