Glad you addressed that Manon is literally a former pro track rider -- I feel like a lot of Reddit trolls entirely glossed over that bit

Been riding fixed gear for like 15 years now.. still cannot skid and still use my front brake, still enjoying it to this day

it looks absolutely ridiculuous for gcn to put out a video on fixed without even having foot retention on the bike.

Jackson, fixed gear is part of my cycling since two years thanks to you. I learned how to skid, and track stand thanks to your tutorials. I tried some other tricks but failed until now. But maybe someday. Thanks!

On my first fixed gear bike I've had a front brake on for a year. Only when I took it off I started to progress as a rider. Then I learned everything you need for daily riding. Bunny hops, nollies, skids. Taking off the front brake forced me to improve my riding

Way to go mate ! Great vid. Informative and straight to the point as always. Keep em coming.

Foot retention was the only "Oh my Christ, what is she doing?!" moment watching the GCN vid. Great observation.

Skids, hops, and jumps are 100% safety essential and not just for tricks. This guy gets it

I find the track stand most useful in traffic with straps, not as a trick

It’s good day when foad posts

thank you for your videos! keep people informed from your experience!!

Berlin cyclist here, usually you will only run into trouble if you ride completely breakless. And even then, if you behave well in trafic you really don’t get stopped often. And if you get into trouble they usually do not take your bike the first time riding breakless.

Been following since the pandemic lockdown, right when I got into fixed gear cycling. Your tutorials have been of great help and your tracklo/fgfs/tarck edits have been both huge inspiration and entertainment. It's nice seeing you guys grow!

great analysis :) and entertaining segments

Great take on riding brakeless, it just gives a real true fixed gear experience

Aww, Manon is one of my favorite presenters at GCN. Thanks for sharing. I have yet attach my straps on my pedals but that’s my plan soon!

Just popping in here. Track bikes in the UK are pretty vast in what the every day folk use, so to a lot of them the big difference is often the brakes. We all know the deal about the brakes, but Americans tend to think every track bike is like UCI legal or race ready or something when people ride relaxed geo fixies on tracks. They have more tracks, they even have "grass" tracks. They don't police bikes quite as much, but yes obviously in Olympic events and the like they are more strict to avoid injuries and cheating.

I left a comment on their video dealing with the lack of information on foot retention. No mention of straps or cages. In two days it will be my 5th year riding a fixed gear offer up $20 special, still keep the front brake because I do tend to go through a park that has many kids and unaware joggers. Have loved every minute, except for that first ride that almost lost it going through railroad tracks and the bike started to identify as a wild horse and tried to throw me 😂. Great video, good positive critique, hope they acknowledge your input.

Great video!! I too have 15ish years riding fixed/Track bikes. Have always ridden a front brake. It's there for the "Oh shit" moments you run into when surfing traffic. I've already broken my collarbone several times in my life. I don't need to do it again. That said I think I've gone several year stretches without even touching it. Also shout out to 49t chainrings!! :D

im waiting for this shit so long😊

Хорошее видео , спасибо!

Yes the thing with the bike taken away is true in Germany, in some cases right away in others they give you like 3 strikes, but make you revisit them again with all the missing parts put on. Alos sometimes they get aggressive and try to pull you from yoour bike by blocking you or getting close with their car. To the clipless part, yes it is true they can unclip but there were these atac time MTB clipless with a huge angle to get out (production was stopped); myself I failed on a track stand and than was laying clipped in on the street in Hamburg and had to twist my legs singlely out with help from the arms. I can recommend for the ratio also to look into what is recommended for what age class on track by UCI so you won´t blow your knees...most people I know had to stop riding fixed gear due to knee health, which is of course getting not well if you overestimate your training level.

In Japan, any kind of bike has to have both front and rear brakes. It's illegal to ride brakeless so some frames designed in Japan have rear brakes under BB to make the bikes look better

thx!

10:10 welcome to UK bike paths haha. look out for the blue sign, it's a shared path for pedestrains and cyclists. Still go slow when you're passing pedestrians (especially mums with pushchairs!)

DUDE I SAW THAT VIDEO AND YHOUGHT THE EXACT SAME THING LIKE NO STRAPS??

Thank you for making this video!

Yes, I've heard of multiple incidents from people riding in germany's bigger cities like Hamburg and Berlin getting their bikes taken away.

