Unknown Singularity, my rad ride for the Rad Race
Story of my Fixed 42 World Championships companion
That’s the story of an adventure.
An adventure started in January and finished on June the 18th with the Fixed 42 World Championships, powered by Rad Race through the streets of Berlin.
But I’m not here today to talk about the whole story — you can get already enough literature about it into my 19 (+1) episodes of Spincake (my podcast) and soon into another publication I’m working on — nope, I’m here to talk about one the companion who rode me to the race: my Unknown Singularity.
The best part of the story is how I met Jan aka Mister Unknown Bikes Europe.
Yes, because Unknown is already a brand really well known in the US but still not enough here in Europe, and the main person for the distribution in our continent is Jan, based in Prague and enthusiast bike rider.
A couple of emails then I got to meet him here in Berlin (at Tante Lisabeth’s to be precise) some days after the Berliner Fahrradschau.
We got immediately a great sync: I love people crashing into the bicycle world with great humanity and intense personality, and Jan matches perfectly this description.
From the day after, I decided to get an Unknown Bike for my adventure on the Fixed 42 World Championships and also to cruise the city with smoothness and aggressiveness. Especially for this second reason, I decided to go for the Unknown Singularity, a really elegant frame with an almost vertical seat tube and really short wheelbase that makes that bike the perfect city racing animal.
The bike itself came out complete: all the components are from the same producer, everything apart from tires and pedals, that, at the end, are the only things I changed straightaway with a pair of Crankbrothers Candy 3 and Schwalbe Durano Tires . Oh yeah, another thing I had to fix during the first days: Singularity comes clearly legal with 2 brakes and racing levers, not so fancy for a fixed gear bike, so I took out the both, put on my handlebar a small lever for the front brake and, once that I was putting my hands on the front part, I also substitute the tape putting on something more colourful.
From day 2 my weapon was ready to go, throwing me into the city like a slingshot. The Singularity is really a great vehicle to move between traffic lights and jams. Alloy frame and carbon fork, mean stiffness and great responsiveness when you have to move from side to side in sprints and nervous shifts. The flat frame tubes, then, let you feel the importance of aerodynamic for longer rides with a full gas attitude. I noticed that during my trainings to the BER Airport or for the monitoring ride of the Fixed 42 track.
For racing itself, another thing can be changed — thing that I didn’t, leaving myself spinning on my bike like a blender — the gear ratio. The Unknown Singularity comes with a 48x17, perfect for riding cities and smashing alleycats, but for any other race you can risk way more. For sure next year — yes, because I’m gonna do it again — I will ride my Singularity with a 49x14 for a better power effort. But in the meanwhile, the Singularity will ride with me in the city as it is: stiff, nervous and marvellous as it is.
Something I will suggest to Jan, and you can bet on it that I will do it, is: give customers some more wheel options — medium/high profile, to get the best from this aero machine — and also a more discrete design — less unknown tags, that beauty is already more than recognizable, but I’m a minimalism supporter.
But that’s my fixed gear bike and I love it, ‘till Unknown will come up with some news.
