Yes I jacked in the whole singlespeed thing after a nine year stint on them.
I never went with the whole ‘it makes you a fitter stronger rider’ Okay if you’re the sort that would drop a gear when no ones looking, but if that was the concern just wack it in the 44 and give it some.
Singlespeeds don’t go up hills quicker, riders do.

I think singlespeeding just makes you a better singlespeeder. Though I’ll concede that there are whole trails that can be a singlespeed sweetspot.

Big Dave wasn’t having a go at you personally but just the ss/geared debate in general that crops up here on here every now and then.

I didn’t think you were. These debates always make me chuckle. Surprised Godwins Law hasn’t come into effect yet…

Warning, descent into the bottomless debate over pros and cons of SS reached….

I’ve not experienced the OP’s realisation as i’ve never committed to one bike. I see both sides of this.

SS is daft. I love it. ‘q – why? a – it’s simple’

“Why have a bike that doesn’t have the correct gear 90% of the time?”

– The human body doesn’t have gears but that doesn’t stop fell-runners. I like the SS bike’s fixed link between cadence, speed and effort. I also like 42/12 on a blindingly fast bit of downhill singletrack..

Anyway. If you don’t want to believe that MTB can be the answer to all, you’ll not be dissapointed one day. And you have a good excuse to own at least 3 bikes. All good…

My 29er Inbred is set up rigid SS, but I can chuck the geared back wheel & gear train on & be 1×10 in a few mins. Another 5mins & the sus forks are on. But most of the time its SS. Its not that hilly where I live. I’m not averse to getting off to push if I’d be riding at walking pace anyway. I love the simplicity of SS, but if I felt geared would be better then I’m no slave to the SS thing, because some terrain is better with gears.

I ride uphill at about the same speed as an asthmatic snail carrying heavy shopping so having a collection of rubbish one geared bikes suits my lack of skill and fitness perfectly. If I ride my geared bikes folks actually expect me to do a bit more than “fire road extreme” which makes me display less co-ordination than an octopus on LSD.

I love my ss bikes they mask all my cackness with a protective aura of niche

Why would you want to take the chain off?

Well OK not every ride but every 2-3 maybe; whip the chain off and in the warm and dry of the kitchen (While the missus watches some reality bollox on the telly), soak chain in cleaning agent of your choice, bit of a scrub/rinse through dry off and re-lube, that’s about all effort the winter SS drivetrain will ever see.

Vs all the scrubbing between Cassette/chainrings/jockeys in the garden/garage with frozen fingers that my Geared bikes would get if I rode them during winter, I’d much rather keep the post ride maintenance minimal when it’s cold/dark out.

Nowt to do with being all tough and Manly, Grinding one gear around the countrysire, no I’m just alergic to the combination of effort and cold weather…

glenh – Member
While you may be able to manage to ride wherever with a SS, I just genuinely can’t understand why anyone would want to.

Why have a bike that doesn’t have the correct gear 90% of the time? Just seems like a massive disadvantage, with virtually no advantages to me.

This is because you can’t see the bigger picture, most people pooh pooh-ing anything have seldom tried it.

My local trail centre is a perfect example of why everything you have just written is utter nonsense, I’m basing this statement on facts not fiction.
The fact is, when you ride over bumpy singletrack such as the Cannock follow dog trail, that one big gear is perfect for the job, it forces you to maintain flow, working hard to achieve that, this has been my own findings, I’m no SS fanboy at all, I just tried and it and realised the truth, that for off road singletrack, it makes a lot of sense.

The fact that I overtake a hell of a lot of people using gears seems to confirm this, a member earlier in this thread said it’s all ‘boll*cks and about mentality of the rider’, while mentality is certainly true, he seems to have overlooked the very point that seems to be going over many heads in this thread, which is..

The PHYSICAL aspect.
If you use gears, then you are far more less likely to stand up and work that bike through the bumpy stuff and up the hills, therefore, you are not working that body in the same way that you are forced to do when you have no choice.
Forget about mentality a sec, away from professional races it is a fact that most (actually all) geared riders I see out and about hardly ever seem to stand up and work hard at it, they become lazy through having those geared options.

Thread now back on track, order restored, now stop being such troll like muppets. 😉

Calm down dear. It’s only a bike.

they become lazy through having those geared options

Lazy, or just conserving energy because they can?

