One ring...

As you may have read, keeping the chain on the front ring of your 1x9 or 1x10 setup is not easy in bumpy conditions. Nippleworks has been futzing with it for two seasons of cross racing now. Read about it here, here and here. Well, James Huang @ Cyclingnews tackled the problem head on in a good article that covers most of the available options including some innovative homebrew stuff.

Fuzzy ear warmers

Here's something I can't recommend enough - the New Years morning bike ride. It does the following:
a) it keeps you from partying like it's 1999
b) it prevents you from learning the meaning of "coyote ugly"
d) it's better than going to a holiday sale at the mall
c) it starts the biking year off on the right foot

This year, I rode up to the top of Mt. Hamilton on New Years morning, along with a huge crowd of strangers and friends, all out for the same reasons. Mt. Hamilton is a not too steep, but very long climb, and the road has 4k feet of elevation gain. During winter, the top is frequently snowy so weather is a serious factor, but traffic is usually not. You can't do it every year, but when you can, it's great. Every part of the US (except Florida) probably has a similarly good holiday ride.

This year, I met a friendly fellow with a really neat piece of gear. Fuzzy ear warmers on his helmet. Here he is surveying the cold, foggy valley below from the warm, sunny peak:

Notice that he's also sporting a cycling cap and that the ear warmers are velcro'd on to his helmet straps. This means his noggin is dressed in layers. Take the ear warmers off when you get warm, and the hat when you get warmer. Put it all back on for the descent. He told me that you can get these, handmade by a local seamstress, at Cupertino Bike Shop. I haven't verified this yet, but I'm sure they'd be happy if you'd drop by and ask about them, or check out the website for yourself. I've been happy for several years with an Outdoor Research Military Watch Cap. It's pretty handy because you can flip up the band to uncover your ears if you get warm.

The fellow with the ear warmers also had an unusual bar mounted index shifter with double paddles:

Where did these come from?

Vintage front derailler and trick brake cable hanger

While I was walking through the parking lot at this weekend's cyclocross race (last in the Bay Area Super Prestige Series) I noticed a fun Hunter bicycle. By the way, check out the sandy beach track just behind it. I noticed that it had a 70's vintage Campagnolo front derailler. How was he shifting it? Not by ergo-lever. Bar end shifter. Also, notice the nifty front brake cable hanger wrapped around the stem:

Dingle Cross

The dingle is a rare breed. This bike I saw was an Independent Fabrication cross bike with horizontal dropouts and S&S travel couplers. Sub note here, if you can race cross on a bike with travel couplers, they should be pretty much bomb proof. Anyway, this bike is a double gear ratio single speed. Hence the dingle name. You can rig it up in either of two gear ratios, one being lower than the other, but both requiring more or less the same chain length. It does require you to loosen the axle nut to get some slack on the chain, so I don't think this guy is shifting during races. Why build a dingle bike? I read an article by one guy who had to ride downhill to work and uphill and into the wind to get home. This reminds me of my bike commute in Boulder which was East (downhill and down wind) in the morning and West (uphill and into the wind) in the afternoon. Why not put a shifter on you ask? Well, winters in Boulder are kind of hard on drivetrains, and I'm sure the East Coast or central Europe is worse. Also, you get rid of cables which really do not like gritty road spray. Could be of benefit to single speed racers too. It allows you to pick the better drivetrain for the course once you get a chance to pre-ride it, unlike a true single speed setup that requires a tool-intensive cog change or money-intensive rear wheel change.

On as historical note, this reminds me of the original Campy suicide shifter:

picture from Rock The Bike

How long before we see the re-introduction of the seat stay mounted quick release?

Miche road components

In our recent post about road bike drop bar shifters, reader Kraytwin makes a great point - Miche is out there selling what looks like complete component groups. However, if you scrutinize the pictures on their web site, it appears that they use Campagnolo 11 speed and 10 speed shifters to anchor those gruppos. I don't know too much about them, and there's not too much about them written in English on the web. I do know that the last time I was shopping for a replacement cassette for my 9 speed Campy bike, their steel 'pignone' were the best deal. Anyone out there using their other stuff?

(BTW, pignone means gears and should not be confused with Pignoni, the Baroque painter who liked his women like he liked his wine - full bodied)

Photos from www.miche.it

Nothing exceeds like excess

By my count, there are currently 22 shift / brake lever options currently on the market for your drop bar bike:

Campagnolo Veloce 10 speed Ultra Shift

Campagnolo Veloce 10 speed Escape Ergo Power

Campagnolo Centaur 10 speed Ultra Shift

Campagnolo Centaur 10 speed Carbon Ultra Shift

Campagnolo Chorus 11 speed Ultra Shift

Campagnolo Record 11 speed Ultra Shift

Campagnolo Super Record 11 speed Ultra Shift

Stram Rival 10 speed

Sram Force 10 speed

Sram Red 10 speed

Microshift Arsis 10 speed (seriously, you named it Arsis?)

Sampson Stratics 10 speed

Sampson Showtime 10 speed

Modolo Morphos 7 to 10 speed

Shimano Sora 9 Speed

Shimano Tiagra 9 Speed

Shimano 105 10 Speed

Shimano Ultegra 10 speed
Shimano Ultegra SL 10 speed

Shimano Dura Ace 10 speed

Shimano ST-R700 10 speed short reach

Shimano ST-R600 9 speed short reach

Shimano ST-R500 8 speed

Has there ever been more selection? Will the economy force bike manufactueres to streamline their product portfolio? Do all these options make sense? Should the big two keep selling 4 different gear number options (8,9,10,11 speed)? Will this explode into consumer confusion with electronic shifting?

Did I miss any?

-p-

Shifting the scoop, scooping the shift

While the big time cycling press is falling all over themselves to review, photograph and gush over the new Shimano Dura Ace electronic road group and the new Campagnolo 11 speed Super Record group, nippleworks has the scoop. Nashbar just began selling their own 10 speed shifter set for the bargain price of $149 a pair. Want to spruce up that old road bike with more modern components? Need to replace the stock Shimano shifter on your crashed bike? Packed your Ultegra's full of mud during cyclocross? Not sponsored or independently wealthy? Pick up a pair of these.

Photos from nashbar.com