Inaugural Winnipeg Whyteout endurance race brings the fat bike scene to Manitoba
On January 24, Manitoba welcomed fat bike fever, when dozens of big-rubber riders descended on Fort Whyte Alive for the Winnipeg Whyteout, an endurance race that's reportedly the first of its kind for the discipline in Manitoba.
On January 24, Manitoba welcomed fat bike fever, when dozens of big-rubber riders descended on FortWhyte Alive for the Winnipeg Whyteout, an endurance race that’s reportedly the first of its kind for the discipline in Manitoba.
The competition’s inaugural competition marked the kick-off of what organizers plan to be a long-term, established event. In all, about 85 riders hit the trails threaded through the woods of FortWhyte Alive, following 10, 30 and 40 km courses. Speaking with Global News, organizers of the Winnipeg Whyteout laid out discipline’s appeal in simple terms, explaining why the scene has so dramatically taken off recently—and why the race drew such a field at the coldest time of the year.
“It’s actually very safe, low air pressure, fat footprint,” said Jackson Locken, manager of Woodcock Cycle in Manitoba and one of the event’s organizers, in conversation with Global News. “I like to think of it as snowshoes for a bike.”
“It keeps people active in the winter which is sometimes hard to do in Winnipeg,” he noted.
The race was part of the Fat Forty Festival, with a range of attractions for visiting spectators. The course itself, though, winding through the forests and acoss Lake Cargill, was clearly the highlight of the day. At several points, the route would rise to an elevation on the technical, sometimes loose trails that offered a commanding view of the surrounding nature, shrouded in snow. In what it gave competing riders as part of the overall experience, the freedom of exploring such terrain in the heart of winter—an option perhaps less attainable in similar conditions with other kinds of bikes—was no doubt a big part of the appeal, too, even if one climb was referred to as the “hill of pain.”
All of that in a nutshell, Locken told the CBC, was the point of the event. More than the competition aspect, the goal, he emphasized, was to celebrate an active winter lifestyle. Though the scene is growing in Canada, there are few other opportunities for fat bikers to come together, he said—especially in Manitoba.
At its heart, the Winnipeg Whiteout is meant to change that.
“This was the first [fat bike race] in the province,” Locken told the CBC, “first one in the city but there’s really not a lot of events like this even in Canada so it’s just to bring the community together.”
