Fixie Culture finally hits York
Fixed gear: check
Deep section wheels: check
Narrow bars: check
Lots of spurious bits of white: check
Spoke cards (vomit): check
Ladies and gentlemen, hipster fixie culture has finally hit York University. I’ve seen a couple of fixed gear bikes around York before, but they’ve looked more like this next one, which I also saw today.
This is more of an old roadbike, bodged into a perfectly sensible all weather hack. It even has two brakes! (It’s not as dodgy as my old Freecycled fixed gear mtb hack, though!) The first one is more of a custom job, with track ends etc (and the horrible spoke cards).
So, now York’s got this far, how long before, like in London, we start seeing lots of truly horrible fake fixies that are totally built up to the culture (like the first one), but are actually freewheelers? Those really do make me sick.
Hey, I think I recognise the first one from a few months back, when I was riding your old MTB fixie to town. They tried to trackstand at the lights, with lots of really obvious ‘Oooooh, must impress girl’ glances, then toppled over. Slowly.
BTW, MTB fixie is still unrideable. Want a go at it, or shall I drop at Bike Rescue?
You’ve still got that? Okay, I’ll have a go at it sometime soon, Sunday may be a good bet.
I actually also saw another one yesterday, a Cannondale Capo. Today he overtook me going up Green Dykes Lane, but my pride is intact as I was carrying 10 pumpkins at the time.
Its in the garage at our old house/Bunny’s place. What’s wrong with spoke cards? Surely its what’s on them that matters! IbikeMCR spoke cards were kind of cool.
Were they? I don’t remember what they looked like. In general I think the things are awful, they’re a pointless trend run by sheep (the worst offenders also seem to be the awful, freewheel wusses).
I’ve also remembered the one thing that our hipster/fakenger friend has missed. Their bike doesn’t have a mini D lock, so their cliche is not complete!
Get down to York College if you want to see some major-league fashion victims, complete with the so-called ‘dildo’ bars (you know, the unfeasibly narrow ones with nice, rounded ends), deep-section rims in various shades of *bleugh* and, by and large, no brakes (someone should tell these idiots that brakes are a legal requirement unless you’re riding on the track)
That said, having ridden a fixed gear for the thick end of 20 years, it’s almost nice to be fashionable for a change