If you have dotwatched the latest edition of the Highland Trail 550 like me, you’ll have noticed that Liam Glen, the winner in 3:10:55 (days:hours:minutes) has done this amazing feat on a rigid singlespeed bike. Liam is no stranger to singlespeeding or the Highland Trail. He also took the win in 2016 (and is therefore the only one winning the race twice).
A year before Liam’s first win the Highland Trail had already been won on a singlespeed bike. Back in 2015, when the conditions were as challenging as this year, Tom Rowntree finished in 4:11:19 (days:hours:minutes) on a rigid 29er Shand. This was also the year when Javier Simon appeared in the race for the first time. Although he had broken his freewheel and had negotiated the stretch along the Caledonian Canal with the help of a long stick to make it to the bike shop in Fort William, he still beat me to finish in the top ten with 6:13:03. He went on to better this time year on year to set the SS record in 2018 in 3:21:55, always with a big smile. There were no official results from the race in 2019, but Isla Rowntree went on to become the first woman to complete the route singlespeed in 6:13:37 as an ITT. And on a bittersweet note: This year’s race was dedicated to Yann Thomas, a French rider who wanted to race it on a custom built fat bike. He sadly passed away in March, but the picture of his bike posted on the event’s website reveals a singlespeed bike.
Why Would You Want To?
So what is it that makes a singlespeed bike the better bikepacking bike? Or in fact a better bike full stop? A lot.
The obvious argument for a singlespeed is weight. A single chainring on the front, a cog on the back (and potentially a few spacers) plus a chain will not only be rather cheap, they’ll also be much less weight. And availability too. At the moment you’ll struggle to buy derailleurs, shifters of some kind and a cassette anyway, whereas singlespeed parts are still widely available. Then there’s the simplicity. All you have to do to keep riding is to adjust chain tension. No fiddling around adjusting gears. Or charging batteries. And then there’s the fitness. If you have limited time to spend on cycling, then riding singlespeed will be the quickest way to get fit. Which brings me to the next point – how to ride a singlespeed bike?
The Technique
I think this is a good time to introduce the fact that I cycled a lap of the world on a singlespeed mountain bike. That’s 34,000 km with around 350,000 m of climbing in numbers, all on the same gear ratio. Or simply put, more than 1,000 m up each day. Getting off and pushing the bike is part of this. There are techniques to negotiate steeper gradients on one gear. The first choice is getting off the saddle and trying that little bit harder. Being clipped in helps, and wide and weirdly shaped handlebars, like Jones H-bars, help even more. If that fails, zig-zagging is another good technique if there is space. If there isn’t, and you have the advantage of freewheeling, then doing half-turns helps, but consumes a lot of time and energy. What are half-turns? Sometimes it will simply be too steep to do a full revolution of the crank when pedalling uphill, but if your balance is good, you can still keep moving by doing a half-turn, pedal backward and do another half-turn. And so on. After all of this you are faced with the reality of singlespeeding: pushing your bike when it gets too steep. Finding the point where to stop and push is experience. And will depend on your strength and riding ability too. Don’t give up too easily, but also don’t try too hard. Cranking uphill requires a strong core for yanking those handlebars. And if it hurts, you are doing something wrong.
But is pushing that bad? Not at all it seems, especially for the man who has just taken victory in the Highland Trai, who was featured in this journal for Apidura: ‘Having to get off and push more frequently means that the niggles are more spread around, which can be more manageable on the longer rides. The lower mental load is also really beneficial. For example, with gears, getting off and pushing is often a blow to the ego, whereas because it’s fully expected, on a singlespeed it’s a lot easier to handle mentally.’
And yes, Liam is right. I am yet to have any serious injuries from singlespeeding. I made it around the world and across Morocco without taking a single painkiller. While the lower mental load is something often underestimated in long-distance bikepacking races, you can use that to your advantage. When I signed up for the Atlas Mountain Race I was fit enough to finish the race, but not fit enough to compete with the top riders. A shoulder operation took me off my bike for three months in September, and the one month I had left to train before the race was spread across January and February. Think of the conditions in this year’s Highland Trail (soggy and cold), but at least 10 degrees less and half the daylight. A turbo trainer could have potentially solved the problem, but I don’t like cycling indoors, so my singlespeed bike saved the day twice. For a start I could ride my bike in those miserable conditions without having to shed out a fortune for spare parts before the race (that was back when you could at least still buy parts). And further I was the only singlespeed rider in the field. As long as I would finish, there was something I could win. It turned out that something was a fancy golden tagine. Whoop!
