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Might be time to give up and get gears.

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Singlespeed & Fixed Gear "I still feel that variable 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 (31 January 1865 - 16 August 1940)

Might be time to give up and get gears.

Old 08-09-07, 04:11 PM
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Might be time to give up and get gears.

Went to see my old physical therapist today looking for advice on cycling stretches. He checked out my legs and noticed that my knees crackle on extenstion under load (forget what it's called), and told me I am probably predisposed to swelling-related knee problems, and that a fixie or SS (especially with big gears) would obviously be the most likely to bring this out, as compression at low RPMs can be pretty damaging. As much fun as my fixie is, it's kind of silly out here in the suburbs anyway, as I really just ride like a roadie to stay in shape. At school (where I don't have a car) it's nice to ride to class or to the store, but I could do this on any bike and also be able to ride with others (there's a very active roadie culture at my school I'm told, and they organize all sorts of rides). As much fun as my fixie is, I'm not really willing to risk injuries that could prevent me from riding at all any more than I have to. I sure will miss fixie though.

As a side note, there may be a very nice 56cm 06 Langster for sale soon if anyone's interested. I will definitely need the cash if I move to a road bike- I was hoping to have one by the end of this summer anyway, but my empliyer has been in the process of self destructing and I got f***** over.

Oh well.
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Old 08-09-07, 04:27 PM
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Might be time to get a second opinion.
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Old 08-09-07, 04:30 PM
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Keep the fixed gear bike and get a geared bike? Run low gears on the Fixed? What are you running now?

Short cranks low gears = happy knees?

Big Freewheel on Langster?
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Old 08-09-07, 04:35 PM
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One word: Sturmey Archer.

TCS
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Old 08-09-07, 04:42 PM
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Originally Posted by eMwolB
Might be time to get a second opinion.
I agree. My knees have been cracking like that for 10 years. Im fine.
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Old 08-09-07, 04:47 PM
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Originally Posted by tcs
One word: Sturmey Archer.

TCS
+1. https://sheldonbrown.com/harris/wheelsint.html
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Old 08-09-07, 04:49 PM
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or you could keep your bike ( save money ) and get a freewheel when you're not feeling like riding fixed..
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Old 08-09-07, 05:00 PM
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I say get a freewheel in a nice low gear. I have bad knees so I run a really low gear (39X15) on my fixie. It's not so fun going down hill, but I have a brake so I just have to scrub off speed. I find that my knees get sore on my gearie because I'm often mashing along in a high gear without thinking about it. That just doesn't happen on my fixie unless I find my self climbing a long hill or something. Even then, on hills I tend to get out of the saddle more often which is good for my knees.
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Old 08-09-07, 05:31 PM
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lower your gearing. get/use 2 brakes
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Old 08-09-07, 06:30 PM
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Originally Posted by tcs
One word: Sturmey Archer.

TCS
Isn't that two words?
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Old 08-09-07, 07:26 PM
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This could very easily be a fit issue. I had some knee pain and popping that was bothering me for weeks and it went away right away after raising my saddle 1/4".
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Old 08-09-07, 11:33 PM
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*sigh* I hear you all too well my friend. I have patella subluxation, which is when the knee doesn't fit well into the bones. It's b/c of the way my body developed. I went through all the annoyance of getting x-rays and an MRI done on my knee, all to find out that my muscles need to be balanced.

I decided, close to the beggining of the summer, that it was indeed time to retire the old fixey (she's old and starting to rust with all sorts of problems now). I rode that bike EVERYWHERE! Why? Because it's not just running too high of a gear that's the problem. It's the constant force downward and upward from the pedals against your knees. I'll admit the raising the saddle trick worked for me for some time, but you can only go so high until you develop hip problems from rocking so damn much. Even with brakes, the fixey just isn't the best bike when you have knee problems.

If you want to be free of knee problems, get a bike that freewheels for a couple of years, hit the gym and work your Quads (REALLY IMPORTANT!). I am currently running a classic road bike, and a newly built Xtracycle equiped bicycle with the Nuvinci internally "geared" hub. It is awesome! :-D I suggest you save yourself the price of a new bike, and replace the rear wheel with an internally geared hub.

