Advice To The Neofixie Hipsters
Fixie + Quick Release = Death
Okay, for all you neofixie hipsters out there, I am only going to say this once so listen up. DO NOT under any circumstances put a quick release on the rear when you have to hold the chain tension. Are you listening? Ah! You are thinking about doing that again...
STOP
I spotted the monstrosity, pictured left, on Friday night after I was leaving the Anza club. I was drunk, but I knew duty called so I got my shit together long enough to document this madness.
The whole thing almost brought me to tears, I cried for weeks afterwards.
Lesson 1
Fixies are a celebration power and stubbornness. Power is when you can mangle your cranks (Yep, its mine and its real). Stubbornness is when you could ride a geared bike to make your life easier, but you don't. Hell, we could also all give in to the man and drive cars everywhere, because its easier. But we don't do we? Who's hardcore... What's Hardcore?
UPDATE: Make that mangle your cranks 2x
Busted Kooka crank 
Busted Sugino
Lesson 2: Fixin' the Fixie
So lets do an itemized list. Look carefully and you can see that you have:
- A Track Hub?
- A Track Cog
- A frickin' big burly chain
To the untrained Vancouverite eye the above is meant to scream
"Crank the shit out of me fucker, I love it that way!"
As the a fixie setup is meant suggests the rider pocesses a kind of sadistic power. The kind of power, where if you listen carefully you can hear the frame cry out...
"Oh, God NO, Not again!!" Each and every time those cranks spin round.
Instead, to trained eye fixed gear aficionado the above screams something alright, it screams
"COFFEE!"
It's ruined because its all held together with a quick release; a cheap wimpy, mother fucking quick release. I can guarantee you that absolutely NO track hub in the history of all track hubs has ever ever ever EVER come with a quick release.
Can you guess why? Crank it hard while braking and the wheel wheel is going to fly right out of the drops and you are going become a road crayon spreading your art. Especially with this frame since the drop outs are angled forward.
When you use your legs to break the axel wants to move forward, this is why *REAL* track frames have horizontal drops that face towards the rear. The worse that can happen if they slip is that you lose some chain tension, not have the frick'n wheel come off the frame!
This is of course not a worry if you are only going down the street to coffee... In that case this set up should work fine to trick the uninitiated fixie loving hipster.
BLAH, I say... BLAH, BLAH, BLAH, BLAH!