yea you right

Spin to win my friends.

No I'm well aware of the flatness of my area. My point being, I like to ride as high as a ratio that I can handle safely so I am constantly working on getting stronger. This is all relative to the topography of your area.

Velodromes are designed to be perfectly level, so its an even playing ground for all the riders. I'm sure you would smoke my ass because you're in SF, and you should have to deal with much harder grades on a more regular basis than at least I do.

i am TOTALLY doing it wrong.

Perfect example. I love the **** out of your ratio, dude.

What GI were you running on that monday ride?

Hahahaha nice.

(assuming it was lower)(also assuming if you're trying to call him out.)

haha, no I'm legitimately curious.

if he was like 85 gi it would make sense that we 'launched up that hill' as he said.

oh psh, just did the gear app. im only 76GI on the 49x17 commuter gear. phew! so it was just my crap legs that failed. or irving at directions...

or my bag full of work crap, and heavy camera, and not clipless with my vans, and aerospokes, and a full day of soreness of snowboarding the day before, and it was raining when i got to mission, and totally irving. => guy's a saint doe~

I could still see that ratio being tough in SF.

Props to anyone in hilly areas.

thats higher than me! thats what some of the other guys were running though.
I'm pretty slow and I need my slow ratio.
I didn't mean to knock at you. See you next monday, yeah?

edit: and I forgot that giant ass commuter bag too. crazy, might as well be touring :P

omg i just remembered next monday no bay bridge! but also no work! => its the post-alleycat davisfixed snowboarding trip =<

it's like we live two separate lives divided by rivaling families :'(

its called a divorce => and we're the kids in between

In my experience, riding 75gi for a long time did nothing. Aside from that, riding fixed never felt quite right until I started gearing down and spent a long time on 48x18/19. I'm sure in a totally flat area I would opt for a higher gear, but the terrain changes a lot here and hanging under 70gi feels the most versatile for me. When I flip the flop I am set with 73gi. I ride that around every once in a while for kicks and to change it up a bit ,again, it doesn't feel "right".

I do climb a lot in the Hollywood hills and have gone out with guys riding larger gears. Looks cool, wish I could, doesnt happen.

I'm tired of your excuses and why don't mom and dad love us :(

Yeah. From what I've come to understand, there's definitely an ideal gear ratio for a particular rider and his particular circumstances.

I have the luxury of having a relatively flat area, so changes in gear inches are not as drastic terms of difficulty for me. I run 46x15 and will soon be running a 48t up front. Eventually, I want to see that cog go down to 13t (too lazy to check if they make those). When I top out (assuming I make it) to a really tall gear, I can then play around to find my "optimum mega fixed gear ratio".

salt flats speed records!

A boy can dream...

I used to be this way. When I first started riding a bike again as an adult, my mountain bike commuter, I kept it on the highest gear on the bike, the biggest ring to the smallest cog, because it actually felt like a "workout." But it killed my knees quickly, particularly my surgically repaired knee.

Then, when I switched to SSFG, I kept the small ratio that came on the bike, 42/17. Not only did riding become more pleasurable, but I got a much better workout spinning at a higher cadence than I ever did by mashing on a super high gear.