Once we were brothers (and a few sisters)

Maybe it's just me, but what is up with the tribe these days?

A little rivalry is always fun, and I've witnessed various factions:
mountain vs. roadie
biker vs. blader
messenger vs. roadie
messenger vs. wannabe

...and then, within these groups (mostly messengers), you had some playful debates:
lifer vs. summerboy
single speeder vs. geared
fixed vs. free
straight bars vs. bullhorns
one brake vs. two
clips vs. cages

...but the fact is, most messengers I've known liked to swap out bars, go back and forth between fixed, free, no dérailleurs, rear dérailleur only, commuter tires, crit tires, one or two brakes, what have you. Eventually you found your groove, the rig that worked for you. Over the last few years, I've finally reached a point where I have that mythical "pile of parts" in the basement, and I can swap as needed, not based on what I can afford, or what I have to borrow from a friend's junkpile until payday. My last conversion was from a single speed 'cross bike to a below-the-radar messenger ride, and the best part? I didn't even have to go to the bike shop for a single thing! I had it all laying around. Ahhh...it only took me 17 years of modding to get there.

While I love the simplicity of a FG with straight bar and one brake, but I keep coming back to homemade bullhorns. Fact is, I even feel a little bourgeoisie on my CF rig these days, like I've finally become that old dude with money to blow on gratuitous bike parts. Maybe I have. Maybe that's why I've been spending all my time on my 72-spoke, ancient phil wood hubbed, platform/clip pedaled, 12 year old saddle with a 15 year old flipped and chopped handlebar, stickerless, freewheeled SS. It's very strong, very dependable, a little heavy, totally filthy, and I think the tubes have at least ten patches in each of them. The best part is, I leave it locked up outside in downtown Chicago every day for about 9 hours, and I don't really worry about having it stripped or nicked, unlike the Velocity rim crowd.

Ah, the Velocity rim crew. Now heavily documented in the NY Times (subscription required to read it now), as well as the Wall Street Journal, SFist (cool photo but it spawned a bit of a flame war), as well as the Independant Florida Alligator, LA City Beat (profiling the Wolfpack, who sound like a bunch of clowns), the Guardian (FG bike polo), the Maryland Gazette (old dude commutes on a FG), and the Philadelphia Enquirer.

This last one is particularly entertaining to me, because it's accompanied by a picture of a grinning "messenger" with a six inch handlebar. I'm down with the "less is more" thing, especially when you're splitting lanes and you have side view mirrors to contend with, but I (and probably a number of other messengers) have cut down a straight bar just a little too much, and discovered the complete lack of control it leads to. Nevermind the fact that you still have to squeeze your ass through those side mirror gaps, you give up little things like stability, power, and control, in favor of....style.

Which really cuts to the heart of it. It's all about style now. Every city has roving packs of skinny boys with retro cycling/army caps, italiano steel, neon Velocity rims, and skin-tight jeans (don't forget to fold the cuffs up to just below the knees, boys!). A friend of mine was riding on a junkpile bike through his neighborhood, which is part barrio, part Ratbike haven, and part fixie-boy crew. He encountered a pack of about a half dozen of these guys, and one of them made some comment about his bike. He's always quick with a witty reply, and he didn't disappoint: "Do you guys all shop at the same store? Do you swap girlfriends too?" Point is, the biker tribe has gone from "freaks of a feather" to being co-opted and marketed into little clones.

I was riding the other day, and a fixie rider said, with a bit of attitude, "nice bike, but why don't you go fixed?" I responded "because freewheel's faster." What I meant to say was "more aggressive" but whatever. Anyway, that's all it took. The light changed, and he charged, and though he was fast, he couldn't drop me, and I eventually got the best of him, though I pulled a tow off a passing car to really put the nail in the coffin. (Oddly, I saw him two days later on a road bike :) but neither of us raced hard that time.)

There has always been a messenger style, and a crowd that borrowed heavily from it. It just seems to have reached a tipping point.

For the record, I'm not down on fixed gears. I love them, and I have ridden one off and on for years. However, if you're riding one in the city and you don't have a front brake on it, you are a either a poser or an idiot. Not because of your look per se, but you're a poser if you are probably GOING SO GODDAMNED SLOW that pregnant women overtake you. You're an idiot if you're flying along, apparently not concerned about the fact that it will take you twice as much time and distance to stop. If a car were flying at you, and the driver had only installed half as much stopping power on it because "it was cool" I think you might have a problem with that.

Granted, back when I was a messenger, it was difficult and expensive to put together these rides (mostly through mail order parts), but the few guys that had them rode them only occasionally, mostly to do tricks like backwards figure-8s or riding while sitting on the bars. They didn't really work on pure fixed gears, any more than the guy who was a trials star worked on his super-granny gear bike. Because EVERYONE ELSE WAS MUCH FASTER ON BRAKED BIKES.

I have passed about a thousand fixies this season, and only one guy truly dropped me (though it was on the lakefront path, where he didn't have to worry about intersections). For the record, I had already swum 1000 meters and run 4 miles that day, but I'm not making excuses, I was properly dropped. I guess I've just never noticed so much attitude from any block of riders before, save the roadie packs on $5k rigs, but let me tell you, if you go on a group ride with those guys, and you can hang with the top fifth, even they'll lighten up.

I'm not saying I'm a star, far from it. I'm a 36-year-old dad who sits in a cubicle all day. The point is this: ride your own ride, but ride it with at least ONE freaking brake. To brake it down one last time (sic :)...using a front brake, you can go from (any speed) to zero in about HALF the time and distance than a rear-wheel skid. The math is explained in excruciating detail in Bicycling Science, and I'd dare to say that those numbers can be drastically improved upon with true mastery of a nose wheelie stop.

Ergo....you can come into an intersection/split lane/sketchy line twice as fast, and still be able to stop in time. If you don't have to stop after all, you have more momentum conserved (vs. the fixie rider who started backpedaling half a block earlier). More aggressive riding = faster riding. For those of you messengering: faster riding = more money (unless runs pay based on "oneness with your bike" these days?). For the rest: stopping faster = less likely to get creamed. As a bonus, you won't look like such a FG poser creeping down the block at 3 miles an hour.

I don't mean to be so caustic, but my passion has been co-opted into an aisle at urban outfitters, so maybe I am just a little bitter. Just ride a little smarter people, and don't be afraid to step out of uniform, and stop ranting to the papers about how you're "one with your bike." You can still be one with it with a brake, and you get to be one with your brain too.