Yeah I feel like GCN dropped the ball by not emphasizing foot retention whatsoever. But hopefully the video gets more people interested in track bikes

As a fixed gear rider of 20 years from London I gotta say, riding with no brakes is the only way to fully enjoy the bike. I’d advise learning how to track stand and skid asap, it’s like becoming one with your sword. BMX pedals with heavy straps is the perfect for city commuting. Enjoy

11:35 18 yrs DH MTBing and my most unexpected wreck on a bike was a pedal strike when me and a buddy had swapped fixed gears so he could try mine out. I didn't think to ask about crank arm length and his were 175 whereas I use 165 on fifxed. End of a long straight and us sprinting like idiots there is a turn I've easily made at speed 1000's of times ... not this time... I flew 14 feet in the air (we measured post wreck) before landing on my side/back cracking two ribs. I was in the air long enough to have time to tuck my head and arms in to prepare for whatever I was about to land on as I was flying backwards. That 10 mm clearly made a massive difference and it essentially turned the bike into a pole vault that I was riding. Scratch on bar end plug and chain stay... and one ruined pedal.

I ride fixies to commute since 2012 and started on the track with a proper track bike in 2021, and I can say for sure that riding a fixie (specially brakeless) on the traffic demands a LOT more skill than riding on the track. Exception maybe could be some bunch racings, that you ride with a lot of people around you really close, but even tho, commuting is a lot more dangerous.

I live in fake London in Canada. I have been riding fixed gear for commuting for 30 years. Being a traditional roadie, the bike has brakes and I don't skid. This year the winter bike used flats without straps instead of SPD pedals to allow for normal shoes. Out of curiousity, I tried my current city bike at the velodrome(really short at 138m with 50 degree corners) and it did not work. The steering was hyper sensitive and would not track in a staight line. It was really bad on standard 650x42 tires but still not good with 700x28 track wheels. Oddly the steep fork and short rake make it stable vs the road set up without any toe overlap. I see some peope riding track bikes on the road but that does not appeal to me.

I live in a hilly place, so 2.75 ratio is perfect, you can ride fast enough on a flat areas, and also can climb hills.

Jackson (and all) - a road legal bike in the UK is required to have two braking mechanisms. Therefore, a front brake and a fixed gear back wheel count as two. There's also a bit more to this as well. There was a UK legal case where a fixed gear cyclist riding brakeless hit a woman (in 2016, if you want to look this up). In part because of his style of cycling (a la inner-city speedy fixed gear videos we've all seen) and because he did not have a front brake, he was convicted of causing bodily harm by “wanton and furious driving” and got an 18 month sentence. His attitude post accident and on the road were noted but no front brake was EXPLICITLY mentioned by the judge. So, there is a precedent for this in the UK which leads to some confusion for people from other countries. I think you said you couldn't find anything about the laws regarding brakes. From what I can see its from the Pedal Cycles Regulations (1983) which state that pedal cycles “so constructed that one or more of the wheels is incapable of rotating independently of the pedals, be equipped with a braking system operating on the front wheel“ - essentially you must have two independent braking systems, one for each wheel. If you are in the UK and don't want a front brake put one on and just don't use it!

The whole brakeless thing gets both sides all riled up at each other. The way I always describe it to non-fixed riders is this; Riding brakeless is much like like going out clubbing on the weekend and getting pissdrunk. There's a certain amount of automatic risk involved, but you can mitigate or exacerbate it. Staying in a group, buying your own drinks and keeping an eye on it getting picked up by family or friends Vs wandering off by yourself drinking/taking anything and everything you can get your degenerate grubby claws on and jumping in a taxi with some rando. Same with brakeless. You can be chill and reasonable safe about it or every ride can be your own hotline. There's no guarantee of being safe or being in an accident either way.

can i reconvert my fixie into road i dont want to die because of the reckless driving in my country? or do i just put V break in my bike?

where is ur bike check of mash AC3?

Heads up, that’s probably a shared path. It’s a bike lane / pavement (sidewalk) combo. And 165mm is pretty short and hard to find in the geared world

9:53 that blue sign means it's a shared cycle path

Looks like the Berlin thing is accurate. You do need two brakes on your bike or it can be taken away. You get one chance to get it right after the 1st inspection

VEGAN POWER! Go Jackson!!!

So in Germany there is Stvzo which governs vehicles participating in traffic. Two brakes are part of that. Berlin cops are looking to fleece people with fines, that is why they enforce this law. You get ticketed a bunch and if it happens to much, they will confiscate your bike. I believe you can get it back in some circumstances. This is a big issue in Berlin and Hamburg. The further south you go, the more relaxed police will be around this or care about other things. We used to go on big ride outs at nights and cops only cared about having the correct lights on our bike (front and back, not blinking). everyone was riding brakeless. Similar thing in Japan. you need two brakes except for if you are a licensed keirin racer, than you may only run a front clamp on one on your race bike for training.

