Fender Defender

There she is, my main ride, the Bambina: late ’60s Bottecchia Professional stage racing frame, mostly Miche track gruppo, Nitto bullhorns, Columbus SL tubing, and…fenders.

How unhip is that?

Not at all. The fenders (and the super-minimalist Tubus Fly rack) have been on there, like everything else except the tires, tape, and chain, for about 30,000 miles of ass-kicking mobility over the last five years, including several centuries. Night and day, street or path, and–to get right to the point–rain or shine.

I’ve had folks ask me why I would have fenders, or a rack, on an urban fixie.

This belies an ignorance of the bicyle’s history, and especially of the fixed-gear’s history. (If you suffer from the same ignorance yourself, you can rectify it by reading Alpha and omega: a Fixed-Gear Primer on my personal blog at Bicycle Fixation.)

Because what’s really unhip is to let a few drops of water falling from the sky keep you home or scare you onto the bus.

As I noted here a couple of weeks ago, it’s pretty easy to ride in the rain. But it’s not easy to show up at work, or school, or the bar or diner or your buddy’s house dripping water and whatever else might have been flowing down the roadway that day.

Fenders keep your tires from slinging filth up at you, so you can get away with using minimal raingear. They also let you ride freely after the rain has stopped but before the roads have dried.

The fenders on my little fixie in the picture are cheap Planet Bike models–less than forty bucks, less than a pound total weight.

For five years they’ve been keeping rain, mud, oil, pee, and what have you off my face and back on wet days and dry, so I can ride and ride and ride. I love ’em.

There are other, fancier brands around too, in case you want to get all Rivendellian about it. And there are bikes–such as most models the Pigeon sells–that come with dedicated fenders designed for the particular bike. Gotta mention removable fenders too.

Even if you hate fenders, you love riding, so you need at least one bike that’s got them.

Because nothing’s hipper than the freedom to ride anywhere, any time, any weather.

See ya on the road….