whilst i was riding home yesterday i stopped at a crossing and noticed a pretty unique bike pull up beside me. bright pink, stripped down to the bare bones just like a fixed gear. nothing special i thought, there are plenty of single speed bikes here that are designed to look like fixed gear bikes. i then noticed the lack of brakes, finally got a chance to see a real fixed gear bike on the road, never seen one localy before. noticed the young girl riding it was wearing 2 inch platform shoes and no helmet, thougth nothing of it. as she set of onto the crossing a car approached, i was curious to see how she handle stopping but as she stopped pedaling the bike just crused as any noraml bike would. she just went round the car. i then realised that this was just a normal single speed bike but without the brakes. couldn't believe it. i then watched as she climbed up over the bridge and decended at speed back into the flow off traffic, relying on nothing more the blind luck to avoid hitting anyone. crazy.

anyone seen this type of bike before or is she just a nutter with no brakes?!?

I bet there's a coaster brake.

Not me.

I hope she has a coaster brake. I haven't noticed anybody without brakes. Doesn't mean they aren't there tho. Have seen lots of crazies, people riding thru a red light without slowing or looking, texting while riding on the sidewalk, etc. Seen some close calls but thankfully haven't seen anybody get hit.

Never mind... You clearly state that this isn't a fixed gear bicycle. Maybe one day I'll learn to read (but probably not).

*Edit*

I just realized that by "stopped pedaling" you meant she was freewheeling (not skidding while riding fixed). Never mind.

I've seen plenty of commuters on brakeless freewheel-equipped bikes, but I wouldn't blame it on the popularity of fixie-styled bikes - most of the mountain bikes I see in the city have their brakes disconnected because the wheels are so far out of true. How do they stop? Aim for a convenient curb Needless to say, there are also plenty of bent forks around here...

I think I've seen a video or two where a guy was riding a singlespeed, non-fixed brakeless bike. He braked by pressing his shoe against the rear tyre. Other than that, it does sound like the girl OP saw had a coaster brake. Did you happen to notice a brake arm somewhere near the rear hub?

--J

from Bike Snob NYC:

[h=2]The Beautiful Godzilla[/h]The Beautiful Godzilla is a particular kind of urban female cyclist who rides as though the rest of the world were created simply to yield to her. She's generally young, good-looking and clad in expensive clothes. She also rides an old three-speed or perhaps a 10-speed or Dutch city bike, carries her handbag on the edge of her handlebars and if she has a basket it usually contains a small dog or perhaps a baguette. She's on her mobile phone at all times and her approach to cycling in a densely populated city is a combination of self-entitlement and Mr Magoo-type dumb luck. Like any self-entitled person, she can't imagine a car would possibly hit her, even if she's riding against traffic and it's coming right at her. Actually, you sort of find yourself disappointed when it doesn't. And just like Mr Magoo would wander into a construction site and a girder would materialise right as he was about to walk off the scaffolding, the Beautiful Godzilla blithely rides through red lights and busy intersections, emerging on the other side unscathed and just as photogenic as she was when she entered it.Why other cyclists don't like them: They should be dead but aren't.
Compatibility with other cyclists: Will accept deliveries from Messengers; will develop crushes on Messengers.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OH5W1Z23wPg

There is a couple videos of people doing this.

Dude...in my hood, most poor people ride old Walmart bikes with the brakes disengaged due to the wheels being so out of true. They bike relatively slowly and drag their feet (or use evasive maneuvers) as required. I see ten every day.

Or, she had a coaster brake.

My 22 year old son. Stops by feet on ground or rear tire. He is actually riding a bmx bike though. Fortunately he is now riding my old mountain bike most of the time now, front and rear brakes.

In Korea they passed a law that any bike on the roads or bike paths must have front and rear brakes with hand opetated controls. I wouldn't get on a bike with cap stamped callipers let alone mo hrakes!

i think this is probably what i saw. she deffinetly had no regular brakes, maybe a coaster but i didn't see her slowing down at all when she stopped pedaling. if i see her again i'm going just going to ask her how the hell she stops. just need to learn the chinese for 'coaster brake' first.

During my couple of weeks in China, the riders ride so slowly, they barely need brakes. Also, so many of the bikes are in such bad condition, not sure half have brakes that work. Mostly commenting on what I saw around Tsing Hua Univ and the rest of Beijing.

I ride a pink coaster brake'r, similar to below, but Im and ugly old man . . .

its because beijing is so busy, they are quite slow down here too but there is much more room to get up speed and the bike lanes are much better here so no need to mix with the cars so much. i've noticed this last year more and more people riding 'serious' bike and wearnig helmets and stuff, years ago it was mostly the old fashioned single gear communist era bikes that are in pretty poor condition.

Reminds me of the time I took my third grade class on a bicycle outing. One boy showed up with a beat-up looking bike. When I questioned him as to whether the brakes worked or not, he replied, "they work good as long as you put your feet down." Luckily we had a back up bike for him. I couldn't believe parents would send a kid out on something that decrepit.

As a kid I had a single speed with flint stones brakes. The coaster brake was broken. I wore out shoes for a few years going down the hill from our house. These days I'm a bit more cautious.

That's the vid I saw.

Recent trend round here is for kids to remove the brakes from their otherwise normal bikes. Last September one of them rolled down a hill toward a busy arterial road. Poor kid didn't make it.