Yay.... and Nay.
Here's why.
I did Lesotho with it, a Wildwood trip, and as I'm the childish type still I'm easily lured into dicing a bit. Add a bit of onnosel too, and conclude with me - lees mooi nou - that I tried to wrestle this Desert Racer into an Enduro tool: ek kan mos so why not eh?
That worked, actually surprisingly well, but yeah, the carbon belly pan (note I didn't say skidplate) took strain there... and you're right with the cracking bit, I pierced it a few times actually. Some big rocks (one
SO big it kicked the bike & me in the air) took turns to put damage on the bottom, and the (Lesotho-normal) smaller flying rocks caused some marks/scratches on the side. It's wide also, with a completely flat underside.
A skidplate (plastic, metal, meant for skidding over rocks & logs etc)) would be the solution you reckon - but I don't, at least not to replace the entire belly pan.
This is a bike perfectly suited for going fast over plains, sand, riverbeds, tracks, roads, hell,
tarred roads even, and there the carbon pan works very well and is more than sufficient, plus light.
But, again, it is
not a Roof tool. If you want to do that other bikes better suited for this spring to mind, and no surprise these all are a lot narrower under the engine.
Having said that though, the flat bottom of the carbon pan
does suit itself for a piece of nylon or the like, and such may be what I'll mount - but will keep the pan as-is, for it looks good, does its intended job well, and the small tool-storage compartment is handy to have