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(Photo: sniderscion

An article on shift gears effectively was forwarded to us recently by an anonymous I Bike TOer. We agreed this might be useful for our readers (and if they still can't get the hang of it they can stick to single speed bikes).

The author is a bike mechanic that realized that an experienced cyclist was complaining to him about his gears but realized that they did not know how to properly shift their gears. So he rode around with him and came up with some tips:

Tip one: Pedal at a brisk pace. It’s better to pedal at a brisk pace using the easier to pedal gears than to muscle the harder gears more slowly. This technique will increase your stamina over a longer ride and will enable you to accelerate more quickly if you need to "jump". I promise you’ll still get a good leg workout. A brisk pace on the pedals also improves the shifting.

Tip two: And this is hugely important. Lighten the pressure on the pedals when you shift. Keep them turning, but don't be muscling down on them while you shift. Lightening the pressure on the pedals significantly smoothes the gear change, reduces those grinding noises when you shift, and lengthens the life of your drive train. You’ll have to anticipate your shifts a bit as you approach the hills, but it only takes a beat to change your gears on a hill once you get your timing down.

Toronto has its share of fast, arterial roads with miles of empty sidewalk. The mantra of anti-sidewalk riding is more about moralizing than about coming up with practical solutions to high levels of sidewalk cycling collisions and falls. In fact, there is some obvious two-faced advice being given since we still allow kids to ride on the sidewalk while also trying to convince adults that sidewalks are so dangerous that we shouldn't even attempt to bike on them. My small part here is not to encourage cyclists to break a city by-law but to give some advice on how safely ride sidewalks if the cyclist finds themselves in the unfortunate and illegal position of being on a bike on a sidewalk.

One such area where cyclists often find themselves on the sidewalk is the suburbs. Take any fast arterial road with nearly empty sidewalks and you'll find plenty of unsure and largely untrained cyclists braving the sidewalks. The law tells them they can only use the road, but I find it highly unlikely that such a cyclist would find their safety level increase by cycling on an arterial road. In fact, it would be a quick way to crush their resolve to bike and force them back into their car.

With a bit of training you too can be a safer and more considerate sidewalk cyclist. :

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