Originally Posted by
79pmooney
I got reminded of another benefit of fix gear road riding (especially downwind and downhill) that has been for me, huge. The training of the leg muscles that aren't actually driving the pedals to relax completely. I was never aware I had those less than loose muscles until I started going down real hills on gears like 42-17. At 45 MPH (225 RPM) any tightness at all makes for a wild ride! But 100% loose, I can go faster and it is ear-to-ear grin fun. And that teaching of those muscles to relax benefits me every ride. (Rollers go a long ways to achieving that same looseness.)
I rode a 50 mile out and back to a point straight upwind yesterday. Hard out, the spin on tired legs coming home. That my legs didn't fight that spin - a real blessing.
Ben
225rpm is a lot. Possible when I was younger. Recently did 180 down a smaller hill on 48x19. One of the few problems with FG is that for those of us who are getting senior we tend to drag brake on the downhills and that is not quite the same.
Two reasons some give up on or never warm up to fixed. There is not much chance of ever doing 225rpm if your position is not already very good and your pedaling at least decent. Fixed does absolutely improve anyone’s pedaling but you won’t get started if sitting awkwardly or too high or if your pedal stroke is too rough. So those who need it most are locked out, or at least need some good coaching and to make a serious try.
The other problem is big gears. Some of the gears mentioned on this thread are just enormous. The 42x17 mentioned in your post is way more reasonable. On rolling ground that is already quite big enough, thank you.The old Cinelli manual - actually the training bible for Italian amateur racers - talks about using gears as low as 44x23 for winter training. Even big riders are admonished to use 44x20 for developing agility during base miles. The old British notion of ‘medium gear’ at 48x18 also made medium gear the biggest to ever be used fixed. Only strong and fast guys would contemplate using medium at all and then only for racing. One of the old tropes was get under the hour for 25 mile time trial in a 48x18 gear before switching to a derailleur bike.