Fixed Gear Panic Stop
My first fixed-gear bike, a Gunnar Street Dog, is light, quick, and nimble. The best way to describe the feel is… zinggg… A bike like that rewards every effort, which of course inspires more effort.
My first time in the saddle I hammered up a long hill. Then hammered back down, wherein my first white-knuckle lesson on the zen of fixed-gear riding. I’m lucky I survived.
“Fixed” means the rear cog is not mounted on a freewheel. It is “fixed” in position and cannot spin. If the wheel turns it drives the cog. The cog drives the chain. The chain drives the crank and pedals. Your feet need to move with them.
Fear helped in confronting sabre tooth tigers, woolly mammoths, and fighting with broad swords. But it’s not well suited to coping with most modern situations.
Fear leads to tension. Tension on a fixed gear bike leads to choppy spin. Choppy spin leads to a greater loss of control, leading to more fear. Once the muscles sieze up the situation takes over. Being afraid is what gives the fates we fear the upper hand.
The bike has taught me to acknowledge the danger behind the fear while setting the fear aside. On a good day can do 130 rpm and be fine. On a good day I can be present, focused, engaged with my surroundings and the forces, and not afraid.
But if I’m off my game in the slightest the bike will makes it instantly, inescapably clear. I can hide things from myself in many situations. I can hide things from myself that the bike, on a steep descent, will quickly reveal.
I think the lesson applies broadly. If, as a society, we allow fear to drive us, our reaction is driven by the instinctive knee-jerk. Instead of the patience, focus, reason, and coordination required to engage and work with the problem, we resort to the knee-jerk. Our fear leads us to deliver exactly whats required for the situation to catapult us into the crash.
Tags: cycling, fixed gear, single speed