like probably a lot of other people, i was a bmx kid. i never raced but i’d constantly being doing stupid shit with my friends that invariably involved breaking my bike or breaking myself. there was a bmx track a few miles from my house, so we’d sneak in there after-hours and ride on the track until the park rangers caught on and kicked us out. i still have the old mongoose freestyle (i think it was actually a flatland bike) frame in my garage at home.

then, predictably, came my foray into mountain biking with my 18-speed mongoose hardnose. i beat the shit out of that thing for many years, though it only got used in the summer ’cause it sucked riding the local trails when it was cold. we did try, however. i eventually “upgraded” to a haro escape (suspension!!!) and proceeded to beat the shit out of that thing too. i broke off the rear derailleur hanger whilst on an urban freeride with my friends in new haven. that kind of got me out of biking for a while and most of college because i didn’t have a bike to ride and pretty much walked or skated everywhere.

i’ll never forget this. august 2005; my friend dan calls me and says he’s at a tag sale with this road bike that he’s going to buy for me for $1. it was an old 80s motobecane 10-speed with the front derailleur removed. i rode that thing the 3 miles to campus EVERY DAY until one day when the front wheel fell off and i bent the fork. i didn’t save the frame or anything because i knew very little about bicycle mechanics at the time. the next summer i bought my first for-real road bike, a 70s libertas ten-speed. it is probably one of the most beautiful bikes i have ever seen. it’s hanging in my kitchen right now with a stripped bottom bracket shell

i rode a fixed gear for the first time in june 2007 and immediately fell in love with it. i moved to boston in july and built a fixie from an old motobecane frame (which some of you may have seen before i bent the dropouts). i’m now on my third and loving every second.

I invented the bicycle in my early years… Then around 1956 I became the worlds fastest trackstar* Then I started wearing my girlfriends slacks and dyed my hair black, black as night. I rode like the wind and everyone knew I was the best at everything because I spent all my time waxing “fixie” on the web. Wax on- Wax off , I’m also a Samurai!!!!

My father was a tourist and my (10 years) older brother was a shredder. there was always a bicycle or four around the garage as a kid. The problem was I would always break them (my friends bikes too). They would sit around until someone or I would fix them, but it was a vicious cycle. I got a mountain bike in high school (which I rode until I was 21). I would periodically ride by myself because none of my friends wanted too. my bike was there, but not really a big part in my life until I moved to Boulder Colorado when I was 18 (1998). I Immediately began riding daily, commuting, mountain biking, Jumping, and zipping around the street/bike paths, It’s also the first place Iever witnessed trials riding. Boulder is an amazing place to ride, I was completely consumed.

From there I moved to vermont where the riding was out your back door, but there was only 3 seasons (out of the 5 in Vermont). I built my own trails and discovered a vast network of amazing backwoods adventure.

I moved to boston 5 years ago, began riding more urban mtb. Eventually I picked up biketrials which consumed all my other bikes and left a pile of wrecked parts in its wake.

3.5 years ago my ss mtb commuter was stolen (I still miss it) and having to start from scratch I turned to skinny tires and simple parts. My first fixed gear was my dads univega with a 26″ rear wheel with a welded freehub, and platforms, no brakes. I credit my survival to years of doing stupid shit on a bicycle. I still ride lots of different bikes and trash everything I own.

I’ve done a lot of reading here, but no writing.

Mountain biking always seemed awesome to me. Always. I mean, back when I was so little that I was riding a Huffy on 16’s (Gangsta style, clearly), I would go to a friend’s house, and we’d ride this BMX style loop in his yard. Needless to say, that was awesome. Then I ended up with a Murray Flexxor when I was eleven. That’s right, the one with the super heavy shock up front, and it ruled. I went over the bars so many times trying to ride that thing in the woods behind the neighborhood around the corner. And then, when I outgrew that, I would take my sister’s “mountain bike” into the woods, because it had 18 speeds, and that was AWESOME. You know, awesome except for the fact that I was riding a lady’s step through frame with more or less of a commuter tread, and it weighed about 30 pounds (roughly 1/3 of me at the time, if not more).
Cycling dropped off for me for a little while during the middle school years, mostly due to a move, and the resultant not knowing the locals, or where to go ride on dirt. Not to mention that when you’ve got my mom raising you and you live in the ‘burbs that riding on the street is discouraged for a 13 year old. Of course by this point I’ve got a shiny new Royce Union with 26’s, a 24 speed, and bar ends. Bar ends, BTW, hurt if you take them to the jaw. I would not recommend it.
By mid high school, a buddy of mine on the cross country team had just got one of those high end Trek Fuel 90’s with full suspension, so I’d ride across town to ride to the trails with him. It’s worth noting how ridiculous I had to look, still riding the Royce alongside this fancy full sussy on the trail.
Then Graduation time came along, and I requested a MTB instead of a graduation party, because I’m not big on parties, and that the same amount of money could go towards a bike which could last longer. Enter the Gary Fisher Marlin. Not so much high end or fancy, but badass enough to handle trails.
(insert filler of about two years involving occasional weekend rides in central Mass.)
So, then I moved to Watertown and got a job in Cambridge selling coffee. I commuted on the Gary Fisher, it being my only bike and all. I then found a ten speed in my dad’s basement, tuned it up and rode that for a few months all over the place until buying the Langster. A few months after that, I started mess’ing for City X, and shortly thereafter met most of you folk.
Long story short, bikes are cool, and are way cheaper than the car I used to have.

