Disclaimer: Legal guidelines and laws relating to fixed-gear bicycles and bicycle brakes differ by metropolis, state, province or nation. Be sure you assessment the particular necessities in your native jurisdiction to make sure your bike complies.
It began with a easy premise: What if I took my fixed-gear bicycle and rode it 100 miles?
That was a heck of a great distance longer than I’ve ridden that individual bike, but a heck of lots shorter than I’ve ridden with all of the bells and whistles of a contemporary, geared bike. It promised to be a easy, experiential and, on the very least, a very good day trip.
Alas, in biking, easy issues are by no means so simple as they appear. I suppose I might have simply pulled on a pair of jorts, thrown a water bottle and snacks in a backpack, and ridden off on some unplanned route like I did after I used my fastened gear for commuting – however that appeared a lackadaisical step too far for a 100 miles, even when this may be my eighty fifth century trip.
As they are saying, the satan’s within the particulars, and I needed to weigh a number of elements. First, the hills. Elevation means stress on the knees on the up however with out gears, much more so on the down. There was the route to contemplate, too, to keep away from busy streets and the nuisance of accelerating and decelerating at stoplights. Then, gear and equipment have been added to a motorbike that usually has none – necessities like bottle cages, highway pedals, a saddle bag and a Wahoo pc. Lastly, I needed to determine how intently to stay to the fixed-gear ethos on the coronary heart of this experiment: wouldn’t it be jorts and a backward baseball cap, or helmet and lycra?
In the end, one by one, I sorted by way of these questions the week earlier than the large day. As soon as Saturday got here round, the duty appeared easy once more: pedal alongside the dotted line on my biking pc till I received dwelling once more. Eat, drink and pedal the identical gear over and again and again for 52,800 toes.
The enjoyment of the trip was that complexity was by no means too distant. In pedalling that very same gear all the best way across the Sonoran Desert and Phoenix suburban sprawl, all the things stood in stark distinction to my 84 earlier centuries on extra difficult bikes. At every juncture, a brand new thought got here to thoughts. I made a decision I wished to share a few of them with Biking Weekly within the hopes that it could encourage you to embark by yourself journey and see the place it leads your ideas.
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My fixie is the most effective $400 I’ve ever spent
(Picture credit score: Logan Jones-Wilkins)
I purchased and constructed my fixed-gear bike in 2019, and it has been a trusted companion ever since. Again then, I used to be excited concerning the prospects of a fixie however had no concept concerning the joys it will deliver me.
I obtained the fastened gear in items, starting with the body and ending in a pair of grips. The body is a black Dolan aluminium observe body, for which I shelled out a grand complete of $175 USD. It was excellent. And by that, I imply completely sturdy and completely inconspicuous when locked on the road.
Subsequent got here the shifting bits. Happily for me, I solely wanted 4 of them: a wheelset, a crankset, a backside bracket and a series. On the time, I used to be dwelling in Richmond, Virginia, and Fb Market was a cheerful searching floor for all these components, which I rounded up for a measly $132 in complete.
5 years later, all these components are precisely the identical.
Different components have modified. I’ve added fastened gear pedals with energy straps to help with stopping, new tyres, grips and varied handlebar and stem combos which have come from my ever-evolving assortment of spare stuff. However largely, the bike has remained the identical over the past 5 years of constant using. Sooner or later, I do know I must change the chain, the chain ring and the underside bracket, however not but. The bike stays the most effective $400 I’ve ever spent.
Using is all about rhythm
(Picture credit score: Logan Jones-Wilkins)
As I wheeled the fixie out of the driveway to start out my journey on a cool November morning in Arizona, I nonetheless wasn’t positive the way it will all go. Would my legs spontaneously combust when climbing up a hill after 4 hours of continuous pedalling? How would my butt really feel after being locked into the identical place for 5 hours? Would the gear that I’ve ridden for 5 years be too small when clipped in and carrying a correct biking equipment?
I received a couple of of my solutions straightaway. A light-weight breeze was blowing from the East within the type of a light-weight headwind. Headwind for a set gear can, no less than in idea, be a burden. In apply, it answered the query of gearing fairly elegantly: if the gear appears barely too huge, pedal tougher, get a bit bit extra aerodynamic, and an enormous gear is now not a problem.
