So it’s nearly winter and traditionally a bit of an off-season but recently it’s become more of a fashion to try and maintain fitness throughout the winter months. A lot of competitive time triallists post their mileages and GPS data on the timetrialling forum and it’s obvious that the top performers are still putting in plenty of miles and quality even at this time of year.
Another tradition for some is to ride fixed or singlespeed bikes in the winter as this can give you a bit of an edge on strength, especially on climbs as you’re forced to ride them over-geared compared to what you’d usually select with your usual 20 choices !
I’ve been doing a few rides recently with my fixed/single freewheel on a flip-flop hub (you just turn the wheel round to select which cog you’d like to use) and I’ve found that a 67″ gear (48 x 19) is ideal for everything but the steepest climb (which just hurt a lot).
Fixed is certainly the smoothest for a pedaling action and the flywheel effect of the chainset gives you some help on the hills. The only downside is that you have to pedal at aroung 180 rpm to do 29 mph down the other side. Hence the switch to a single freewheel for the last couple of rides.
Anyway, I went out on the old winter bike (alloy frame, full mudguards, gears) today and found that the fixed had definitely improved the fitness and was able to average 17’s without too much of an effort.
Still, the best part of the rides these days is the bath with the cup of tea afterwards !! I’ll be glad when we get the cold dry days instead of the cold wet ones……
Fingers
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