Observation

I knew this would happen but since coming to London I saw a lot more people on single-speed or fixed geared bicycles, its a large city so that’s to be expected.

Sadly a lot of them are the annoying “fakenger” kind who dress like messengers but aren’t…they’re recognisable by how clean they look for example.

I’ve met them before in Nottingham and laughed about how they’d buy a frame for £50 then invest £300 into a wheelset because they obviously needed the Velocity Deep Vs with Phil Wood hubs in order to ride fixed, anything else would have been anathema. Add to that removing handlebar tape from their bars and riding without gloves to get what must be a very comfortable riding experience.

They also seem to be the same sort of people you see walking around town who wear girls’ trousers, and when the need arises having them hang somewhere around their kneees.

I’ve also seen a lot of people with handlebars just long enough to fit grips around, I may be an exception but I had always thought handlebars provided you with the ability to steer and provided leverage when climbing, but I might be wrong.

Whilst on the subject of handlebars take a look at this, a pretty standard bike as far as that gallery is concerned but please note the description “The bars in the other are a 12″ copper pipe from home depot” now I might be slightly confused but I thought copper was a soft metal unlike the standard bar material choices of aluminium or steel. Do you really want bars which bend when you crash? Or even impale as he’s left them unplugged.

Unplugged bars annoy me as well, especially unplugged bull horns which just seem like an accident waiting to happen or a great way to collect rain water.

Camelbak’s next product is likely to be a rain water recycling system using a handlebar reservoir for the discerning hipster.

The price of bikes like the Specialized Langster also shows that people seem to have more money than sense, but not on a carbon scale. I see a lot of people on Langsters close to where I live struggling with fairly small hills, I just hope they’ll stick to cycling and have enough common sense to know they’ll get better with training.

Speaking of more money than sense, I was in a bike shop close to where I work yesterday evening to pick up a wheel I ordered (my front hub broke and replacing the wheel costs as much as having it rebuilt here in London), a guy in front of me riding a Langster brought his bike in to have the tube changed. I nearly burst out laughing because while I was waiting people were going in an out of the shop, borrowing tools and track pumps in order to fix flats yet he was willing to spend £15 for someone else to do a five minute job for him.

Amusingly when I left twenty minutes later he was sitting across the road waiting for a friend…

It seems that 2008 is a good year for cycling, a lot of people are getting into it from women with their 3-speed city bikes to the thousands of young single-speed/fixed gear hipsters, I just hope they’ll stick to it as it’s a fun and liberating experience.

As for me?

I’ve fitted a new cog to my hub which brings me up to 87.2 gear inches, it’ll be a pain in the ass but I’ll know I’m going to get what I want from it when I cycle to and from work sporting trouser clips, and do 30-40 mile weekend rides.

Which is decent training for when I get a new bike for which I’m saving up for at the moment (one with gears), my current bike will be outfitted with mudguards, a rack and some panniers for the winter for me to grocery shop with back at uni and I’ll keep using it as my general commuter.