I’ve been spending about 15-30 mins every day learning to trackstand on a road bike. (Not a fixie or mtn bike). Watched some youtube videos that suggested it wasn’t as hard as it seemed, so figured I’d motivate and give it a go.
Turns out it’s a LOT harder than those videos suggest. Seriously, after 3 weeks of near daily practice I could only achieve about 0.5-1 seconds worth of actual trackstanding. But I didn’t give up (pat self on back) and kept at it.
It’s now 2 more weeks after that, and enough has finally clicked that I can manage 10-45 seconds intermittently. But I still have a lot of trouble getting into the trackstand consistently, and I need a lot of room, no way I could do this at a traffic light right now, as I’m often rolling partway across the road in the process.
For all you folks that can do it on a road bike, how long did it take you, and can you do it at a stoplight in traffic?
It helps to practice on a bit of a slope at first so you get used to the balance. Then work on it on the flat. My town has 1 set of lights, so I’m a bit rusty these days.
Learnt when I was a teenager. I don’t do it on flat or if it’s only a tiny incline. Need to find which side you prefer to turn the bars and which foot is first as well. I can’t do a decent wheelie though
I don’t think I ever really tried it because, well, who cares and what’s the point? That stated, skills learned all those years of BMX racing and freestyle riding in the 1980s have helped in numerous ways riding road or tri bikes.
As others have said, find a slight uphill. Let your bike roll back a little, then just push the pedals enough to counteract the roll. Turn your bars to about 1-2oclock, keep your pedals at 3/9 o’clock. It’s much easier to stand, don’t try it sitting. Keep your hands on the hoods so you can grab the brakes. Just practice and practice.
About 30 years of commuting and leisure riding on road bikes. I think I learnt by doing it next to the guard rail at the stop lines so I always had a bail out (guard rail on one side, car/van on the other)…. And yes, stoplights and give ways I’d default to track stand as it was more stable than trying to stand on icy/wet roads in road cleats.
Using the back brake not the front is the ‘trick’ for me. That and over a decade of Pilates helps a lot. Balance comes from the core, not your arms and legs.
Or at least it was until a medical event that means I have no balance at all. So the above is all (conveniently for me if you wanted video proof) past tense
Yeah, years of commuting. Just trying to hold as long as possible. Being able to unclip either way pretty quickly if needed. Feathering breaks and rocking back and forth, angling wheel and shifting weight accordingly are the go.
I’d say a few months? Commuting few times a week? Not stopping much per se.
I remember once doing a tail whip in traffic near Rittenhouse square to avoid getting doored, and catching a SEPTA bus driver’s eye as he went past me, in shock, amazement, and awe
I learned on a fixie because I raced track, and then used a fixie in college. Still have not really tried it on a road bike, no real need. I think my bike handling skill have declined since then, too much time riding in a straight line.
Answering the question that you didn’t ask, but should’ve:
Should you trackstand at a stoplight?
No. Well, assuming the study report I’d seen some years ago that suggested that perhaps the one thing that annoys drivers the most is some wanker rolling up the side of the line of traffic, pulls into the crosswalk, then awkwardly trackstands until they put a foot down just before the light changes.
While I agree with you that people (like me) who can’t trackstand really well shouldn’t mess around at lights and potentially roll into the path of the cars, I’ve witnessed two guys who did it well enough to look like near-statues taking up no extra road space when trackstanding at the light - it’s what inspired me to finally learn to do this.
I can tell that’s a long way off from me right now, hopefully I’ll get there someday.
There is a long list of things that cyclists do that annoy drivers the most. In reality it’s probably something different for each driver and potentially each day depending on the last thing they saw a cyclist do….
That said, whilst seeing your point and not totally disagreeing with it, then on a commute especially I was pretty good at knowing the phasing and the timings of the signals to be able to know as I arrived how long it would be before the change and if it was worth the effort. The corollary is annoying drivers by riding off slowly once the lights changed as you’re trying to clip in and keep missing so end up weaving to the other side at 5mph before you finally get going. Ahem, according to a friend. Not me I’ve never missed a clip in. Just someone told me it had happened to theirs brothers friends uncle.
Where I agree (I think, not wanting to put words in your fingers too much) is that don’t do it to try and look flash if you’re going to annoy other people. If you’re able to do it and by doing it you’re not impeding others then I personally don’t see the issue. That said, the added one is don’t roll up behind other cyclists, try track standing and end up rolling 3 bike lengths over the stop line half way into the junction, almost fall off. Put foot down. Then be angled across the lane as the lights change, be in completely the wrong gear, wobble all over and delay traffic and bikes that were ahead of you. In that case I will summon the god of punctures on your spandexed skinny arse.
Number One on that list is “Just being there, in the first place”
When I used to hang other with bike messengers and other shadowy bicycle people in Philly, I knew some that were really good at it, but they never would trackstand out in the wild, preferring to save those skills for drunken parking lot antics and feats of braggery
