A Big No No
On my ride home today, I happened to have come to a red light and waited next to a dude who was on a fixed gear–an old Bianchi. He wasn’t wearing a helmet. (Please refer to my previous post about riders that do not wear helmets.)
Anyway, when the light turned green, I wasn’t in the mood to try to race him, as it was the end of the day and sadly, I am sick today. And this hill was a doozie. So he takes off like any cyclist would, tearing out of the crosswalk in which we waited, baiting me for a race up the block. I bet he felt great peeling ahead of me and riding over his bar to get up the hill.
However, I wasn’t that far enough behind him to miss the fact that he was one of those riders I spoke about in my previous post about track or fixed gear newbies. As he rode over his bar, cranking his pedals to get up this hill, it was obvious that he had no real riding experience. He was rocking his frame back and forth so much that it looked like he had a metronome hanging off of his butt!! And riding as wrong as he was, expending so much energy into rocking the frame back and forth, I was still able to keep quite near him, as tired and sick as I am today!!
Novices!! Especially fixed gear newbies. It’s sad when they sport the fixed gear, chain wrapped around their waists with the trendy little mini U Kryptonite and their trendy hipster clothing, and CAN’T ride. And they don’t even know had bad they look to a trained cyclist!! As I have stated before, they think it’s just enough to sport the flashiest gear and most don’t take the time to learn how to actually ride, getting the full benefit of working out on a bike and actually beating the hell out of a good bike. You can ride the living bejesus out of a good bike and it’ll never let you down.
When will these trendsters ever learn??
Watch all of these pro riders rock their frames as they sprint:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=He__9knF3S4&feature=related
When sprinting the frame can be rocked for additional leverage. Given a fixed gear’s typically low gearing it’s especially applicable to rock the frame when riding up a hill or when sprinting. You are dumb and probably old.
Funny, I think the same about novice golfers who go and spend 3 grand on clubs and apparel they can’t even make use of because it’s their first year and– worst of all– NO LESSONS! It’s like feeding strawberries to a pig! LMAO I, however, will make use of your blog to make sure I start out the right way. I’m in the market for a bike b/c my sons are now riding and I have to keep up.
And hey? Any rebuttal to the first comment! You can’t take that shit lying down…
Hey Buddy, thanks for stopping by and reading. You can certainly get a lot of information that you need from my blog here on purchasing and riding a bike safely. I hope you enjoy!! Also, I did post a response to the first comment. Check out a post I wrote later on called “Controversy Anyone?”
Cheers!!