planning a trip for next year, have heard alot of good things about marquette and copper harbor. Trying to decide between there or the extra time to winter park co. looking for technical stuff!!

the up totally rules. you will like copper harbor because it is pretty technical.

A trip to the U.P. is definitely worth the drive. From the twin cities, you can make Houghton in a little over 6 hours or Marquette in about 7. Take a long weekend and go exploring. There's great riding in Copper Harbor and in Houghton. Then there is some absolutely sick Freeride stuff in Marquette. Tons o' fun to be had.

I have not been up North since I was a kid. I have thought about the race up there, can't think of the name. For almost the same drive time I could be in West VA with much better elevation and choice of trails.

Is ore to shore the race you were thinking about?

I live in marquette and I can tell you it is well worth the drive. From big hits to little sh*ts there is enough technical stuff to scare even the most hardcore. I look out at marquette mountain everyday from my work window and just wish the 4 feet of snow would just leave.

Yo Joe, you live in Marquette too?? I'm living in Shiga-ken, Japan right now, but I'll probably be back there next year. I too know from first hand experience, there is some sick shift to ride there, from big hucks, drops, etc. on Benson's Grade to riding the lifts at Marquette mt- they have quite a bit of fr/shore type stuff built. Then there are the hundreds upon hundreds of xc/tech/epic trails all over Marquette county, let alone the rest of the UP. Out of the UP my ranking for the best riding would have to go, 1. Marquette 2. Copper Harbor/Keewenaw 3. Houghton/Hancock 4. Munising etc.
if your from Minnesota you will probably be used to the terrain- rocky, rooty, patches of sand, etc- mostly very tech, but there are trails to meet everyone's skill level too.
I've ridden w/ a few cats from somewhere in MN who made the trek to Marquette, and they really loved it. I showed them around to all the hot spots- some good guys. If I move back to the US within this next year, get ahold of me, I'm always up for a good ride w/ some new people, but if not, here's a few trails to check out: Bareback, Split-tree, Flow (along w/ the rest of Benson), of course Marquette Mountain, Jedi, Range Mt trails, man there is a ton of them in Marquette, then there is the Maahsto Hiito and Tech trails in H/H, The Keewenaw Adventure Company in Copper Harbor has a pretty good map of the trail system up there, then there are some good ones in Munising too, but I can't think of the name of the really good one, dammit I hate that! Oh well, you definetly won't regret the trip.

There are quite a few races going on in the UP - just off the top of my head there is the Ore2Shore in Marquette, the Superior Bikefest in Marquette, the Keewenaw Chain Drive in Houghton/Hancock, the Tour Da Woods epic in Munising, and probably one of my favorites, the Copper Harbor Fat Tire Festival of course in Copper Harbor. Check'em out, it's a good time.
man, that was a long post, but I hope the info may have helped.

i took a trip to the u.p. this year, and took about a 7 hour drive, and is was definitately worth it. copper harbor and michigan tech trail are sweet, and the marquette trails are just ridiculously awesome.