Mothers, watch your children! He's on the fixie!

[gone]

First ride today on the fixed gear. As I mentioned here a couple of weeks ago, I was thinking about converting an old bike I had but when I figured the costs it turned out to be cheaper to buy a Bianchi Pista (my old bike was pretty much crap anyway). Got it set up and waited until dinner time to take it for a spin around the neighborhood. Major league weird! It took me about 150 feet to get my second foot clipped in - darned difficult to hit that moving target! It is also truly amazing how strong the instinct (training) is to stop pedalling!

A little too far forward in the saddle - no problem - stop pedalling and slide back. Ouch!

A car taking a curve wide - stop pedalling, swerve and brake. Ouch!

A little fast coming into a turn - stop pedalling and brake. Ouch!

And I've got to admit that I looked like a controlled crash coming to a stop. There is no way I would even think about going out on the open road at this point. I'm going to confine myself to jaunts around the hood for a while until I "retrain" my instinctive responses.

[fiamme red]

"Coasting is a pernicious habit."
--Sheldon Brown

[Samster]

eh. you get used to it.

either that, or you don't live very long... ;)

[Fixed]

bro go to a basketball court and ride for an hour just play stop go slow turns figure 8's just get a feel for it you don't have to be a kamikaze i.m.h.o. cheers :beer:

[CPP]

Hey 54,
Where did you get the frame and how much was it?
Thanks CPP

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Hey 54,
Where did you get the frame and how much was it?
Thanks CPP

My LBS. Complete bike $532 with front brake. I got the cool chrome one.

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bro go to a basketball court and ride for an hour just play stop go slow turns figure 8's just get a feel for it you don't have to be a kamikaze i.m.h.o. cheers :beer:
Good advice which I plan on taking. I wasn't trying to be a kamikaze (though it sure felt like it!), just an easy ride around the neighborhood during a time of little to no traffic or activity since it was Sunday and most people were eating dinner.

It's like anything else "different" that I've done: you spend a lot of energy doing the wrong thing. An analogy from skiing which I learned at age 24. Although it came very easily to me, I remember how sore I used to get when I first started. After I relaxed and stopped using muscles to fight gravity, the bumps, etc, and just went with it I could ski all day with very little effort.