The Berlin fixie crackdown is real, and although Im not sure about the current situation, but it was (since around peak fixie hype, 2010-ish) by law required to have a working front brake. And the law was enforced, first time a fine, 2nd time loose your bike. This is what I heard about it

Make more branded straps for the gcn viewers! (And me)

Get yourself a fixie if: You live in a big city with no hills, and you spend most of your life there, since a fixie can't be reasonably used anywhere else anyway. You don't mind having a bike with little utility value, since in a big city you've got everything. You don't need a rack, nor lights! You don't mind strapping yourself to a bike with intentionally reduced steering and braking performance. You don't mind potentially endangering others. You're in your 20s or early 30s and feel immortal. You value (affordable) style above everything else.

Riding Hollowtech II cranks fixed gear seem a little risky

How to do a slider on a fixie?

I use flat pedals and I don’t use a retention system. My legs are strong enough to slow me down. I don’t want to skid, tires are too expensive.

I could not follow the english pronunciation "on a fixie if you stop pedalling, you ??" ... was it catapulting? What does that mean? I have using a 'fixie' ... those found in India (which are similar to those people use for commuting in Neatherland too). I often stop pedalling and go for quite a bit before needing to pedal again. Also, regarding brakes... I can't imagine myself riding a cycle without brakes! I am not quite fond of getting into road accidents! I have a feeling this 'fixie' is a somewhat different kind of fixed gear bicycle than what I am used to riding.

i commute most of the time in the boston area, don't really just ride for fun enough--and honestly if you're going slow, its perfectly fine to ride flat pedals with no straps or clips. if you do think you'll sprint or take on hills, i think clipless or straps is a toss up since it should be a similar amount of effort to bail. i think clips can be a bit harder to bail from depending on how deep your foot is into them. in scary areas with a lot of mixed traffic (pedestrians, cars and bikes), i'd recommend unstrapping/unclipping and just being on pedal if possible. i'm running 48/16 on a 52 myself--nice and slow and a bit of a crunch with my height/leg length.

12:03 all cranks avail these days are 175 min. absolute PITA. MTB slowly is coming around with 165 or 160 but yeah. pain.

No skidding. Steel is real. Keep pedaling. It's possible to skid without straps or cages, you have to put one foot under the pedal but even more exhausting. BTW I've got a front break just in case my chain snaps or derails and for being lazy on red light stopping.

The GCN video was made for cyclists who have never ridden fixed gear bikes and would MAYBE consider it for commuting only. Track cycling & Urban commuting are 2 VERY different things.

_When it comes to brakes one may want to follow the guidelines/laws of your city or state._ *In my city, front/rear lights & brakes are required. No way around it.*

Lol ride with no brakes told the cop ( it's has a coaster brake! ) did a skid to show him and was told nice bike

at nite have some light ,don t ride on side walk its for footers !!, have fun ! njoylife

"How to..." and we're straight into gatekeeping for the "fixie culture" and the brakes/no brakes thing? Manon's videos for GCN are typically strings of breathless cliches anyway; no need to add to that. Things you need to know about riding fixed (whether you call it fixed wheel or fixed gear): if you choose a low enough ratio for the steepest hill you will be riding up, you will probably spin until your knees smoke on the way down the same hill. Riding fixed gives you great control of the bike at low speed when weaving between obstacles. Riding fixed makes you feel connected with the landscape because every incline or decline means a change in your pedalling. You only have 3 gears: sitting down, standing up, and walking. It's enormously good fun. Part of the game I play is never to touch the brakes except in an emergency. That sometimes means starting a descent slowly and only spinning out towards the end. A geared bike is faster over a distance, but riding fixed makes you stronger and more determined.

I like my gp5000 too much. It's definitely a break for me👍

cool

im use this chain :c

Maybe its just me, but I would never use metal pedals with metal pins on my fixed gear, not even with foot retention. The idea of somehow getting hit by those pins scares me. btw I am from Berlin and yes they take away your fixed gear if you ride it without brakes. But it depends on the cop, I never had trouble with the police riding with a front brake, but ymmv

You said that knowing how to skid is crucial, but you don't explain why. I am riding a fixie for 2 years and I don't intend to learn skidding. Why should I?

about the brake law, here in my country such law is highly encforced such that there are traffic marshals whom are on patrol or deployed in fixed gear hotspots, stop all fixed gear riders’ brakes if they work or not. if the brakes aren’t working well or they don’t even have brakes, the bikes are confiscated😢

The first time i rode my fixie i got airborne while braking too hard trying to descend a hill.

Many countries have laws that fixed gear bicycles need to have 1 or both brakes.

I'm looking to build one with sram hydraulic rim brakes How hard do people pull front brake? Mountain bike I only use front brake, never went over

Manon's awesome - don't hate on her!

