On The Pedals
The Daily Grind
Over The Bars
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Das Rant
Shifting Gears |
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Believe it or not, one of the first bicycles I clearly remember riding happened
to be a 3-speed. It was a road bike whose brand name eludes me now that must have
been made/ purchased sometime in the late 1960s/ early 70’s. It was far from new
by the time I got to tool around on it and all I really remember is that it was
painted sparkly purple and the shifter looked more like an automatic gear selector
on the floor of a Camaro than it did a bicycle component (yes it was on the middle
of the top tube of all places, very safe for the “family jewels” should one slip
off the saddle). Thinking back on it now I’m convinced the bike must have either
been designed by a woman or someone very concerned with population control.
From there it was directly back to the single speed mentality as BMX was becoming all of the rage in the early 80’s. Never mind that neither me nor any of the other posers in the neighborhood were actually taking our bikes anywhere near a crumb of dirt, the goal was a thick crossbar pad, circular number plates, and both lever-activated and coaster brakes. From there it became cool to ditch the BMX attitude altogether and to move up to an “adult” bike of the generic 10-speed variety. It didn’t matter what brand so long as it had skinny tires, handlebars that appeared to have been designed after looking at a ram’s horns, a slung-over riding position and the ever-critical derailleur. Yes five cogs out back and a pair of chainrings in the front is all that separated the men from the boys in those days. It was shortly thereafter that my friends and I started driving cars and realizing that girls were a lot more fun to chase around than each other and the bikes got stationed up on rafter hooks for quite a while. I remember hearing about mountain bikes once the local department stores made the switch from carrying only BMX and road bikes to carrying their own version of the term. These bikes had knobby tires instead of those skinny road-racing slicks and where 10-speeds was once a mind-boggling set of gear combinations, 18, 24 then 27 gear combinations became standard equipment. By the time I returned to the game in the early 90’s, it was looking like sky just may have been the limit for the cog makers. Why stop at 27? I mean instead of 9 cogs out back and three chainrings on the cranks, what would happen if you could go 10 and five? 50 gear combinations, that’s what! As in that line of thinking, I found it pretty counterproductive to hear single speeds were coming back in force in recent years. I mean come on, talk about knocking us back down to my early BMX mentality! What next, the rediscovery of the 3-speed I hurt my taint on? I bring all of this up because if you haven’t heard already, SRAM says its time to rethink the mountain bike transmission once again. Only this time, rather than pursue my crazy 50-speed concept, they’re looking to knock 27 down to 20 gears. The Truvativ XX group will make use of 10 cogs out back just like I’ve always dreamed was possible only rather than four chainrings up front, will use just a pair. Will this new trend catch on? Who knows? It seems like every year at least one company has to reinvent something that nobody even realized needed attention. If not single speeds its 29-inch wheels then 27.5”, or oversized axles that require a pair of Allen wrenches rather than a quick-release skewer to service. All I can say for sure is that maybe ditching 7 gears from the average MTB tranny will free up some mental energy for actually riding that is currently being allocated to figuring out what the hell gear you’re in. In the meantime, so long as the shifter isn’t located on the top tube, count me in. |