Knee problems suck soooo much, and I know exactly how you feel about getting ride of the fixey. But like you said, "...I'm not really willing to risk injuries that could prevent me from riding at all any more than I have to," and I couldn't have said it better!

Best of luck! and check out the xtracycle stuff at www.xtracycle.com. It's amazing!

Peace
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Old 08-10-07, 01:32 AM
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When did www.xtracycle.com start advertising around here? I thought they were only up on the car free folk.
 
Old 08-10-07, 01:53 AM
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who says you can't be car free and ride a fixed gear? I gotta say that some of these posts are pretty scary. I hate to think that something I love would be screwing me up later in life, but from the sounds of the rest of you it isn't a foregone conclusion so at least there's hope.
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Old 08-10-07, 12:27 PM
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Originally Posted by elemental
Went to see my old physical therapist today looking for advice on cycling stretches. He checked out my legs and noticed that my knees crackle on extenstion under load (forget what it's called), and told me I am probably predisposed to swelling-related knee problems, and that a fixie or SS (especially with big gears) would obviously be the most likely to bring this out, as compression at low RPMs can be pretty damaging. As much fun as my fixie is, it's kind of silly out here in the suburbs anyway, as I really just ride like a roadie to stay in shape. At school (where I don't have a car) it's nice to ride to class or to the store, but I could do this on any bike and also be able to ride with others (there's a very active roadie culture at my school I'm told, and they organize all sorts of rides). As much fun as my fixie is, I'm not really willing to risk injuries that could prevent me from riding at all any more than I have to. I sure will miss fixie though.

As a side note, there may be a very nice 56cm 06 Langster for sale soon if anyone's interested. I will definitely need the cash if I move to a road bike- I was hoping to have one by the end of this summer anyway, but my empliyer has been in the process of self destructing and I got f***** over.

Oh well.
strangely, my knees popped and made that rice crispie sound before I ever rode a SS or a fixed gear............

my understanding (which could be wrong) is that the sound is from broken cartilege in the knee area.

you might want to just change up the gearing or riding frequency, and see if you can maintain a 'pain free' existence while just having the noise to deal with.
I agree that riding is more important than fixed gear riding however.
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Old 08-10-07, 12:33 PM
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He never said it was painful
His knees are fine.
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Old 08-10-07, 12:38 PM
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My knees sound like rice crispies too. They've been popping when I extend my legs since I was knee high to a grasshopper. I got hit by a car last night and while it wasn't very bad, I fear my right knee is a little worse off than before. It's pretty stiff right about now. *sigh*
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Old 08-10-07, 12:46 PM
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That sucks. I've been there.
But "body" slows the effects of age in different ways.
I'm pushing 56 and my orthopaedic surgeon diagnosed me with "chondra malachia" (sp?).
It was so bad I could not walk down stairs unless I went sideways.
A good (not so easy to find sometimes) physical therapist discovered that I had rotated my knee caps out of alignment.
A few months of PT and most of the pain has stayed away.
IMHO, the fixed riding has helped me strengthen my knees.
I'm use a very low gear (65 gear-inches) and spin a lot. Way more spinning than my geared bikes.
Good luck!
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Old 08-10-07, 01:04 PM
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Originally Posted by deathhare
He never said it was painful
His knees are fine.

neither did I.
are you being snippy because you need to, or because you want to?
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Old 08-10-07, 01:04 PM
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me neither
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Old 08-11-07, 11:34 AM
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Yeah, see, you can get a Sturmey SRF3, a trigger shifter, some spokes, a rim and some zip ties for maybe $125 and put it right on your Langster. It's a cheap experiment.

HTH,
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Old 08-13-07, 02:54 PM
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deathhare nailed it- nothing wrong with my knees as it is (and no pain), but I'm predisposed for problems. I appreciate the advice, but lower gears would sort of defeat the purpose as I ride like a roadie and don't live in the city. If I have to spin 120 rpms to make 15mph, there's really not much point. It's not that I'm in pain, it's that i want to avoid getting into situations with pain, because I love riding and want to do everything possible to keep doing it. The thing about a three-speed is that then I exist in a vacuum between fixie guys and roadies, and can't really ride with anyone, at least not on the same level.

