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fixie haters: latent queers or the most homophobike bigots ever?
why is it no one seems to be able to criticize fixed gears without calling the bikes "gay" and the people who ride them "faggots"? so lets have a serious discourse about what is so bad about riding a track bike on the street.
1. this is not a new fad. bike messengers in new york and chicago amongst other places have been riding fixed gears for decades (havent you ever seen quick silver with kevin bacon ;) because they are low maintenance, cheap to repair, light to carry, and you can stop without putting your feet down thus allowing you to start faster and jig through a gap that you would have otherwise missed. the only thing new is hipster/posengers copying the look of couriers while riding their tarck bikes slow and retarded like.
2. a serious fixed gear cyclists can hang with the best roadies out in the country and smoke their rich asses in the city. i blow by roadies in their live strong gear every day. just cause our pedals are moving slower going up a hill doesnt mean are bikes are. riding fixed, in my opinion, makes you a stronger and faster rider because you cant just cruise.
3. once you learn to ride a fixed gear skillfully you learn to predict traffic patterns and car movements, you pay more attention to a cars turn signals and brake lights, you pass on the left of a car instead of on the shoulder. at any given moment you see every possible scenario of what traffic might do and you have a plan for each, you see 10 seconds into the future.
the number one reason cars hit cyclists is because they simply dont see them. when you ride your bike like an asshole people notice you. so take the lane, blow the light, weave through the gridlock, and stop giving a fuck what motorists think about you! that is, of course, unless you yourself are behind the wheel most of the time and just like to go for a pedal on sundays.
in my many years of riding a track bike everywhere i go, every single day i have never been hit pulling any of the shit people think is so crazy. i have been hit hard 3 times. once rearended by a guy doing 45. once buy an oncoming car making a left turn. and once buy a car crossing a major artery from a stop sign. in every scenario i had the right of way and i was riding as far to the right of the road as possible. the motorists just didnt see me until it was to late.
back to the gay thing... tight fitting, breathable clothing is condusive to cycling and thus a little "gay looking" to some, but seriously who looks less hetro-macho?
this guy:
http://api.ning.com/files/La-8-LYiNwq8YJpFlTU2TkXRZuEXB3D8jRF5D3mItv5rDv...
or this guy:
http://farm3.static.flickr.com/2149/2057227831_7c7e504baf.jpg?v=0
I'm pretty sure that's the last time someone cared about the fixed vs. road debate.
Just so it's clear plenty of people can criticize fixed gears and their riders without calling either gay or faggots. (Side question: is there something wrong or undesirable about being a homosexual?)
As for your list of items --
1. Kevin Bacon can't make up his mind about what bike he wants to ride during his race -- a track bike or a bike with gears.
As for being new or old, fad or not, so what? This is 2009, and you're riding your bike today. Who cares what people rode 100 years ago, or will be riding 100 years from now?
Sure, low maintenance. Easier to repair. Even less likely to break! But lighter weight? Well, those parts do add a little weight, but not much.
As for `stopping without putting your foot down', 1) many fixie riders can't trackstand, and 2) some other riders can trackstand with a freewheel (you just need a little hill.) Saw a cop doing it downtown the other day. And what good is trackstanding if you're not going to stop for the red light anyways? Advantage, but a minor one.
(Unless you're playing bike polo. Then the fixie rules. And it's great for certain types of stunts. And it's probably good for training, as it forces you to ride outside of your cadence zone of comfort.)
And as for your `hipster/posengers copying the look of couriers', when people are hating on fixies -- THAT'S WHO THEY'RE USUALLY HATING ON. Not the couriers. Not the people racing in the velodrome.
2. It's not the bike, it's the rider. If a fixie rider can hang with the serious roadies, it's because he's a serious rider, not because fixes are great. And he doesn't blow their `rich asses' (who's hatin' here?) away in the city. Unless the city is totally flat, has no wind and you never have to stop I guess -- and then he might be a tiny bit faster. Put that same guy on a geared bike, and he becomes a tad faster under real world (Austin?) conditions.