I confess that this thread makes me realize how I want another go at SS. I learned a lot and it was fun. Even with gears, I tend to ride with lower cadence and am out the saddle more. Stupid knee. I just fitted a new 34t/1×9 XT setup recently, so will stay with that for now.

I didn’t miss any point thanks.

Just stick a load of bloody gears on and shut up

Sorry 😉

There are some very silly, insecure people on this thread

SSs are great. So are geared bikes. Saying one is inherently better is silly. They’re better at different things and depending on what you consider important and how you ride, that will produce a different idea of what is ‘better’ overall.

Many find that SS forces them to ride faster. Others who don’t need to be forced into putting effort in make geared bikes go faster (hence why serious XC racers are all racing on gears). SSs should be simpler, lighter and have less maintenance.

The fact is, when you ride over bumpy singletrack such as the Cannock follow dog trail

😆

I stopped reading then

Well OK not every ride but every 2-3 maybe; whip the chain off and in the warm and dry of the kitchen (While the missus watches some reality bollox on the telly), soak chain in cleaning agent of your choice, bit of a scrub/rinse through dry off and re-lube, that’s about all effort the winter SS drivetrain will ever see

That’s about a lifetimes more lovin’ than my SS ever gets, it’s a £4 BMX chain I reckon it works better a bit rusty. Just squirt a bit of 3 in 1 on it to stop it squeaking annoyingly every few weeks and you’re set.

flow – Member

🙄
I stopped reading then.

I stopped reading then

You’re just too ‘rad’ Flow. 😉

I stopped reading before the OP even posted this thread.

“This is however a case of egg on face as I have just finished a Ti SS rigid hardtail”.

Just fit an Alfine hub, 8 or 11 speed. All the chainline reliability, plus gears. What’s not too like?

It even looks like a SS (from the right angle) 😆

I have a light SS and a bigger, heavier geared FS trail bike.

To ride, they’re wildly different from each other and this really is the only point.

I will admit that riding the SS has made me a better all-round rider, I believe largely for the reasons that mental Mickey has said. The SS leaves me no option but to ride with commitment, but the FS allows me the option to be a lazy twiddler and I can still ride it with commitment if I choose.

Just ride gears, and apply a liberal dose of salt and a birch whip and quit your jibber jabber.

Just ride gears, and apply a liberal dose of salt and a birch whip and quit your jibber jabber.

This.

All this ‘singlespeed make me strong like bear’ is cobblers, and points up what most of us already know; STW style mountain bikers are blouses.

Indeed all we’ve acertained is that singlespeeds are ideal for people to weak to HTFU on geared bikes. Still trying to work out how 32X16 toughens you up, when you could be enjoying the pain of 44X12

flow – Member

I stopped reading then.
🙄

A bit further and you would have managed your first sentence

Isn’t a SS just a 3×9 where it’s stuck in 1 gear?

No I’m being very naughty, I enjoyed all the singlespeeds I’ve owned. In the end I just missed the big gears for traditional XC.
Though it’s been mentioned that singlespeeds give you a good work out and help with fitness and all that. Myself and others I know used them exclusively for solos because they kept you in check, taking away the temptation to hoon around in a big gear and possibly burning you out.
But like I said before I’ve done rides and races and thought afterwards that a singlespeed would have been ideal.

it’s all about riding your bike and having fun. For me I get more smiles per mile on a SS most of the time, even for endurance races as they stop me going like a mentalist for the first few hours and then entering a world of pain.

Some riders are just mentally fast regardless of what they ride, and some SS riders are fast enough to beat very fast/sponsored gearie boys n girls in big races like the niner race squad. Yes they would be even faster on gears but if they are winning on a SS then putting them on a geared bike, must be like cheating or something 😉

No comment so not to offend other riders

SS is just more efficient IMO. Ok your only ever at 5 or 105 rpm cadence, but you get fitter because of it. there are no worries about gears going wrong, and your never in the wrong gear because you get fitter to cope. there are just less problems all round.

SS is just more efficient IMO

Demonstrably wrong.

but you get fitter because of it.

Again, wrong.

there are no worries about gears going wrong, and your never in the wrong gear because you get fitter to cope

…and you have the perfect excuse for not being fast…

glenh – Member
While you may be able to manage to ride wherever with a SS, I just genuinely can’t understand why anyone would want to…

For me it is simply more enjoyable. Light bike (useful for chucking over 7′ deer fences), nothing to go wrong (derailleurs get bent dragging them through thick heather), bugger all maintenance.