Anyway, here's an update on the situation: I decided that selling my Langster and replacing it with an entry-level roadie is only an option if I don't have to ride crap (Sora is a four letter word for a reason, just like the ones I utter when I try to reach that stupid button from the drops). With this in mind, I capped my price at $600 and went hunting to see what I could find. After the LBS in my town (which I hate for this reason) told me that a $600 Tiagra double was impossible, I went to my favorite (and what I really consider my) LBS a few towns over and asked the same question. Turns out the guy waiting on me was the owner, and really hooked me up with a 2007 Scott S50 on clearance. When I say really hooked up, I mean he sold the bike at $550 and swapped the levers (Sora 8s for Tiagra 9s), bottom bracket (not sure, but nice), cranks (some nice Suginos), chainrings (replaced the stock triple with the Sugino double), front derailer (SRAM Rival [!]), rear cassette (8sp Sora for 9sp ?), and rear derailer (8sp Sora for 9sp Tiagra). He did ALL of this for $50!!!!! Needless to say, I was amazed, and think I got about the best new bike $600 could buy. It's no Langster, but it moves in it's own right (under 21 lbs) and is a lot of fun. This afternoon the Langster went on Craigslist, and I'm hoping for a quick and clean sale to make up some of the difference from the new Scott (anyone want a 56cm Langster?). It's too bad, because my TT levers, TT bars, and yellow tape just came in this morning, and it would've looked great. Oh well, now I guess I can call it "custom."

Even though I'm a sellout now, I plan on sticking around here, as my short time on the fixie has given me some wisdom with which to answer the "Which is faster, Gold Deep-V's or Pink Ones?" threads.

P.S. The roadie forum is scary- people who average 17mph on their Madones talking about getting Zipps makes me ill.
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Old 08-13-07, 03:37 PM
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Originally Posted by kemmer
My knees sound like rice crispies too. They've been popping when I extend my legs since I was knee high to a grasshopper. I got hit by a car last night and while it wasn't very bad, I fear my right knee is a little worse off than before. It's pretty stiff right about now. *sigh*

whoa

wha happened
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Old 08-13-07, 10:30 PM
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Automatically linking knee problems to fixed gear is a good sign of not looking at the whole picture. Sure, it might be part of the problem for some people, but most of the time there are other, more important factors. Pushing too high a gear, for example, is going to put unneeded strain on your knees whether or not your bike coasts. A singlespeed with a 90" gear is going to be a lot worse than a fixed gear running a 65" gear. I'm not pointing fingers here, I might add - this is just a major peeve of mine. Understand and listen to your body and you're fine, fixed *or* free.
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Old 08-13-07, 10:56 PM
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Originally Posted by bike_mike_pa
That sucks. I've been there.
But "body" slows the effects of age in different ways.
I'm pushing 56 and my orthopaedic surgeon diagnosed me with "chondra malachia" (sp?).
It was so bad I could not walk down stairs unless I went sideways.
A good (not so easy to find sometimes) physical therapist discovered that I had rotated my knee caps out of alignment.
A few months of PT and most of the pain has stayed away.
IMHO, the fixed riding has helped me strengthen my knees.
I'm use a very low gear (65 gear-inches) and spin a lot. Way more spinning than my geared bikes.
Good luck!
+1 agree. You've made an informed decision elemental and I don't want to make you doubt it--just want you to know there may be some hope out there: If you ever get a sweet health plan, do hunt up a sport doc, best if it's one who works with cyclists, and get a second opinion, even if it's a few years from now. S/he will also have a sport specific physical therapist recommendation. They have a world of specific and up-to-date help even the best ortho will not. Twice I've lucked in to sport docs/pts when I thought I had intractable problems and it made all the difference in the world.

Last edited by reluctantfeste; 08-13-07 at 11:27 PM.
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