slowboytommy

so front or back? both? none?

Drastry

Certainly no rear brake. It is pretty useless on a fixed gear bike. However I would recommend you to install a front brake, especially if you are new to this thing and live in a traffic-heavy or hilly city.

TejanoTrackie 

Front only with the caveat that I have proper foot retention on my pedals.

Zei

+1 for foot retention, riding clipped in gives a lot of control over speed.

The faster I can brake, the faster I'll go. A front brake is all that's needed to slow down as fast as possible, which is under heavy braking on the front while rear wheel is in the air, which I experienced recently. Testing out a new headset, I did a few loop-di-loops in the parking lot, and decided to haul ass out of the lot and turn right onto the side street. A semi blocking the usual visibility of the turn hid a car squeezing by. I noticed it as soon as possible and started braking in emergency style. Before I knew what was happening, I felt my saddle lifting my butt a foot higher and saw the ground looking a bit closer. Right then, I eased the brake and sat down on a locked up rear wheel, stopping with relatively plenty of space. First time I had done a front manual on a bike, and absolutely the fastest I've ever came to a stop not counting crashing out in a crit at 27 mph.

Leukybear 

Front + proper foot retention as mentioned above OR front + rear

Skid stopping is quite ineffective even if you have the lower body strength to pull off masterful sick skids. Sure your wheels may have stopped rotating and you're skidding as a result but altogether the mass of yourself and your bike is still in motion.
A prevalent real world example supporting this is the advent and wide spread use of ABS anti-locking brakes in modern vehicles as a safety feature. Grip>skidding

BilbroSwaggins

the only time i put my brake on is when the weather is crap outside. it screws up my grip on my drop bars and I'm not shelling out extra money for a hood brake. skid at high speed or hop the rear wheel at slower speed. i know someone is going to give me **** for not running one but oh well.

Drastry

I'm with you here, brakeless brotherhood is strong!

clengman

Both, because I have no track hub. Just loctite and a BB lockring to hold my **** together.

MattoftheRocks

Front + Reteniton

hairnet

Both. just too cool for ya'll

Bandera

Both.
I live in the hills, a deftly applied rear brake is the best way to minimize "hamster-in-wheel" syndrome on big descents and the front provides both speed modulation & stopping power. Clipless pedals for proper foot retention.

-Bandera

bmontgomery87

another brakeless dbag checking in.

rustystrings61 

Both front and rear AND foot retention! The front brake does the real stopping work, usually in conjunction with a little gentle back pressure. I'm with Bandera, the rear helps on long fast descents for speed modulation. It's also cheap insurance - I had a front brake cable fail on me a while back, and while nothing bad happened, it was a sobering idea. Finally, I like riding on the hoods at least as much as I like riding on the tops and the drops, and I cannot abide the idea of a brake lever or body that isn't actually operational.

Scrodzilla

Sick poll, bro.

TejanoTrackie 

I disagree. A rear brake is no substitute for a working front brake in an emergency situation, regardless of whether you are riding fixed with foot retention or not.

TejanoTrackie 

Awesome post, bro.

rustystrings61 

An acceptable substitute? No. As a means of augmenting leg action in slowing a rear wheel? Has some merit.

My view is biased by a crash I had 14 years ago when a clipless pedal released spontaneously on me at speed, which caught me quite by surprise. Had I been riding with my hands on the hoods, I could have slowed the rear wheel down and brought things to gentler stop. As it was, my clipped in right foot became the lever the wheels and cranks used to pitch me into the bars and over. My last ride on a fixed-gear using clipless pedals, but that's a whole 'nother story.

rms13

why is this a poll? The answer is based on fact not opinion

bmontgomery87

ftfy

rms13

Facts according to Sheldon

Braking and Turning Your Bicycle

mihlbach

I have fg bikes with front only, front and back, none....it depends. How do I vote?

bmontgomery87

No one is going to deny that the most efficient and safest way to slow a bicycle down would be using a front and back brake.
However, that isn't what the OP asked. It just says, front, back, both, or none. That's all personal preference.
Front/back is the safest.
If you can't ride a bike with a rear brake, or with no brakes, you probably aren't very good at riding a bike.

bones_mcbones

front and back. Saved me from murdering a cute lil' bunny rabbit this morning.

TejanoTrackie 

It's a multiple choice poll, so you vote all three.

mihlbach

I've eaten things that I ran over.