if you want to develop strong legs and a good base of off season training.
get a fixed for winter training...
I have been riding my lovely fixed around for the last six months, and I got on my tri-bike at the weekend and flew like the wind! the base training has really paid off...
I still feel that varable gears are only for people over forty-five.
Isn't it better to triumph by the strength of your muscles than by the artifice of a derailer?
We are getting soft...As for me, give me a fixed gear!
--Henri Desgrange, L'Équipe article of 1902
http://www.sheldonbrown.com/fixed.htmlcheap to build and will save you more seconds of your 40k time that £1000s of gucci extras for yer road bike!!!
Comments
just not strong enough legs!!!
It is like saying only run in trail shoes
Never got round to it though.
Had a few sessions at the velodrome with a fixed, very exilerating.
You can go up most hills (ie, up to 14%) with fixed gear, I used 42x16 and left most people in the group on the hills behind me. Downhill can be a bit painful though and after 2.5hrs it starts to hurt.
i'll have you know i'm a spinner and at our club its the old timers that ride fixed
;ob
There are two camps of cyclists anyway, the Ullrich type (power) and the Armstrong type (cadence).
Just a personal observation, my impression was that the older guys just didn't bother and were mainly focussing on to get as many miles into the legs before the first race in spring.
Does take a bit of getting used to though and I will mainly be using it through the winter as it's got guards and is much easier to clean !
They don't stop dead Monique as you have the intertia of the bike pushing the pedals round. You do have to remember to keep pedalling though otherwise it can throw you over the front. Does your club do any trips to Manchester Velodrome ? You can learn fixed there.
Not sure I agree on the needing great strength to ride them Andrew. For me the best thing is keeping me in a lowish gear and encouraging me to spin, therefore not needing as much power. Too many people ride too big a gear on the roads which does call for greater strength. Oh, and you can't coast with them as well.
We had a GB rider out on the club run last year. His Powercrank computer told him he'd only physicall been pedalling and creating power for about half the time we'd been riding. So I figure - it is a better, more intense workout.
He must have had his hair cut very frequently 'cos I was only in there once in a blue moon, and he was always there. Weird.