“Last section of the trip. The ride out of South Lake Tahoe to cross the last bit of the Sierra mountains is an ass kicker. If you’re wanting to get gnarly I would really suggest a hard tail mountain bike, flat bar, and true suspension fork. I really don’t know that there’s an ideal setup for the route. There’s plenty of great, graded, relatively smooth dirt roads. There’s a good amount of rough double track, rocky double track, and a nice sprinkling of technical single track. Some of the downhills along the way would be great on a full squish, unloaded mountain bike, but you can take it slow and be deliberate with your lines and get away with less bike.”
[N.B. Post includes a YouTube video, “South Lake Tahoe to Pony Express single track to Sacramento along the Pony Express Bikepacking Route.”]