While I currently hold four regular subscriptions to bicycling magazines, the off season is usually a good excuse to pick up a few more. Mostly, I suppose, because in the winter I spend less on the bike and more time on my butt. But that’s a whole ‘nuther post.

I’ve subscribed to several biking magazines over the years and occasionally pick up more individual issues at Borders and Barnes & Noble. Some interesting and some quite good European mtb mags, I must admit. I’m currently receiving Mountain Bike Action, Bike and of course the old standby, Bicycling, who has recently included their mountain biking edition, Mountain Bike.

And when you subscribe to magazines, you get a bunch of offers for more. About a month ago I received a trial of Dirt Rag, the Mountain Biker’s Forum. It’s a grassroots publication, especially compared to the slick Bicycling. The stories are relevant to mountain biking and interesting with trip and trail reviews, new product reviews and the usual stuff, but written in a laid back and conversational manner. They feature a lot of bike related art work from their readers. Very cool mag. I think I’ll subscribe.

I also like Bike. Bike offers great features of interesting bike personalities, obscure bike shops riding locations. But what really sets Bike apart is the photography. AWESOME photography.

I remember BMX Action magazine from my BMX racing days as a kid. Mountain Bike Action is the big kids version, but still the same style. Mountain Bike Action offers race coverage, riding and mechanical tips and product testing reviews and several pages of classifieds in the back. A dry read compared to the others, but great useful info.

Bicycling, and their mtb counterpart, Mountain Bike, share the familiar, slick writing and layout that makes Bicycling the standard read for the sport. Short bits make for lots of information in little time.

These are the five mountain biking magazines that I like enough to plunk down my dough to get them every month.