this is how not to ride your bike in nyc.
theyve got balls.
ive seen that many times (and done worse lol)
I would love to be a cycle courier! I looked into doing it as a job but theres not many here in the UK, I think mainly in the big cities.
edd
So that’s a job? What is the purpose? Links anyone?
bike couriers/messengers usually work at the downtowns of large cities. They ride fixed gear bikes (meaning if the bike is moving the pedals are moving, no coasting) usually with no brakes. They deliver documents and packages to office buildings. In a city like NY a bike messenger will be able to deliver a package much faster then a truck because of the crowded streets.
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Yeah its been posted at least once before here, but its a pretty damn cool video. They hold what are called alleycat races where all the couriers get together and are given a series of locations in the city they need to get to. Sometimes they will dress up in silly costumes, some take it more seriously. There are no rules, they aren’t official races, they are basically just a bunch of bike couriers going balls out for the hell of it (or maybe a bit of prize money they scraped together).
There are a bunch of other cool bike courier videos on youtube, a few documentaries on them and stuff like that, most critical mass rides are usualy full of couriers.
Pretty much every big city has bike couriers, and where you have bike coureiers you are going to have alley cat races in some form. Even Ottawa has them, although I don’t know how hardcore the races get. But imagine that, that kind of aggressive racing on snow, ice, and slush! 
HOLY FUCK! (excuse my language) those guy are crazy!
What a bunch of idiots. They could easily hurt someone else or cause a crash. I would hate to drive there…
It’s alright, you’re from Montana. We understand.
that looks like so much fun!
I like how they hang onto the cars:D
I have a fixed gear bike, they can be scary especially with clip in pedals and no brakes, but they go fast and if you know what your doing you will be fine.
I think it’s one of reliability… when your income depends on your bike you don’t want to discover your gears have stopped working or somesuch. There’s very little to go wrong on a fixed gear bike, and in cities that aren’t too hilly gears aren’t really necessary anyway.
For reference those videos in the link above came from http://www.digave.com/.
Phil
I haven’t seen more than a few (or possibly the same) messengers on a fixed gear bike. Probably because many of the messengers here are road- or mountainbike riders who use the job as a way of getting the expensive bike they want without having to pay tax when they buy it.
Also there’s not a lot to swipe from a fixed gear bike, which is a plus, and if it were stolen, chances are that the only people in the market for a fixed gear are in the same scene as you, bike couriers and hardcore cyclists.
Above, I tried to post a pic of “Quicksilver”, a badly written movie about bike couriers, it’s not showing up. Kevin Bacon rides a fixed gear and his arch nemesis is a drug dealer in a large hoopty that runs over his friends.
Me and a couple of friends are getting more into road biking, but we don’t ride in streets with lots of traffic (we value our lives somewhat). But commuting between classes can be a blast, especially when it’s crowded. I’m still too scared to take the front brake off of my fixie, though.
I don’t think the bikes in that vid are fixies.
One of them was. Did you see how the guy coasted down the bridge?
yeah, too many wheels
Oh yeah, right.