Wired: 5 Inexplicable Fixie Fashions

http://blog.wired.com/gadgets/2009/04/five-inexplicab.html

*Fixed-gear bicycles are the scourge of modern bike fashion. Actually, fixies are almost nothing *but fashion. If you took a swaying, brainless, gazelle-like catwalk model and turned her into a bike, a fixie is what you’d get.

tee hee

that link will waste 4 minutes of you life

eg:

Cards in Spokes
Why? This is the bike equivalent of wearing a top-hat with the ace of spades tucked into the band — foolish teen-minded posturing which serves as nothing more than an in joke between equally feeble-brained "insiders." If the perpetrators would make one simple modification, clipping the card to the frame with a clothespin and letting it rattle against the spokes, at least their rides would sound like a motorbike. Well, maybe not a motorbike, but at least we’d hear them coming so we could look away and deprive them of their life-blood: attention.

eg2

Top Tube Pad These were first seen on BMX bikes back in the 1980s, and did about as much good than as today. A thin foam cylinder wrapped around the top-tube does little to protect the family jewels from a whack, but it does at least protect the knees from a knock when you bail on a 360º endo. For a fixie, though, it is nothing more than posing — if the riders were that worried about safety, they’d buy a front brake.

this thread has wasted 58 seconds

Hm, for me this is actually a bit anti-porn.

It’s not enough that these cred-machines don’t even work well as city bikes — their track-bike heritage means that they have but one gear, no freewheel and no brakes

The backlash starts here!!!!!!!

[quote]
Cards in Spokes
Why? This is the bike equivalent of wearing a top-hat with the ace of spades tucked into the band — foolish teen-minded posturing which serves as nothing more than an in joke between equally feeble-brained "insiders." If the perpetrators would make one simple modification, clipping the card to the frame with a clothespin and letting it rattle against the spokes, at least their rides would sound like a motorbike. Well, maybe not a motorbike, but at least we’d hear them coming so we could look away and deprive them of their life-blood: attention.

I mean, for all I know, he may be trying to be not serious (if so, he's failing to get that across), but one thing I really dislike about opinion pieces like this is that people just don't do research.

    ![](http://blog.wired.com/photos/uncategorized/2009/04/15/2861130875_351e259d81_m.jpg) 

The Mag Wheel
I’m not sure if these are even still called mag wheels, but they were back in the '80s when the coolest BMXs had Skyways or Zytecs on them. They may have looked dumb even back then, but at least they matched — you bought a pair and put them front and back.

Today, these plastic wheels have grown to road-bike size and are only ever found on the front. There is actually a reason for this. Cycle couriers, the deities of fixie fashion, use these five-spoked wheels so they can more quickly sling a chain through the front wheel. As always, fixie riders took the form but not the function, so we have to contend with this eyesore.

HE MEANZ ARROSPOK!

Handlebars There are many variations on the mindless mutilation of fixie 'bars. It seems that the less practical and more uncomfortable, the better. Standout mods include handlebar tape (or the lack of — the less the better, especially in winter) and the "flop-and-chop," which means that you flip your drop handlebars in the head and cut the ends off, often resulting in something a matador would be scared to face.

Has he ever ridden on any of the bars he mentions? And is he actually trying to criticise people who use handlebar tape?

One evergreen favorite is to trim the bars down to an unusable length, barely wide enough to contain your two hands. This is also a courier hand-me-down — the pros do it so they can slip between close-packed cars in traffic. Fixie riders do it to "keep it real."

And to show off good balancing skills--I could never do that, as my sense of balance is poor. I want my bars to be as wide as possible.

And is it just me or do you hardly ever see somebody actually riding a fixie?

It is just you, mate. It is just you.

Can't say I agree with any of their reporting but is interesting to see what Joe Public thinks or is being told to think by the media...

rubs hands and waits for the east London posse to start selling their bikes cheap

Hmmm somebody's been reading a lot of bikesnob. Not exactly sparkling wit, is it.

Fuck me, they've already started! ;]

Why do you think I turned up to easts on a Raleigh Superbe?
That drunk bloke last week proclaiming the virtues of Sturmey Archer was in fact a visionary prophet and we'd all do well to follow his revelations.

London's Trendy Fixiebeiks are so over.

I will dispose of yours for a small fee.

http://blog.wired.com/gadgets/2009/04/five-inexplicab.html

Ha! that made me chuckle.

i won't be sad to see the back of the hipsters cluttering up my lifestyle choice
and there'll be heaps more lo pro's available
huzzah

Hmmm somebody's been reading a lot of bikesnob. Not exactly sparkling wit, is it.

it's amazing how people fail to see the unseriousness of biksnobnyc!

The Wired article is bollocks that lacks balls. So there.

it's amazing how people fail to see the unseriousness of biksnobnyc!

Well, I guess I meant 'hmm that article's like a potted bikesnob, only not as mildy amusing'.

The palpable anger in Skully's reply made me chuckle.

Journos love attention, too.

The palpable anger in Skully's reply made me chuckle.

keep on palping

Looks like someone has been reading some bike snob and has missed the point.

keep on palping

Sounds like a really good Soul II Soul mash up.

[QUOTE=Skully;635291

[/QUOTE]

ahem
what ya saying there Willis!

rubs hands and waits for the east London posse to start selling their bikes cheap

I guess it was following on from this...

it's amazing how people fail to see the unseriousness of biksnobnyc!

Yeah, we don't get American humour over here, it's somehing our two great countries share with each other.

'PUT YOUR JUNK IN THE BOX'

Yeah, I love bike snob, and bike snob is basically correct and always informed.

This article is just woefully misinformed. Typical dick journo essentially 'trolling' themselves in the sea of their own gleeful ignorance. Mind you, fuck people who ride 'fixie'.

Peace

You can't argue with him over top tub pads.

The courier lock/spok bit reads (probably unintentionally) like something from Tynan's HHSB piece

Bike Snob FTW!