benjamin_s

I was under the impression that the bike messengers rode track bikes because there are virtually no parts to steal from the bike.

nathbdp

Riding a fixed in traffic is much less annoying than having to deal with a freewheel.

luckycat

It's close. The first, or at least the first recognized graffiti writer in ny was a messenger(though I think he was a walker). There's mention of riding fixed in old BDP stuff. Futura 2000 rode a track bike. Etc...

muzzymuz

Which song?

luckycat

And it didn't hit SF until the CMWC there(in '95 or '96, i'm getting old...), when the NY crew came out. I don't know about LA but imagine it was sometime after SF.

luckycat

I love that Eddie is being used as a reference... That said, his Frejus definitely had an impact on my own love of track bikes.

neilG

I was going to HS in Manhattan in 1970 and they were riding them then.

luckycat

"the p is free" from criminal minded.

luckycat

Why the chip on your shoulder about the city? Track racing has been big in NY since the turn of the century. The original Madison Square Garden was built for it. One of my favorite things while riding a track in the city back in the day was the old ass guys that would flag me down and tell me about their ****.

Zombie Carl

It's not exactly a huge logical leap to ride a track bike on the street. I'm sure 1,000 people did it independently at different times.

deathhare

I have no chip.
Track racing in NY is and was never like Japan.

Just saying it seems to be a fact that riding track bikes on the street didnt start in NYC...so we can move forward from there. Messengers riding them...maybe so. But that's irrelevant because that wasnt what the OP was interested in anyway. Me neither. The messenger thing is OT in here.

eskachig

Huh? You mean coasting once in a while? I rode a single sped mtb for years before I got my first fixie, and when I rode through traffic to the trails it was never an issue.

shasta

My neighbors father rode 100+ miles a week on a fixed gear bike in the San Jose California area and in Mexico until the day he died. This guy went strong into his late seventies (started riding fixed on the street and track in the 1940's) and he had a old guy fixed gear crew too. He was one of the people instrumental in having hellyer velodrome built.

My point is this, people have been riding fixed gear bikes on the street all over the world as long as fixed gear bikes have been around, especially anywhere there is a track. New York gets so much hype over it because as usual they are the loudest, proudest, and most aggressive. New York also has a huge population which means they have more fixed riders but not necessarily more fixed riders per capita compared to other places. I'm not hating on New York or its riders. I'm just saying that fixed riding on the street has been around way longer than the New York fixed fad.

muzzymuz

Wow! I can't believe I never noticed that.

jim-bob

This is crazy talk. I was wrenching in SF from '90 - '94, and my shop was building fixed wheels for sale by '92. I built my first one in '91 or so, when erik zo showed up at the shop with a bunch of hubs.

Sure, maybe NYC was deeper into track bikes, and maybe y'all had the majority while our dudes were still riding mtbs with slicks, but fixed gears were around as far as I can remember.

"I first met Erik at the 1993 Cycle Messenger Championships in Berlin. I was riding a fixed-wheel, and so was Erik. There were less than 10 people out of 350 on fixies at the CMC, and Erik reckons that they are all in this pic." https://www.movingtargetzine.com/arti...mber-5-erik-zo

kemmer

Haha... I ride my Lambretta when I don't want to look like I'm going to work.

reckon

I'm from SF, and I was born in 1959,...I can remember messengers (or at least one) on fixed gear bikes in SF as early as the seventies. I remember I would go to work sometimes with my mom downtown when I was a kid (she worked for an ad agency) and I remember one bike courier's bike was a fixed gear bike, and when I asked him about it he called it his "circus bike" because he could do tricks on it, like in the circus.

you remember weird **** when your 12

andre nickatina

Taki 183 was a foot messenger. Though he was the first graffiti writer to gain real publicity (but not necessarily the first to do it in NY).

jussik

"Ridin one day on my freestyle fix
Jammin to a tape scott larock had mixed
I said to myself this tape sound funky
Ridin past the 116th street junkie"

BDP: "The P Is Free"

mander

I met a fiftyish guy in Vancouver BC Canada who used to ride a brakeless track bike around Vancouver in the 70s. He picked up the habit from his dad, an Englishman. Which leads me to speculate: The English have historically been into track riding; and more significantly, choosing fg over derailers for winter training, time trialing, and general ****ing about on the road; and they certainly would have spread some of this interest around the Commonwealth.

luckycat

Ok, my bad, I stand corrected... Just going on what I'd seen and heard. I visited SF for a week or so in 97 and hung out with a bunch of messengers(including Erik Zo) downtown and at zeitgeist and so on and the only fixed gear messenger I saw was an ex NY kid who'd stayed after the worlds. Unfortunately I didn't make it to the worlds in SF but from what I'd heard the east coast kids(NY, as well as Boston and DC) were basically laughed at for their track bikes. Maybe this wasn't the case... Hawkwheels, were you out there? I know your brother was...

willypilgrim

no, because see, things don't count as being 'started' until america, and specifically new york, does it. then the trend has officially started, and everyone else is a biter.

deathhare

Oh, yeah.
I forgot we were talking about NYC.

Hawk Wheels

I was at the San Francisco CMWC in 97, there was a fix gear only alleycat and the sprints winner was on a fix.

My first messenger worlds was Toronto 95 and there were a lot of fix gears, mostly east coast but some from pretty much everywhere.

I think the CMWC which started in Berlin 93 is one of the reasons why track bikes on the street are common today.

marqueemoon

...or if you don't really want to get there?