But what does singlespeed riding actually feel like? Pretty damn good! It’s almost like a state of mind. You are often not slower than other bikes (Liam’s Highland Trail win proves this), unless you ride a Sportive with a singlespeed mountain bike. And if you do, there’s plenty to chat about. The power transmission is more direct, and by the time you have ridden your bike a few times you’ll forget about gears anyway. You go at whatever pace your gearing allows you to go, not what the fastest rider dictates. While pedalling around the world my average speed was very consistent, which was due to only having one gear. And there’s another thing that’s even more important. What you’ll quickly find out is that most singlespeed riders take life that little bit less seriously.
So far this all sounds pretty easy, but it isn’t that simple. If you are not used to singlespeed riding, it will take a few rides to settle in. For me the most important thing, especially when it comes to climbing, is that you want to take as much momentum up the hill as possible. Look ahead, think ahead, and try to anticipate what might come. And you need to ride more strategically. The beauty of the Highland Trail is that it allows for exactly this, so it’s not a big surprise that in its eight editions it has been won twice now on one gear. There is no point to pedal on the downhills. They are better used to give the legs a short break. And while speeding on long flat tarmac stretches is tempting and will buy some time, there aren’t that many roads in the Highland Trail that would make a huge difference. What makes a difference that is you won’t risk bending or, in the worst case, ripping off your derailleur. Chain suck doesn’t exist, no matter how minging the chain is. Use grit as lubricant and it will still work fine. Apart from the fact that the chain is also much cheaper, it lasts at least twice as long. On my round the world trip I changed the chain every 5,000 kms, and I still made it around the world on the same chainring and one spare freewheel.
The Technical
Most frames will be suited to be converted to singlespeed with the help of a chain tensioner, but horizontal dropouts will make it much easier to keep the chain well tensioned. You can use a conventional freewheel that normally takes a cassette and use spacers to fit a single cog instead. Sheldon Brown’s website will tell you everything you need to get the chainline right. The straighter your chainline, the better. When it comes to gearing, I am not an expert, but I managed to cycle the world, Strathpuffer and the Atlas Mountain Race on the same 32-18 gearing. The lowest ring I could find on the front was 30t, but I preferred a stronger steel chainring, which was only available in 32t upwards. Things are much more flexible once you use spacers on the back, but with a proper singlespeed hub, like Surly’s Ultra New hub, and a screw-on freewheel choices are less. White Industries is the gold standard with a range from 16 – 23t but a hefty price tag, while Halo’s Clickster freewheel comes in 16 – 18t only but at less than half the price. Since last year I have been running an Absolute Black oval chainring on the front, which makes a difference on the climbs and comes as small as 30t. To give you an idea of price. A good front chainring retails between £30 and £40, a cog is around £30 plus a few pounds for spacers, the more expensive screw-on cog is around £100, but you can get them for as low as £20. The Halo Clickster is £40 and in my eyes the best value. Add in a chain that starts as low as £10. All of this will outlast any other drivetrain.
Wheel size has an impact on your choice of gearing too. A 32-16 gearing on a 26inch bike, will be similar to a 32-18 on a 29inch bike. I could go into much more detail, but this article from Surly has it all. On my retro gravel bike, a 1970s Claud Butler, I currently use a 42-20 gearing, which was mostly fine to cycle up and down landrover tracks in the Cairngorms for my last film.
So it’s cheap, it makes you win races and makes you a better rider. Still not convinced? Well, you’ll be able to spot a sticker from Singletrack’s very own Charlie Hobbs, formerly known as Charlie the Bikemonger, on Liam’s bike. ‘Everytime you change gear god kills a kitten.’ Well, if that doesn’t change your mind, what does?
No one else like a single cog on a freehub?
Yes! I’ve done the white industries thing. Had about 4 of them. The bearings and pawls last me about 18 months, the sprocket itself about 3 years. WI freewheels only seem to come in to the country as complete items – those selling bits for them are breaking complete ones. I’ve a couple knocking about but I wouldn’t bother again. Surly stainless cogs last well, parts are easy to get from a number of sources for hope hubs, and the latest fancy Newmen wheels, while not as easy as hope, do use standard size bearings.