Momentunism: A game the whole family can play.
GarethPJ
Posts: 295
I was discussing riding single speed and fixed with a friend today. He was surprised that quite often when riding off road I am faster than him up hill, at least until the point that gravity wins and I change gear from stand to push (thanks Kona). I explained that for a geared rider the temptation is to drop onto the granny ring and winch up the hill, but for a single speed rider the only way to defeat gravity is to maintain forward momentum. Which is why fixed and single speed riders rush at hills.
This then reminded me of the old game of Momentumism we used to play on our mopeds as kids. Those things were so pathetically slow that you had to maintain momentum at all costs. A 50cc engine is not the most powerful of things even after you have removed the restrictions (Of course it was like that when I bought it, officer) so we used to play a game we called mometumism. This basically entailled hitting the redline as soon as possible and then maintaining forward momentum at all costs. A point was lost if you closed the throttle even the tiniest bit with ten points being deducted if you were to touch the brakes. Of course nobody ever completed a ride with anything other than negative points so the nearest to zero won. With the typical lunacy of the average sixteen year old we claimed this game was much safer than actually racing on the public highway. Yes, of course negotiating complex junctions without touching the brakes is safe. Another trick was trying to keep your brake light on without any actual braking effect so you would only lose ten points for tricky sections that required braking several times.
Anyway having been reminded of the game I was coming home from work today when I saw a guy on a Langster pull the craziest line through moving traffic at a roundabout. At first I thought he was a complete lunatic. Then I realized he was just playing momentumism. Feel free to join him.
And of course the higher your gear the more imporatant momentumism becomes.
Enjoy.
This then reminded me of the old game of Momentumism we used to play on our mopeds as kids. Those things were so pathetically slow that you had to maintain momentum at all costs. A 50cc engine is not the most powerful of things even after you have removed the restrictions (Of course it was like that when I bought it, officer) so we used to play a game we called mometumism. This basically entailled hitting the redline as soon as possible and then maintaining forward momentum at all costs. A point was lost if you closed the throttle even the tiniest bit with ten points being deducted if you were to touch the brakes. Of course nobody ever completed a ride with anything other than negative points so the nearest to zero won. With the typical lunacy of the average sixteen year old we claimed this game was much safer than actually racing on the public highway. Yes, of course negotiating complex junctions without touching the brakes is safe. Another trick was trying to keep your brake light on without any actual braking effect so you would only lose ten points for tricky sections that required braking several times.
Anyway having been reminded of the game I was coming home from work today when I saw a guy on a Langster pull the craziest line through moving traffic at a roundabout. At first I thought he was a complete lunatic. Then I realized he was just playing momentumism. Feel free to join him.
And of course the higher your gear the more imporatant momentumism becomes.
Enjoy.
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