Single Speed

Like most people, my cycling life began on a single-speed bicycle.  I got my first bicycle for Christmas when I was six years old.  I was so excited!  It was red and blue with a banana seat and streamers at the ends of the handle bars.  It came with training wheels, which I used for a while until I was ready to try riding without them.  Of course, I fell plenty of times in the beginning, but eventually I got the hang of that balancing feeling.  It’s still a thrill!

A few years later, I got my big sister’s old bike.  It was a single-speed, too, but it had larger wheels and more grownup geometry.  I rode that bicycle everywhere, at least within a few-mile radius.  I went to friends’ houses, explored unknown streets in the next neighborhood over, and worked up the nerve to ride down the steep embankment next to my elementary school.  Every kid should get to have that feeling of freedom and independence.

My sister moved on to a three-speed bike.  Sometimes I tried to keep up with her on the hand-me-down single-speed.  I remember riding to a neighborhood farther away than I had ever ridden by myself.  She rode seemingly effortlessly up the hills and had to wait at the top for me as I lumbered up on my old clunker.  Our whole ride was less than 10 miles, but I had a glimpse of something bigger.  Even then I knew that a bicycle is the key to great adventures.

My most significant single-speed experience was during the Race Across America (RAAM) last year.  I was ready to start my first shift, waiting for the tag from my teammate.  Off I went!  I shifted gears, and…

Nothing

My Di2 (electronic) shifters decided they didn’t want to work, even though my bicycle had had a thorough tune-up before RAAM and I had fully charged the shifters before the race started.  Right then, there wasn’t anything I could do other than ride my best with the single gear.  Fortunately, it was a good one, and we were in the flat desert.  I simply went into TT mode and channeled two of my good cycling buddies.  One was Jeff, a.k.a. “Stony,” who mashes the pedals in a high gear, putting the rest of us in the Stony Grinder.  The other was Chad, time trialist extraordinaire, who has won several state TT championships.  Although I rode single speed just fine for the first two shifts, I was extremely grateful to get my shifters fixed quickly under rather fortuitous circumstances, and I completed the race on my Marin without further incident.  (See my monstrous ride report from 7/3/15 for more details.)

Since RAAM, I have had other problems with my Di2 shifters.  Some have had easy fixes, but others have baffled even the Shimano rep as well as my bike mechanic.  I think that overall, it’s a good technology – hey, the pros use it – but I seem to be at the tail end of the bell curve on experiencing difficulties.  Everyone else I know with Di2 really likes it.

My most recent Di2 repair was in October.  I thought maybe it was fixed once and for all, but within a week it wasn’t working again.  I’ve concluded that I have a lemon system.  My plan is to swap over to a mechanical system, but in the meantime, for road riding I’m exclusively using my Trek endurance bike, which has mechanical shifters.

Today I rode at lunchtime.  I took off on my bicycle and tried to shift gears – nothing.  Only then did I realize I had brought my Marin to work.  Am I the absent-minded professor, or what?  My Marin and my Trek hang right next to each other on the garage wall, but still…

What's even crazier is that I checked the air in my tires before I loaded my bike into my car this morning.  I commented to Robert that the pressure was surprisingly low, about 50 psi.  Even though it had been several days since I rode my Trek and the weather has gotten colder, I wouldn't expect that much of a pressure drop.  You'd think that would have been a clue that I had loaded the wrong bike!  At least I had a lovely single-speed ride.