Feel the love, but don’t bother reaching for a brake ‘cos it ain’t there! Fixed wheel bikes are machines in perfect harmony with their rider’s legs. Try one and you’ll understand.

It’s Zen and the art of riding in traffic. Just don’t stop pedalling. Ever. Or you’ll be thrown clean over the bars.

The fashion for modifying classic road racing bikes by ditching the freewheel and setting up a direct connection between wheel and legs started with penniless couriers trying to keep their costs down. These days riding a fixie about town is more an ideological than an economic statement.

The courier image hangs on: over the shoulder bags, body piercings (most visible, some thankfully not), no helmet, narrow, sometimes ridiculously narrow, handlebars to keep you moving through tight traffic and flyers in the wheel to tell everyone which gigs you’ve been to. But now, as you’ll see around the specialist shops, in Brick Lane for example, the spectrum is wider. Pretty girls love riding fixies as much as ugly guys.

The image: Ice cool, chic and master/mistress of the technically very demanding.

Bike: High-end road bike frame stripped of all creature comforts, and most safety features. Fix wheel (no freewheel), 12-inch wide handlebars, and suicide front brake, if any.

Fashion: Three quarter length combat jeans, studded belt, over the shoulder bag. No washing machine.

Media: Guardian, Metro and, of course, eBay/theGumtree. com for new old bikes.