I’m more concerned about distance covered than spot speeds. I use my bike to get me into interesting places – one of the nice things about living in Scotland is we can go where we want.

If I lived in a place where my riding was constrained to trail centres I’d probably ride a full sus with gears.

The “rad”, “niche” etc stuff is hopefully a joke, because I’d hope no-one took a bike that seriously. IMO if you want to be a proper hard cross-country type, then become a fell runner.

So why? Because it is there.

I only ride SS on my own really. Not because of the (anti)social aspects of racing off up the hill when with friends and then being last back down again. No, I only SS for the image so I get off and walk anything remotely uphill and friends would get mightily peed off with me if I kept doing that and taking forever to get to the top.

I do look good on it though and that’s what counts. 😀

SS is just more efficient IMO. Ok your only ever at 5 or 105 rpm cadence, but you get fitter because of it. there are no worries about gears going wrong, and your never in the wrong gear because you get fitter to cope. there are just less problems all round.

That whole paragraph is a load of shite

The human body doesn’t have gears but that doesn’t stop fell-runners

What about walk, jog, run, sprint? Come to think of it is singlespeeding a bit like a walking race? I know so people are dead fast on a single speed but then some people are really fast in a walking race. Walking race athletes will never beat a sprinter or and distance runner though as their disciple naturally limits their speed. But on Redsocks walking days I bet they really get a kick out of being the first to the tea shop.

I doff my cap to all SSers not that I have seen many int dales
and theres no way I could winch my body up the dales and lakes hills with only one gear

just get out and ride and have fun

GEDA, my point is that on legs or on a ss, effort and rpm / pace affects speed in the same kind of way, the link is direct. you’re right; maybe i didn’t make the point well but what i mean is that rpm and effort affect speed directly like the the difference between walking and running. i like the way on a ss i get tuned in to speed and cadence.

“IMO if you want to be a proper hard cross-country type, then become a fell runner.” aye, or a john stamstad type..

Bristol Bike Fest last Saturday;
1st solo male, 25 laps
1st solo male singlespeed, 24 laps
Assuming the top riders in each category are about the same level of fitness and technical ability, then on the right sort of trail, there’s not a lot in it.

yeah I’d agree with Graham there, that course was quite SS friendly for the most part (though I did spin out a bit on the brief flat bits). 1st & 2nd in Male Solo SS would have come 4th & 5th in open Male Solo

Why have a bike that doesn’t have the correct gear 90% of the time? Just seems like a massive disadvantage, with virtually no advantages to me.

Actualy, I find myself in the wong gear a lot more often on the geared bike.

e.g. night ride, ina group, unfamiliar trails (something I do a lot of), go into a failry level corner on SS, stand and sprint out of it, no problems.

Do the same on a geared bike and 50% of the time you either spin out because you’re still in a gear you used to climb upto the corner or or you cant put the power down as youve gone down a hill into the corner and shifted up too far.

Yes you could look ahead/learn the trail, but after 15 years riding off road I’m as good as I ever will be at that and I still get cought out on twisty stuff.

SS just removes the complications from riding so you just concentrate on line choice, staying off the brakes and either pedailing like a madman or grunting up the climbs.

Also it does make you fitter, but only specificaly for SS, I cant ride the geared bike as fast as someown whose used to it, as sitting and spinning the correct gear doesnt come naturaly anymore, so I’m probably fitter if i’m sprinting out of a section in the perfect gear, but show me a slog of a climb best done seated and I’ll really struggle (the option of standing and mashing the SS gear being removed by virtue of being on a FS). On the plus side I have upper legs like tree trunks and can split swimming shorts just by looking at them!

That’s one less of us and one more of them.

Seriously. I have ridden to Scotland on a one speed, and Belgium too last month. And gears have a place. But for me it ain’t off road.

Do the same on a geared bike and 50% of the time you either spin out because you’re still in a gear you used to climb upto the corner or or you cant put the power down as youve gone down a hill into the corner and shifted up too far not very good at using gears.

Happy to correct that for you.

SS just removes the complications from riding

Mmmm, walking and talking can be such a challenge…

Nope, sorry, singlespeed is great for the lack of maintenance but that’s about it.