When the route of the route modified, I sat up a bit, received a bit extra snug, and spun up my cadence. When the route went uphill, I introduced my focus again to my pedal stroke and surged with the terrain. When the route headed down, I targeted on managing my pace and cadence to not get overwhelmed by the fast turnover of the pedals. Using a set gear is all about managing the rhythm and having a deal with kind whereas decelerating the pedals heading right into a cease mild, and accelerating away from the intersection.
There’s energy in going again to fundamentals
(Picture credit score: Logan Jones-Wilkins)
What turned clear by way of the primary few hours, as I used to be studying the rhythms of prolonged time on the fixie, was simply how a lot of biking with a geared bike could be a senseless pursuit. Mindlessness could be therapeutic, however it might additionally forestall a bike owner from understanding the method of pedalling and the right way to pedal higher.
Gears, like different instruments of contemporary comfort, are unbelievable for creating effectivity. What it does uninteresting, nonetheless, is approach.
Spending time on bettering your pedal stroke can encourage what some of us name the mind-muscle connection. This neurological connection between muscular tissues and the thoughts is difficult to quantify, however the concept has been popularised in weight lifting and crossfit communities as a method to increase efficiency by acutely aware consideration to muscle recruitment.
Principally, if you consider what muscular tissues you’re utilizing and which different muscular tissues you might be utilizing as well as, you’ll activate extra muscle fibres, and you will note higher outcomes.
Most of that is extremely speculative science; nonetheless, there may be energy in muscle reminiscence in a sport like biking that’s so depending on repetition. In comparison with different endurance sports activities like swimming, operating and cross-country snowboarding, approach is commonly much less of a spotlight in biking as a result of changing energy into pace has all the time been seen as king. However the approach continues to be essentially necessary, particularly within the quest to get stronger.
Using a fixed-gear bike, with its pure modifications in cadence and torque, brings every pedal stroke into a distinct focus. This identical feeling could be present in low cadence intervals, nonetheless, on an extended fixed-gear trip, the relentlessness internalises the method greater than the finite time of an interval.
Biking could be monotonous and dynamic
(Picture credit score: Logan Jones-Wilkins)
For the primary three hours of that fixed-gear century, the trip was euphoric. The one main climb I needed to get by way of, a nine-mile, 3% slog alongside a useless straight highway by way of the Sonoran Protect, couldn’t have gone higher. It set a three-minute PR as a result of, because it turned out, the gear was an ideal match for a tempo effort up the shallow gradients. My place felt strong, a fear each time one trades bikes for a grand outing, and I used to be removed from bonking for the reason that nervousness across the unknown of a set gear trip led me to be, for as soon as in my life, over-prepared.
Nevertheless, that euphoria dissipated within the following two hours. The downhill turned out to be much more taxing than the climb. My saddle place, with none room for the micro-adjustments in place that include coasting, turned a nuisance. My knees began to fade after a couple of hours of pace administration. My fingers, with out hoods to relaxation upon, have been getting stressed, alternating between varied subpar positions on the drops and tops. And stoplights turned extra frequent as I labored my approach again into town streets of Phoenix.
With the interruptions turning into extra frequent and extra irritating, I took my foot off the gasoline, choosing consolation with minimal energy into the pedals (a pleasant attribute of a set gear is it’s a lot simpler to go simple on a flat route, the system has little or no friction and might roll endlessly).
As I spun out the fatigue, I mirrored on my trip and stored coming again to the steadiness between the simplicity and complexity of the trip. To place that steadiness in several terminology, intrigue is all the time relative and all the time altering. The important thing in a pursuit like biking can concurrently be monotony and dynamism.
This specific 100-mile trip, looking back, just isn’t an distinctive effort. In actual fact, when it was all tallied up on the finish, the trip’s stats have been remarkably regular. In 100 miles I averaged 18.8 miles per hour at 141 beats per minute. For me, that’s about as common as common will get. But, inside that standard, extremely monotonous trip, I discovered many takeaways that can assist me greater than any five-hour coaching trip, no matter depth.
Nonetheless, after I subsequent left my driveway on a motorbike with gears and a freewheel ticking away, I used to be completely happy I had choices. One other fixie journey will come; I’d simply have to attend a bit for my undercarriage to get better.