Riding fixed probably does make you a stronger rider, because anything involving a stop, hill or a wind is that much harder. So train on a fixie -- but race on a geared bike. Or just pull your kids in a trailer on your geared bike while you train -- that'll harden you up too.
3. what does any of this have to do with fixed gear bikes? People on geared bikes learn to ride skillfully too, you know. Freewheels don't make you stupid and unable to learn.
> the number one reason cars hit cyclists is because they simply dont see them
Sure, but what does this have to do with fixie riders? Really, nothing in the rest of your post has anything about fixies or their riders, except for this --
> back to the gay thing... tight fitting, breathable clothing is conducive to
> cycling and thus a little "gay looking" to some, but seriously who looks less
> hetro-macho?
You're really hung up on this gay/homophobe thing, aren't you? Don't worry too much about it, people make fun of both archetypes.
But you've not really talked much about fixies themselves, their pros (and epsecially) their cons ...
Simpler and therefore more robust. Sure. Lighter? Perhaps a little, assuming they started with a light frame (and not something `vintage'.) And yes, trackstanding (and going backwards if you can) can be useful in some cases.
But if you're going up a hill, gears are a damn nice thing to have. Sure, you can harden the hell up and power up the hill in a fixie, but that only gets you so far until you're exhausted or your legs fall off. I see lots of fixie riders walking their bikes up hills when the less serious riders just downshift and ride up it.
Going down a hill, you pedal like mad -- and get beaten by grandma on her cruiser who just stops pedalling and coasts.
And then there's brakes. Part of the `fixie experience' seems to be that you don't need brakes. Well, fine, but grandma on her cruiser with coaster brakes can stop twice as fast as that fixie rider with tree trunks for legs. And that little girl on the hybrid with front and rear brakes can stop five times as fast as Mr Tree Trunk Legs. And that's all assuming the fixie rider has legs of wood. What if he's a poseur? Then he just plain can't stop. Perhaps he tries to do it with his feet, perhaps he jumps off ...
And when brakeless fixies do stop, they tear up their rear tire. Some people spend all these money on beautiful tires, color coordinated with their bikes -- and they only last a few hundred miles. Go down a big hill with a bunch of them and the smell of burnt rubber permeates the air. It's not a good smell.
And when they do stop, they skid, with their back wheels all over the place. Rather disconcerting when you riding with them, when your front wheel is only a foot or two away from a brakeless fixie rider's back wheel that's skidding all over the place. (You learn to avoid this situation.) And you're often wondering if you're about to get run over from behind by somebody who couldn't stop. (This one is harder to avoid. So far, I've been lucky, but there's been some close calls.)
The usual counter-argument is that the brakeless fixie rider learns to anticipate traffic so he doesn't need his brakes. OK, that may actually work 75% of the time, but two things -- 1) riders with freewheels (and brakes!) can learn the same thing, and 2) what about that other 25%? Being able to stop quickly is mighty useful. My helmet? It's saved me from injury zero times. My gloves? Perhaps twice. My brakes? Dozens, perhaps hundreds of times.
Ultimately, I have nothing against fixies or their riders. Many of my friends ride 'em. I don't ride one (yet, I may try it at some point, though I doubt my knees would appreciate it), but that's my choice. To me, gears and freewheels are good things. They won't make me go from an average cyclists to a great cyclist, but they do help me adapt to changing conditions, and they do help spare my knees. But hey, if you don't have 'em, that's fine with me.
I'm not particularly fond of brakeless fixies, however -- it may be more `pure' or make you `closer to your bike', but it may also get you (or me) hurt or killed. Brakes are good things. (Does that make me a brakeless fixie hater? I don't think so. But if it does, so be it.)
Ultimately, ride what you got. And if you think somebody's hating on you, ignore them and ride on.