What gear and Where do you ride?
- Thread starter totallyfixed
- Start date
Page may contain affiliate links. Please see terms for details.
totallyfixed said:
I'm in SW London but I've done Putney to Cambridge and back many a time. I've also gone North West up to Chalfont and then (The Severn Across 400 Audax) over to Chepstow (via Stow-In-The-Wold and Tewkesbury) and then back via Malmesbury and Membury.
Separately I've done the Bryan Chapman 600 Audax (Chepstow to Menai and back via Snowdonia), so that's quite a bit of Wales covered.
I've also done Putney to North Berwick (via Cheshunt, Lincoln, Thorne, Coxwold, Alston, Longtown, Eskdalemuir, Dalkeith, North Berwick). That was a 3 day warm up to doing Cheshunt to Dalkeith and back in 5 days on London-Edinburgh-London 1400km Audax. That's bits of the midlands and North East done.
Dorking to Hackney (via Box Hill) and then the Dun Run out to Dunwich in Suffolk, and back to Putney (to make it into a 400km ride). That covers the South of East Anglia.
Putney (up to Cambridge and back) then down to Royal Tunbridge Wells then Bethersden for the start of the Flattest Possible 300 Audax around Kent (down to Hythe, Rye, Bethersden, Frant, Rye, Hythe and back to Bethersden). South East. Yep.
All of that was on 67" fixed.
Only done the SW (Putney to Honiton) on the geared bike. Also took gears for the Peak District (Sutton Coldfield to Holmfirth and back as a 300km "Grimpeur" Audax).
So we need someone from the Midlands and North West, the South West and most of Scotland.
OP
OP
totallyfixed
Veteran
- Location
- The only county without a McDonalds
Confession from me Ian, I take the geared bike when I go to cornwall cos I KNOW I can't make it up some of those hills, on saying that I'm bowing down to Greenbank, that's some riding! I am truly humbled.
totallyfixed said:
The one time I aimed the bike towards Cornwall I took the geared bike and only got as far as Honiton before I gave up (demoralised, tired and wet, and 3 hours behind schedule). I'd hoped to finish it and decide whether I should try it again on fixed (I probably will anyway). Dartmoor seems the worst of it but I don't mind prolonged 10% climbs on fixed (at least once they're done).
67" means I can get up most hills and it doesn't make it too silly on the descents. The gear needed for me to ride up the Devil's Staircase (25%) would be far too silly to ride the rest of the 300km ride that it's part of, so I get as far up as I can (30 yards or so) and then walk the rest (there are several people walking their geared bikes up it too).
There are plenty of far stronger, more accomplished, more audacious fixed riders than me.
rogerzilla
Legendary Member
70" here (48 x 18 on 700c or 41 x 15 on 26 x 1.35). It's lumpier in north Wiltshire than in London, but a 1 in 6 hill is doable provided it's short enough to run up a bit of an oxygen debt.
Next year it will all change - the 700c bike will have an S3X hub with 48 x 15, so that's 85" direct drive, 63" and 53". Should make mixed terrain a lot easier. 48 x 14 would have been better, since it would give me my TT gear of 91" and some slightly nicer cruising gears, but at the moment the 14T 1/8" sprocket doesn't seem to be coming over.
Next year it will all change - the 700c bike will have an S3X hub with 48 x 15, so that's 85" direct drive, 63" and 53". Should make mixed terrain a lot easier. 48 x 14 would have been better, since it would give me my TT gear of 91" and some slightly nicer cruising gears, but at the moment the 14T 1/8" sprocket doesn't seem to be coming over.
