Why ride a single speed mountain bike

Every bump a rockgarden. Every berm, a loose and dangerous liaison with the elusive limits of traction. With progression, harder and more diverse trails can be tackled. The point of this is that basic green trails are usually more accessible, especially for mid-week night riding, or for the time poor parent snatching a quick weekend session in.

Artificially enhancing the challenging while retaining the basic precepts of speed and fun can make the trails great again , conveniently and considerately achieving without bringing the world to the precipice of a nuclear apocalypse. When the singlespeed movement kicked off circa , it was a reaction to a generation of mountain bike gearing systems that were mostly a shoddy transposition of road drivetrains. While they shifted nicely in the shop, they wore fast in poor conditions, could clog up in mud, ghost-shift on dual suspension bikes, slammed around like mad and dropped chains, and often detracted from the enjoyment of the ride.

With the singlespeed, this woes were conveniently forgotten, although unfortunately supplanted by a series of spectacularly bad singlespeed retention devices. Highlights including cracking dropouts, eccentric bottom brackets that creaked more than a rusty bed, and frames that required the rear brake to be removed to remove the rear wheel. However, these significant design flaws notwithstanding, singlespeeds are reliable, low maintenance bikes.

Early singlespeed hype waxed lyrical about the philosophical importance and the achievement of a transcendental state of zen. Now that the singlespeeders have scrambled to the comments to melt down like their own thigh muscles on a gentle slope, I should point out that I like singlespeeds.

In this scenario you, of course, become the weakest link. Get out there on a long, muddy ride and nothing on the bike will break. Because you will instead. Again, though, I accept the thinking. Beautiful maths. Of course, lots of people ride singlespeed mountain bikes. Lots of people enjoy them.

Well, not lots. But so what? You will see the trail in a new way, and when you apply the lessons learned to your geared bike you will be smoother and faster than ever.

This also makes the drivetrain very smooth. And when you combine a quiet and smooth drivetrain with the riding style you will naturally adopt—a flowing, swooping style that maintains your momentum—you get a riding experience that is enjoyably meditative. We all know that riding has fitness benefits, but riding a geared bike can make you lazy in some ways: You can stay seated a lot, and you can spin a highly efficient low-torque, high-cadence stroke.

You will need to stand up and grind out high-torque, low- cadence revolutions; you will need to pull the bars hard and thrust your body to keep the bike moving.

And this provides different fitness benefits than riding a geared bike. The Monocog is a tank-tough and simple 29er singlespeed. The Unit is a tough and minimalist singlespeed. And if you want to do an overnighter, it has three bottle mounts, and cargo mounts on the fork. The SIR 9 comes with a trail-ready and high-end singlespeed build highlighted by the mm Fox Factory 34 fork and dropper post.

A super-versatile frame, the SIR can take 29er tires up to 2. It has mounts for racks, a fender, cargo bags, and can take a derailleur too. You can choose to roll on 29, or Bikes and Gear. United States.