They bars are as short as 19 oatcakes era lol

England has diff rules on the roads tho.

in germany its (afaik) required by law to have two independent brakes on your vehicle (no right leg, left leg doesnt count), furthermore police is allowed to sack your vehicle if those requirements arent met. but i'd be really surprised if its allowed for the vehicle to be destroyed, that would go to harsh against property laws i'm riding fixed gear no brakes on my daily commute, havent been stopped once by police but if i get involved in an accident i'm for sure in a world of shi*

Yes it's shared bike path, totally illegal here in UK to ride on pavement if not bike path or shared bike path that pedestrians will not move for you

I’ve been riding fixed for 8-9 years now. I started when I was 14 and now I’m gonna be 23 in couple months. I’ve never rode anything else like a roadie, mtb or bmx my entire time riding. I’ve rode everywhere on fixed. For being so young and have parents that’d let me ride far as hell in the world. Basically exploring the world on my own with my friends was probably the best time of life span of years. When nothing was important to me other than riding, man I wish I can tell all the stories with me and my friends. We’ve road thousands and thousands of miles and I say that confidently. The amount of uphill climbs and downhill bombs felt like nothing else. Hitting whipskids, going as fast the cars downhill man ain’t nothing else. I’d say if you wanna ride fixed and actually get serious about it, just keep riding your bike. You learn as you ride your bike. Simple as that. If you ride somewhere it’s not commonly known for people to ride fixed then don’t worry about it. I’ve went from riding with a big ass group of 10-20 people regularly to literally only me. There’s only one like 3-4 of my homies who still have there bikes but don’t ride it like how I ride. In all honesty just enjoy riding fixed, try pushing yourself like never before, and just ride safe. Can’t promise nothing and it’s always a danger riding on the street so imagine me riding by myself. I don’t care bc I ain’t a bitch no disrespect but yea. Riding fixed especially when I’m alone is very peaceful to me. I don’t think about anything else, I just keep pedaling, got my AirPods on jamming, got my whole riding attire on, helmet, glasses, clipless shoes, short shorts, and just breathe nothing but air. In all honesty, if I didn’t ride fixed gear even tho I was already into other sports, I’d probably be lazy fuck lmao and that’s the truth. But nothing but some coffee, a joint, a cold breezy morning, fresh nice cold air. How can you not be happy?!?!

Anyone else run flats without straps and brakeless?

#Nostrapsgang 😂

GCN could have made a better video in my opinion if they brought in a guest co-presenter with fixed-gear crit or more street experience. She is definitely one of the best presenters at GCN, but this is just enough outside of her experience that it shows.

I'm not a hater of Fixie, but whats the skill riding it?

I ride pro in my mind and grom in the streets lol

49/16 is good ratio?

In London, in 2017, 44 year old Kim Briggs, died after being run down by 20 year old Charlie Alliston, he was ridding a fixie with no brakes, Alliston was sentenced to 18 mouths in prison for causing her death, after crash investigators proved he would have been able to stop in time, if his bike had been fitted with brakes, I think I'll stick with my hydraulic discs, and avoid the tragedy and remorse of causing a death!

Zach gallardo be like dont call it a fixie >:(

This is the third or 4th fixie video they've done and all feel cringe and the comment sections are full of roadies complaining how dangerous and bad it is

Traaaaaaaaack stand!

anyone else really triggered whenever she says "fixie" instead of "fixed gear"?

Your posters crooked :(

idk if they destroy your bike but yes in berlin they take your bike but in frankfurt (also a city in germany) they dont give a shit. thats my experience ringing in frankfurt without brakes.

I learned how to ride fixed gear by bashing my face into the curb and biting through my lip, then breaking my tooth inside my lip...😂😢

first tutorial: how to truckdriver on fixie 43839th tutorial how to ride a fixie

been watched the video for 2-5 min and when i know shes not wearing foot retention i skipped the video lol

Foot straps all day every day

Pro tip, never pull a brake lever while riding out of the saddle and you _most likely_ will not get trebuchet’d off the bike

in Singapore, all fixed gear bikes must have brakes by law, after a 16 year old girl rode off a building because she could not stop

Front+rear brakes are a legal requirement to ride on public roads in Japan, if the police see you don't have them you will get fined

I thought you were going to say something about her see through pants

Haha finally

All love for my fixed+ brakeless family

GCN should just stay in their lane 😂

Some bikes are designed and sold very close to or actually Track ready. Obviously nearly all are not, but... Random unverified bicycle law quotes are cool. Try harder next time. hahaha

Need more clickbaity thumbnail. Something like GCN logo and like “Fixed” “WRONG?” Take as much attention as you can. Why not?

Hehe