This weekend, Team Lope member Cyclomania (known by most by his nom de plume, Eric ‘frogleg’ Gratacap, though that’s just to throw people off his true passions as a cycling…maniac…) arranged a ride with his better half K and a few friends, heading into Marin to get some more early-season saddle time, or as the kids call it, ‘junk miles’. Usually I cannot attend such things, saddled, to use that term, with honeydos and zoesdos and so on, but this time I got the necessary hall pass and headed out, needing some distance miles on this bike in preparation for the AIDS/Lifecycle ride in June. So far the bike’s been holding up very well, and with a few adjustments in the bar padding and the rear wheel/chain alignment, Crook has been a solid bomber, easily the tightest ride I’ve ever ridden. And by rise, I mean whip. And by ridden, I mean sessioned. Because as we all know, if you ride a fixed gear, you have to have skills both mad and displayable. My unfortunate lack of skid stop and track stand competency is ignored for the purposes of this ride report.

The gang’s plan was to do the China Camp Loop heading out from SF. I had done this a few years back so it seemed a good fit for my needs: getting some distance in to compliment the Paradise Loops I’ve been doing on Crook so far. I didn’t really remember the ride in detail, but I know everything from my home in Mill Valley to the San Rafael approach to the Civic Center, so I figured it would be fine. Worst case scenario, I’d turn back when needed. As everyone was riding road bikes, I was prepared to be dropped, but I tend to set my expectations low (I suppose in order to exceed them, ha) but really, pushing an 82 inch-gear around, you just never know what combination of distance and/or climbing that will cook you. On ALC, I’m bringing spare cogs, because I’m neither proud nor excessively idiotic*, so when the big hills come, I’m gearing for them. But the overall plan is to ride a big gear for the flats and rollers, minimizing revs and maximizing speed. This assumes I can keep steady on rides between now and then, not find problems in the knees, and keep the recovery down.

We met on the bike path between Marin City and Blithedale, and after a meet and greet, headed out. The ride basically bi-forks the Paradise Loop, just as any ride into West/North Marin from the south will. We were, as always seems to happen on weekends, taking Camino Alto right as a gang of other riders were hitting it, which is a scenario I like to avoid even when on a road bike (these days, many riders try to ride double or triple wide and not move for cars, then swerve into you when the SUV doesn’t accept this practice, or they slow you down by crowding the road ahead of you and chaining down into grannys or what have you. I like to set my own pace on climbs, particularly fixed, as I have so little flexibility in terms of cadence and gearing. So, once we hit it, I hopped ahead and got out of that mess as soon as possible.

That’s the thing about big gear fixies: any fixie has an optimum cadence (usually 80rpm and whatever speed you get is the speed you get) and a minimum necessary cadence for climbs. I’ve found, on road bikes, that I can, and generally do, eventually chain down to a tiny gear on serious climbs (in fact, my road riding style is opposite to this big gear fixie: I’m a high-cadence low gear rider, especially on climbs) and even if I have to tick them over slowly, I can still do it, even down to barely turning them over at times depending on the road… without fear of falling or stopping. And if I do have to stop, I can get going again on that gearing with about 30s of recovery time. But on the fixie, when you crank too slow, you stop. You just can’t turn em over. Unlike road bikes, you aren’t restarting after a necessary stop easily because you don’t have a tiny gear to get into. You have the gear you have, and since the minimum gearing for a fixie to be bearable is maybe mid-60s (in my opinion, and mine are all in the 70s generally) you’re still stuck with a heavier gear than perhaps you need to start up again if you were forced to stop in the first place. But anyway, what I’m getting at is that I tackle hills on a fixed gear the same every time: hit at the cadence I need to maintain to get over it, and just get through it. But something strange happens with a big gear fixie. It’s arguably inappropriate to take these over much climbing, right? I mean, when I put the same approximate inchgear on the carbon Look fixie project, Villain, I was initially figuring I wouldn’t be climbing at ALL. I just one day decided to take it into Marin and back when I lived in the city, and found that (with stokers to hold onto, anyway) I WAS able to get it up the grade, but only barely. Little by little my caution, and fear for my knees, waned in the interest of maximizing the amount of riding I could do in the bigger gear (and it just maks riding my mid-70s geared bikes that much easier later) and once I decided to go this route for ALC, I knew I had to push the issue, literally. But with a big gear bike, getting over hills isn’t a matter of will as it is on road bikes. If you slow down from exhaustion or inattention or even road conditions, that might be the end of the climb for you.

This is all to say I bombed up all the hills. I felt like that guy, the one you see on Spinergies going up Headlands or in full USPS team kit on the bridge or time trialing through stop signs. You know the one: the asshole. I like to ride with a group, not just attack my own riding crew and slam it. I feared it was perceived that way. Frankly, my only goal was to get to the top of these hills, so I had to get my gear going as fast as I could as early as I could. And anyway, I expected to be in the back on these things, so it was just timing and circumstance that led to me pushing these hills so hard. In order to stay with the group on the way down or in the rollers beyond, I had to get a head start. That’s kind of a bummer. But anyway, the important thing was getting through what I’d guess was my hardest fixie workout without injury or bonk. I’ve down longer fixie rides technically, but between some climbs and this gear, this was the HARDEST. All told, it was a good sign that I was able to keep up with these other riders and that I didn’t have knee problems during or after. And the critical barometer for me on this bike, in terms of ALC prep, is recovery. It’s going to be a hard bike to ride down the coast, but I’m most concerned about recovery after feed breaks and especially overnight. So the more of these longer weekend rollers, the better.

Everyone on the ride was awesome: Bobby and Jared, both transplants from Chicago, were experienced fixie riders back home, probably far more competent in technical skills than me, now on new higher-end road bikes and getting used to them. Great guys. Kristin and Corrine were slammin the hills and it was great catching up. In fact, towards the end, passing through the Tiburon side of Paradise, K and I were alone in the front and laughed about the fact that between my clamorous BMX chain and her allergies, neither could sneak up on the other. Oh, and China Camp? I had forgotten how beautiful it is. It’s like an abridged Paradise itself, but with more water views and a 7-11.

A great ride! Very satisfied.

*Other than, you know, riding ALC fixed in the first place…

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1. Team Lope Ride Report: China Camp Fixed
2. Team Lope Ride Report – ALC Day on the Ride, WR’s Account
3. Bike Build Process Log: Crook