It Depends.
like for hilly rides?
Then why brag about spending 8 hours a day for 10 days straight when they only covered that distance?[/quote]
I think it’s pretty hot the time of year they were riding? I dunno, heat really takes it out of me, and depending on how much climbing they were doing, it could certainly be a pretty big effort to “only” do 70mi+ consecutive days, even if the overall average speed (not moving average, but overall average) was “only” 9.3mph.
Paris Brest Paris requires a similar minimum pace be maintained over 1200km, but they finish in 3.75 days (90hrs) instead of a week. Doing that distance in a week sounds a lot more pleasant, to be honest, rather than the sufferfest PBP ends up being for many/most people.
I dunno, there are others here who have done much, much longer rides than me fixed, and I’m pretty new to “distance” riding in general, so of course take my comments with a large block of salt.
But, from what I’ve read, and just as an example, the randonneurs who ride fixed generally use gearing around 65-70" and seem to do OK even on relatively hilly courses (like 6,000ft of climbing over 200km).
Trying to do the same course with 75"++ might be a lot more tiring. Whereas it might not be so bad over a flatter course, or one with less steep climbs and more rollers.
Likewise, if you ride a geared bike but mostly do not spin when climbing, but instead push big gears, you might be as tired (or more tired) than someone riding fixed.
And how much time you spend on the drivetrain surely has to make a difference, too.
Just some thoughts on the subject. I’ve done the same ride fixed and geared and it generally wears me out about the same amount, and I generally end up going about the same speed at the end of it.
As an addendum, I don’t really hate on these people for doing long rides on their fixes, I’m all about that actually. And even making videos about it. It’s the whole “this is so much cooler than anything that’s come before” attitude that I perceive/project on the whole thing. Biking across Aus, in any conditions, sounds crazy brutal.
i seem to only fall when a camera is present.
Hey c’mon they conquered their inner demons.
I like the first video cause it’s called KIWI BOYZ.
this thread is so sweet bros
This really doesn’t warrant more than a three minute video, and sure as fuck doesn’t need “sponsors”, etc…
It’s not a totally unimpressive feat, but it’s not that “cool” either.
SBFixed 2 (9/24/08) from Chris Little on Vimeo.
I actually like this video fine, it just shows the local scene about 2 years ago for what it was: a bunch of people having fun riding their bikes. I don’t think the person who put the video together was trying to do anything more than capture a moment in time.
This is what it should be about, atmo… trying to read too much into something done only for pleasure (even “epic” masochistic pleasure) is taking yourself and what you’re doing way too seriously. Got real tired of that in surfing, you’d think getting “so pitted” was as important as curing cancer or something. Nah.
someone actually called the police over some people ridin in circles? as far as i can tell from the video, they weren’t doing anything wrong
That’s at the Amtrak station here in town, apparently it was the ticket agent or something. The planter they were circling is not actually in the street, it’s just back of the main ‘platform’ area… anyways, not a big deal normally, just this one time, for whatever reason, somebody had enough. Many lulz were surely had.
Definitely bullshit. For an untrained cyclist, that may be the case, but any trained cyclist is going to have a certain work capacity that’s fairly consistent. Folks that are serious about training use a power meter and measure that work capacity in kilojoules which is a function of time on the bike and the power expended during that period. So, to answer your question, a kilojoule on a road bike is the same as a kilojoule on a track bike. One caveat to that is that very low cadence will engage more fast twitch muscles and cause fatigue to accumulate more quickly. In some circumstances it is possible to expend more energy on a track bike than on a road bike. Descending, for example, requires some energy on a fixed gear bike while the dude on the road bike is going to be coasting.
REAL MEN SPIN 53-11 DOWN EVERY HILL, THEN UP THE NEXT ONE
Can you explain the game they were playing?
Slowest person wins?
Last person to fall?
Footdown.