The New York City bike messengers have ridden fixed gear bicycles for years. The ultimate bike for them was a track bike; singular speed "fixed" gear, no brakes. Movies have shown the messengers darting in and out of traffic, retention on to taxis and buses and portraying themselves as bike outlaws, if not scofflaws.
This minimalist bike has now gained resurgence among colleges and urban centers. The bikes have fewer parts to break or wear, cost less and are less desirable to a thief, or at least were so before the new found popularity. This description will elucidate what all the hoopla is about and how this unusual bike can be a needful part of an adult recreational cyclist's garage of bikes.
Fixedgear Bike
First, let's discuss some background on this entertaining bike to elucidate how it got to be in the place it occupies today. Bicycles in the late 1800s all had singular speed "fixed" gears and the "freewheel" didn't arrive until the early 20th century. When people are not familiar with a fixed gear bike, they wonder "How can you stop it?" and "Can you coast?" I like to use the analogy of a child's tricycle to explain. The tricycle has the pedals and cranks directly attached to the front wheel and when you pedal, the trike moves transmit and when you resist the pedals it slows. This is exactly how a track bike with no brakes can turn speeds.
When bike racers are riding a track bike on a velodrome they all are riding bikes with no brakes so nobody can slow down any quicker than the next person. This allows a group of riders to coexist safely on the banks of the track. When one rides a track bike on the road with no brakes other than the braking quality of resisting the pedals, the situation is changed. Bike messengers think it is very cool to ride a bike in traffic with no brakes. They tend to be master riders who are able to plan ahead well enough to avoid collisions in most cases, however. What makes this conception entertaining is when a college trainee or recreational rider with undeveloped skills goes out in traffic on one of these machines and cannot deal with the limitations. This is not only incredibly dangerous but is madness! Many cities such as Austin, Tx are banning "fixies" without brakes from their urban environment for legitimate security reasons.
I have a track bike that I race on the velodrome and I also have an additional one I ride on the road. How can it be done safely? The write back is simple; I installed a front brake on the road fork and I now have a bike that can stop as genuinely as any other. It also has the advantages of a fixed gear that I am about to discuss which revolutionizes my training and riding experience. It can for you as well.
Fixed gear road bikes were genuinely used in the Tour de France until the 1930s. The organizers knew that the singular speed bike was much more entertaining than multiple geared bikes and thus outlawed the "sissy" bikes for years. These bikes genuinely had two gears. The rear wheel had what was called a "flip-flop" hub that had a cog on each side. The smaller cogs were used on the flats and descents while a larger cog (read: lower gear) was used to climb the mountains. The riders had to stop at the bottom of steep climbs and remove the rear wheel, flipping it around and installing it with the lower gear. They climbed the mountain, stopped at the top and reversed the process.
As a side note, Tullio Campagnolo invented the "quick release skewer" in 1927 which not only made the business of repairing flats easier in races but revolutionized the switching of wheels in races like the Tour de France. Riders had a huge advantage with the quick release rather than dealing with the wing nuts which were the proper issue.
Enough about background! Why in the world would an adult recreational cyclist want to train with a fixed gear bike? I think a better write back exists than the one Sir Edmund Hillary used when asked why he wanted to climb Mount Everest. (The write back was, "Because it is there.") The write back lies in the conception of cycling as the Fountain of Youth: intensity.
While we spend much time discussing the best ways to shift gears, we don't spend a lot of time working on pedaling and cadence. With a fixed gear, you are relieved of the worries of gear option as you only have one! Well, you aren't exactly relieved of the gear option worries, you just are when riding! It is very prominent to select the right gear before the ride.
Assuming that you agree that intensity is a key ingredient to enjoying cycling as a way to stay young, and the fact that as we age we tend to get busier rather than less busy, a fixed gear bike is an thinkable, way to pack an awesome workout into a short timeframe. The intuit is this: a 30-mile ride on a road bike will have a needful number of coasting involved. 30 miles on a fixed gear is 30 miles! Additionally there is a bonus that is not available on regular road bikes: spinning down hills.
When I take the fixie out on the road around San Antonio I have to select my gears so I can make it up the hills and still be able to hang on after the hill is crested. It is an entertaining challenge to think about the ride before it happens so the permissible gear can be chosen. I have a range of chain rings and cogs so I have learned over time which gears work and which ones don't. This is one of the best parts of cycling. We can "fail" by doing something like a poor gear option and the worst thing that can happen is we may have to walk up a hill, hit the brakes on a descent, or get dropped by the other riders. That "failure" is what makes us learn. This is why we train and why cycling is so incredible.
Every time I ride the fixie I am entranced by the elegance and simplicity of a bicycle. It is fantastic to think that this same type of bike was ridden over thinkable, distances and thinkable, terrain by cyclists just like us, but born in a distinct day. The options are simple. Pedal faster, go faster. Pedal slower, go slower. When the hill comes, your power is what gets you over the top with the tools you have chosen before the ride. When you crest the hill and every person else is coasting your real job has begun, the descent which turns your legs into a whirling dervish. At the end of the ride you know you have genuinely finished something.
This feeling of accomplishment is what gets cyclists up in the morning to challenge the elements, the traffic and their demons and ultimately makes us distinct than other sedentary people. Cyclists are truly a hardy breed and amazingly we can come to be cyclists at any point in life.
I know that this description may not turn all of you into fixed gear fanatics but I hope you gain some perspective as to how we attain the Fountain of Youth. It is through efforts that exceed our limits and recovery, as our bodies write back by getting stronger and more capable. A fixed gear bike is not the only way to fitness but it genuinely is an entertaining one!
Fixed Gear Fever
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