So yesterday was the NYC Century/Bike the Boros ride, of which I did the metric route on the Vigorelli (fixed 48/17). 94 miles total, including riding to start and back home at the end. I'd had some hoods installed and the one brake lever relocated accordingly, and put an adapter and bottle cage on the bars, too, figuring that would make the ride more comfortable.

Number one lesson learned - slowing down and stopping is a lot of work. I never really minded it before, and always enjoyed approaching a stop using just the legs, but I never went so far or had to stop and slow down so much before, so didn't really pay attention to the effort it required.

Not sure if moving the brake lever was such a good idea - it seemed harder to operate, unless I was in the drops, and most of the time, being mostly stop-and-go traffic, I was not. It's also a disconcerting sensation to be leaned over in the drops going downhill approaching a stop sign - hard to keep the weight back and not feel like I'm about to do a somersault over the bars.

Having a bottle on the bars was hokey, but had no appreciable effect on handling, as I was afraid it might. I suppose I could have kept two water bottles in my back pockets, but it was nice to have one of them there handy.

Since there was no climbing to speak of, what few appreciable grades there were were of the sort that are easy to go fast on, where you most feel the advantage of the flywheel effect. But going fast is always the easy part. Who knew slowing down and stopping could be so difficult?

Also got some new shoes. They're sold as "casual" shoes, but worked great. Sort of fake vintage-y cycling shoes with a ridiculous name - "Crush City" from Cycleur de Luxe - but everything was right about them: suitably stiff sole, excellent fit, soft and supple lining, proper bicycle toe construction.... It was great not having cleats at the stops and at the places we had to climb stairs or walk up the bridge approaches, and not have to ride around on the flimsy soled sneakers I'd been relying on.

What is this flywheel effect advantage of which you speak?

Seriously?
From wikipedia:Have you really never noticed how, in gradual accelerations, and when attempting to sustain any given speed, the way the wheel and crank maintain steadiness naturally? How the drivetrain does not throw momentum away like a freewheel does, but instead keeps your legs moving the right way? When moving, you never have to work just to get the crank turning and your legs up to the speed required to propel the bike forward because they never loose the speed required to make it go as fast as it happens to be going. I can't believe you've never noticed these things, or that you chose to ride a fixed gear bike and don't appreciate them.

Sometimes, riding on a geared bike, it feels like there's a governor on the system. Sure, it will roll downhill pretty fast, but if you want it to stop, you don't have to tell it twice. By contrast, on the fixed gear bike, sometimes it feels like it will fly away unless my legs stop it, and it doesn't always like it when I try.

Just being a wise-ass.

Ah, well, it's hard to tell here on Bike Forums, but thanks for providing the opportunity to practice an explanation, which I might preach to the heathen.

Flies have wheels?

I don't get it. Why is slowing down hard work? You have a brake, right? I ride a metric century fixed almost every weekend and have never noticed slowing down to present any particular challenge.

My hilly 5 mile commute by FG was enough to beat me up... and I had brakes! I had to learn to allow my legs to just spin on the downhills. Its like running: there is no coasting!

Difficulty spinning downhill and difficulty slowing down sound like two different things to me. The first one takes years to master while the second takes just two fingers on a brake lever.

If you can only use your hoods when you're in the drops, something is wrong there. Congrats on the big ride though. Should've rode around the block a few times and made it a full century.

Yes, one brake, but like I said, it wasn't very effective. Also, although in most individual instances, slowing down by using the legs instead of the brake was rather enjoyable, the fact that it required more work than squeezing a lever each time added up.

Thanks.
Yes, what's wrong is that I've got hoods on track bars I got them because although it was the most comfortable position generally, my hands tended to get cramped grasping the sides. Thicker tape went a long way to resolving that, but I figured I couldn't risk it becoming an issue over a long day. I could use the brake when on the hoods, but only from the drops did I seem capable of squeezing it as tight as it would go, and even then I don't recall it ever being anywhere near as effective as the brakes on my road bike. Well, maybe it was as good as the brakes on carbon rims on a bad day (wet), but at least then there are two rims to work on. More significantly perhaps, I didn't feel confident about it at all, which made it mentally as much as physically exhausting. Maybe I just need to get it (or the pads) replaced? The scraping noise it makes doesn't sound exactly healthy.

I had thought about making it a full 100 miles, and probably would have if the day hadn't turned out so hot and steamy. Also, the battery died just as I checked the phone at the finish, so Strava wouldn't have recorded it, thus it wouldn't have happened anyway.

Haha, that explains it. Props for going all the way though, that's all that matters in the end.

Hmm.... Lake Forest.... You probably have a lot of things easy.

Seriously, it's never much trouble to slow down as long as one doesn't have gravity making the bike want to keep going (and one isn't going too fast to begin with). Granted, the course yesterday may not have been any more hilly than what one might have to deal with on a regular basis in Chicagoland (1800', nothing extended over 6%), but I can imagine one could ride all day and never have to worry much about working against gravity. Also, I imagine one would take those weekend rides out away from the city and densely developed areas (as most of us normally do), not into it, so one probably wouldn't experience anywhere near the number of stop signs and stop lights as we did yesterday. From the beginning I knew it would take forever - we didn't take the Greenway to get downtown, we went down 9th Ave!

Just to compare, it seems the second longest ride I'd done on the FG was 33 miles and 1500 feet - little more than a third as long, but more than 80% as much climbing. Not much in the grand scheme of things, but I remember it being occasionally challenging at 48/15, and I skipped the biggest climb that the rest of the gang did. However, the interesting thing to compare was speeds. The shorter ride was with a familiar group, over mostly familiar, open roads; average speed 12.8, and I topped out at 38 mph. Yesterday, with a strange crowd on many unfamiliar city streets - average speed only 9.4 mph and max of only 28 mph. Again, LOTS of stop-and-go. A real slog, but wandering through the city as it did, it certainly didn't get boring.

Thanks for noticing. I do lead a pretty cushy life. The hardest thing I have to do is decide if I want to go riding in the morning and yachting in the afternoon or the other way around.

I think the biggest difference is that my fixed gear is set up for long distance rides with road handlebars, brakes that work, water bottle cages and a slightly lower gear. I didn't realize that you were basically riding a track bike with a brake thrown on as an afterthought. That explains the difficulty slowing down. Well done!

I like those shoes. I wish they were spd though