Riding Fixed With Roadies
Nature is calling!
So you’re having some coffee with your good cyclist friend… He is telling you all about his last escape with the boys and it sounds like they had quite a blast riding together. What about joining them? Only problem is: It’s a road bike group and you don’t own a multi-gear black magic piece of cycling engineering…yet. This adventure is calling for you! And the idea of having some coffee and a snack after a few hundred kilometers sounds somewhat like a wonderful idea to you! So, would it be possible to follow them while riding your track bike? Can you keep the pace? Can THEY keep the pace?
Questions we will try to answer today!
A few weeks back, I had a surprise weekend presented to me by my girlfriend at the last minute. I should have seen it coming when she looked at my bike and said: “Can you do long distances with that one?” The night before she told me to pack my stuff for 2 days, put some drop bars on and a pair of clipless pedals. Not gonna lie, I was super excited but also full of questions… She was taking her road bike, but what if there's more people? More roadies, more gears and more cassettes loudly laughing at me on the descents while I’m looking as far as I can for the next corner and planning how to not crash in it. Knowing that a fixed gear bike was my only option, I knew I would just have to deal with it and see what would happen. Fun fact: It’s not my first time riding fixed along some road bikes, but I can’t help being a little nervous every time.
Riding in a pack full of people that can control their speed and brake way faster than you can (if you’re riding brakeless) is a terrifying sight. So what do you need and how do you behave?
Coming back to my little weekend surprise, we were a group of five in the end with two of us riding fixed and the rest ripping through a cheeky amount of gears. One thing I can’t emphasise enough is that if you end up in this kind of situation, go with people you know and trust. There is nothing better than knowing the group you are with has absolutely no problem with you riding around them. (Even more correct if you ride brakeless.) If they are confident with you tagging along, it will already make things way easier. If you’re riding brakeless I would definitely avoid closely shadowing someone (or a group)as they could brake for any reason: wild animal, car, pothole, flat tire or even a raging desire for an immediate snack. Keep a good 2-3 meters of distance and make sure that if they stop, you can pass them easily to stop yourself after.
On to climbing! Since you can only use brute force to spin your heavy gear ratio up hills, you’re probably gonna pass everyone, ending up first but tired as hell at the top. I would recommend just finding a nice and steady rhythm to focus your effort on. If you don’t know the route just be careful on the descents since you never know what’s coming around the next corner.
On to gears…
I am way more comfortable with wide and shallow drop bars. I have a Zipp SL 70 which is 440mm wide and it feels just right. I use normal MTB SPDs since I have Chrome shoes I can footbrake with. For the gear ratio, I just went with my “all time classic” 49x17; not too spiny and not too hard while climbing. You can of course adapt your ratio depending on the route or the group you’re riding with. With all this you should be pretty set for your ride, but just don’t forget tools and water! Even if the Mash work is a great bike which I use for everything, it’s far from the right choice for this kind of trip, especially while climbing, one can feel so much flexing in the bottom bracket area and all the power going away. I guess I’ll take something stiffer next time and maybe a tiny bit lighter…
As you can see below, I had all my bags for this weekend. It was just to go from Paris to our destination since I don’t really like backpacks and I wasn’t sure where we were going. But to be completely honest, taking the train with a 14kg bike is a huge pain! I guess next time I’ll just take a normal bag…
Thank you to @ellaellad and @richthofeny for the surprise, @graine.de.courge for the good vibes, and @anbl.b for tagging along in the fixed gear category!
