Singlespeed and Cross

With Cyclocross season winding down, I wanted to take a moment to talk about a misunderstood group of people: singlespeeders.

When I first decided to give Cross a try, I wanted to do singlespeed (or as I call it, one-gear). Galen Mittermann (Midtown Direct) asked, “Sal, why would you choose the hardest category?” At the time, I didn’t have a good answer. Now, I do.

‘Cause it’s awesome . . .

It takes a while to come to that conclusion, however. When you first start riding one-gear, you try to use it as an excuse or a handicap. You find yourself always in the wrong gear for every situation. You start thinking things like, “Oh, well, yeah, I could have ridden that run-up too, if I had gears.” You learn to hate B’s that come flying by you on straight-aways in their big rings. But, eventually the tide turns and you realize you are handi-capable.

This happened early for me. At my first Thrilla in Bend, Ryan Trebon lapped me halfway into the race. As he passed he said, “Come on Buddy!”

As I was about to yell back my excuse, I looked down at his freewheel, and I’ll be damned if he wasn’t a singlespeeder. Well shoot. By the time I figured out what to say, he was gone. He didn’t need any excuses, and didn’t have time to hear any from me.

As they say in British car racing, “Push on regardless.”

You learn to spin, you learn to mash, you learn to run and you learn to love the natural feel of it all. In talking to fellow one-gear riders, the one word that keeps getting repeated is, “simplicity”.

Maybe that’s why, as a group, we are thought of as “earthy”, riding unpainted frames with flat bars.

We may have some tattoos, and drink a little beer, but the truth is we are a bunch of hard-core bike racers that will stack up against anybody. So, the next time you see a singlespeeder racing in another category, give ‘em a shout. And the next time you see a hundred singlespeeders flying down the start straight, back up, cause it will be all knees and elbows. Oh, and the next time you buy a bike, make it a one-gear.

-Sal