i just got into biking this year, well fall 07.
when we moved into our house in allston there was a specialized hardrock mountain bike in the basment, and since i didnt want a car here in the city i decided to use that to get around. rode that for less than a month, till i got hit by a garbage truck, the driver gave me a specialized sirrus (+ a hundred bucks to keep my mouth shut), a hybrid, and for some reason after getting hit i figured i should probably ride more (dont know why ?) then a few months later i decided i wanted a fixed, so now im riding an old shogun conversion, working for city express, and playin polo when weather permits.

Throughout my childhood I had numerous bikes, the most memorable was a Diamond Back BMX bike that I bought to try to be a super BMXer then realized I sucked at BMX. I remember my dad telling me he’d buy me a bike for my birthday and going to the LBS and him trying his hardest to convince me to get a road bike but I wouldn’t look and anything other than BMX. Funny cus now I desire to own one (or more of just about every type of bike except BMX, wish I have utterly no interest in)..

In the late middle school early high school years bikes disappeared from my radar. I was more into cars/trucks, I owned and taught myself the basic mechanics of a 78′ chevy pickup then 64′ Chevy El Camino. I remember “getting into cycling” my Sophomore year of highschool when my dad came home from work and started talking about doing a double century from Houston, TX to Austin, TX with some of his friends from work. I knew my dad was into cycling back in his High School days but the thought of him dusting off his old 70’s beast and riding anywhere seemed laughable to me. I teased him for a couple of days about being 45 yrs old and over weight and never making it more than 10 miles, to my surprise within 3 weeks you was up riding 40-60 miles on Sunday mornings. To me at the time the thought of 50 miles on a bike was unimaginable, but I figured there was no way I was gonna let my geeky overweight dad do like that while I sat at home nursing hangovers. I started searching around for a bike and found out that one of my friends from school had a dad that was doing the same Houston - Austin ride as my dad and they happened to have a few bikes laying around in the garage. I borrowed a bike, and my friend Mark and I set out to beat our dads to Austin. Eventually they beat us by 15 minutes!!

From then on cycling has been a big part of my life. When I moved to Boston to be with my girlfriend at the time who went to Harvard, my dad bought me my first brand new road bike, a Lemond Etape. Having only ridden hand me downs before then (mostly shitty 70s and 80s steel tanks) it was the most advanced piece of machinery I had ever seen, I remember thinking there had never been a lighter bike.

My entry into the Boston bike scene and fixed gears came when my beloved Etape was stolen. I had to get new wheels quick and I didn’t have much cash so I turned to the internet, while searching for bikes I stumbled across Bikeforums SS/FG “Boston Rides” thread. I didn’t know what FG stood for, I just knew there were people in my age group in Boston looking to drink beer and ride bikes together, it seemed heaven sent!!! Around the same time I found a CL ad for what looked like a really nice road bike on Craigslist, but for some reason the owner had removed all the gears. When I couldn’t figure out why all the bikes I kept finding had no gears I went to Sheldon Brown and he explained everything. It seemed interesting and I needed a bike, so when I saw a SS/FG convert on CL for $100 and jumped on it.

Since then I’ve made some of my best friends and learned to actually really enjoy this city. Cycling got me out of my apartment and onto the streets. Through riding with people from SS/FG I realized that Boston doesn’t suck as much as I thought my first year here. It also gave me a circle of friends and an escape from the apartment when my girlfriend of 3 years and I broke up just over a year ago.

Fakenger, Posenger, Hipster, whatever… I like cycling.. road, fixed, mountain, polo, touring.. I just like riding

I completed my 20th unsupported century before I could form memories. By the age of four my thighs were so massively disproportioned that doctors warned I would have to quit all muscular activity in my lower body for fear it could rip away from my torso and go off to conquer the pro peloton.

then in college i moved 10 blocks west of campus and got a huge 58cm black fuji road bike that slapped my nuts like a defiant whore. i wrestled that feisty bitch on the rolling hills and humid ghettos of west philadelphia for a long unemployed summer. a fortunate encounter with a brick wall killed her. then i got an even crappier schwinn. turned it into a ss. then fixed. then i got my black pista off my buddy for cheaps($200 and an 1/8th) since he couldn’t figure out why he kept getting hit by cars. this was 2001.

Next!

