Oh yeah! Here's to riding a Karate Monkey with aggressively studded tires!

I'm rolling some 2.25" Ice Spiker Pros on mine, and after 4 years of 700x35 Marathon Winters, I must say that these are another beast entirely. The higher volume improves the capacity to roll over relatively lightly packed snow mounds/bumps and carry speed, whereas the Marathons would slice through, slowing me down a whole lot more. The ISPs are just so nice on ice and lugged like mad for traction in snow. I'm loving these and happy that I finally splurged to try them out. But I really do have to build up a second wheelset to decrease the likelihood of me just being too lazy to switch to the Marathons on days when I really don't need the overkill, because I do expect that they will wear saddeningly fast if I don't stick to riding them only when and where necessary.

Montreal had a foot and half fall on Thursday and with temperatures having stayed consistently well under freezing over the last week there was already a nice icy few inches in uncleared areas. All of which has created a pretty impressive playground. It's pretty slow going getting anywhere and there are frankly impassible spots (unless I get off the bike and just walk it through, of course, heh heh) -- I just love coming to a stop next to a stuck motorist, getting off the bike, picking it up off the ground and walking over whatever they're stuck in.

I'm pretty shocked by how surprisingly little grip even these tires have on/in the really finely ground down snow crystals which result from cars rolling through snow which then stays on the ground unless enough salt gets dumped over it. Not that I'm complaining or anything, but I think the Marathons had a slightly better performance in this precise area because they did slice down deeper into the stuff than the fatter Spikers.