The first bike I was into was a crappy, neon orange Huffy MTB. Total death trap, the chain fell off every other day. But my friend’s dad was into motorcycles, so he’d get a kick out of helping us fix up our ratty bikes. I grew up rural, and my friend and I (only kids with parents “from the city”) always got into scraps with the farmer’s kids, with a lot of dirt-road bike chases that had hazing at stake if you got caught.

Then they all got BMX bikes, which were quicker than the Huffy. So I got caught more often. Eventually stopped riding, played more video games. Got chubby with puberty.

Just before my 14th birthday I got a Trek 720 Hybrid for my birthday, with 21 speeds and Cromoloy tubing. I find it unbearably slow now, but then I thought it was the coolest thing ever, because I could leave those punks in the dust every time. I would go out after school every day that year and do a 20-mile loop around town, and I remembered what it was like to be in shape again.

Got the car, stopped riding, but then brought it with me to college. One of my friends was a mechanic at the local shop in my college town, so I started to haphazardly learn things.

When I moved to Boston I was in Lower Allston, which sucks for public transportation (suck it, 66). So I found myself a red Raleigh 3-speed (on Sheldon’s recommendation) and the rest was history. I’d known about fixed gears for a few years before I built mine, but I was insistent that I would build it myself. I had the misfortune to attempt it on an old Raleigh 10-speed with proprietary Raleigh everything, but all the headaches just taught me more, and made me feel better about finally getting her up and running.

I get “fakenger” glares sometimes, but it doesn’t bother me much anymore. I commute a beat up fixed because it’s cheap and reliable and fun. I wear a Chrome bag because it’s a huge, waterproof bag I bought for $40 on craigslist, and panniers blow.

Messengers figured out a good system for everyday cycling in the city. People who are interested in cycling in the city looked into it and adopted some parts of it. What else do you expect?

I had random garage sale bikes throughout my childhood that my mom’d pick up every once’n a while, most cool-y, the “Street Rocker”, a hot pink tiny coaster-brake laden machine with a radio velcroed to the front handlebars.

Finally got a new hybrid bike along with my brother in middle school which I rode for the next 4 years or so. Loved that bike, and only recently did i realize i didn’t have a clue how the whole thing worked. Mid-high school I jumped on a friend’s road bike and was completely taken aback by how freakin quick it was (having never rode 700-23 tires). Picked up a new Allez Elite after fruitlessly searching virtually the entire summer for a used road bike (a concerned clerk at a local shop wouldn’t sell me an old 56cm trek1000 on the grounds that she thought i’d develop wrist problems if i rode too much, since my frame size was more of a 58cm.)

That Specialized really got me pumped up about biking’n I’d go out just about every day…/i just remember the thrill of being able to go super quick. Joined up with a junior racing team, showing up in shorts and a t-shirt for the meet’n greet practice, waaaay intimidated by 20 kids wearing bright full kits. Coach was a norwegian olympian back in the day, and his son took 4th in worlds cyclocross (after winning US nationals of course). Only did a couple crits with them/never wanted to drive for an hour to get to practice just to spin around for a little while’n then drive an hour back.

The next summer i built up an entire bike from scratch at the greatest bike shop in the world, the Grease Pit, completely volunteer-mechanic-run with a bunch of stands open and a full set of tools. Word of fixed gears leaked into my bikely friend group, and we were all mystified by it. (The grease pit bike is now my polo bike, though many modifications have been made since.)

oh god this is so long…./time to cut short. Got a fixie from Cars-R-Coffins, loved it to death’n commuted all mn winter, when I’d look forward to the ride home from school because it’d get up to 10 degrees’n the facemask could come off. Picked up a bianchi Pista Concept after getting into track racing with my team.

Sassy told me to come out’n play polo during my first week in boston for school’n … well… polo is the greatest thing since fixed gears.

Currently two days into couriering for City Express, and all is well.

oh, i guess i’ll go, but i’ve always had trouble telling this story. (i tried writing it for creative nonfiction last semester. it was tough.)

my bike love started in middle school. (quick side note: i originally wrote ‘92, and i don’t know why.) in grade school i rode around town and in the powerlines behind my house on a shitty ds mtb, but when i hit middle school, i decided i wanted to buy a bmx bike. so i got a gt vertigo. i wasn’t very good, but god i loved that bike. i took it apart and put it back together more times than i can even remember. it got to the point where i wanted to race, but i couldn’t find any tracks close enough to me. but for some reason, a year or so into high school i just stopped. i couldn’t even drive yet, and i just stopped riding.

flash forward to the summer. i’d been wanting a bike for a while but hadn’t bought one yet. i had some friends who had “fixies,” thought they sounded fun. i didn’t wanna deal with a derailleur in the city, so i built up my fixed. but here’s what pushed me to building it: i’d dated a girl for a year and a half, and we broke up at the beginning of the summer. i won’t get into the details, but know that it was enough to keep me in bed. and when i wasn’t in bed, i’d usually want to be in bed. the bike took my mind off her, it became my best friend. i had forgotten how much i missed it.

gosh, this story is so girlish.