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The Mountain States Cup season finale at Purgatory celebrated what the MSC came to do! This series revival brought high level racing back to the Rockies! Thanks to MSC, Shawn, Julia, and Bill for the vision, patience, and ability to bring this home. Excited to see what they bring next year! This is the series to watch and attend! The videos are on their website and on You Tube. https://mountainstatescup.com/

Worth noting- broadcast pricing is planned to start at ~$10 USD (depending on exchange rate at the time). This won’t be a normal race broadcast as you know it- we are building out a full show, and when racing goes live we’ll have 40+ cameras on course.

That's quite a hard working rocker link...

Must we, every 3 months, have this same tired drivetrain discussion. You like what you like, I like what I like. No one cares. Start a new topic if you guys want to duke it out about how terrible the wireless world is. Back to the rumors: 30T ochains on more builds in the future from a few brands.

Product managers aren’t looking for shiny new things, they are looking to create sales w max profit margins. Shiny and new is one way to do that, but it ain’t the only one.

If an STFU is the price for that it’s pretty good though, right? I still remember when SRAM went from the 2.0 clutch to 2.1 without telling people and suddenly they couldn’t be adjusted or serviced - it would shred itself, race mechanics all over found out the hard way. That kind of fuckery sums it up. My current cabled Shimano can be rebuilt pretty quick, it’s adjustable, you can even turn the clutch off, and it works great. I know that’s not Di2, but the thinking is the same. When sram went public they released a portfolio showing their...

It’s weird - sram can release an ecosystem of groups with proprietary cassettes, derailleurs, chains, rings, that have stratospheric prices and persistent issues (speed, shift calibration limitations, QC issues, cassettes that need to be installed multiple times to settle, battery pins corroding etc etc), plus compromises they try and correct release to release. Maybe that’s ok, it’s up to the rider. At the same time, Shimano releases a new di2 ecosystem that uses their existing(and awesome) cassettes, chains, rings, has the industry leading shifter for ergonomics. A sealed battery compartment, but its perceived to be noisy on some bikes, but...

¿Por qué no los dos ?

Yeah, I am not sure of the exact details and other possible differences, but my understanding is that prototype molds are made from aluminum and thus are much faster and easier to machine, whereas full production run molds are steel and are much more difficult, time consuming, and therefore costly to produce.

Crestline uses prototype molds. So he literally can’t make more than like 200 before they wear out IIRC

In response to the latest Tallboy they're going to start making VPP bikes with interrupted seat tubes

Can you imagine watching a 12 hour live stream ultra race? My own mom wouldn't watch that if I was winning.

Incredible project to be part of, and an awesome creative escape for a contract engineer like Dan. Dan and I have worked on many projects together, and I’ve been lucky enough to spend some time in Champery with him the past two years. He’s an incredible bike engineer and absolute shredder. Getting to chase him down Verbier, Les Houches, Aosta Valley, Champery DH track the day after World Champs has truly been a treat. Dan hired me to take on the fabrication side of the project. Here’s some in process shots. Hopping on a plane shortly to go buy Dan...

Dude, dude, dude... hear me out: I agree that you'd ideally want to have cage spring forces that are lower in the big cogs for easier shifts while climbing and higher cage spring forces in the smaller cogs for greater chain retention and chain calming during descents, and yes the current arrangement on the new dual-spring Shimano RD's is kind of the opposite of that. You know what could be done by Shimano to reverse the derailleur cage spring force problem? You know what they could do? You know what? RAPID RISE IS BACK BABY!!!!! LOW NORMAL THIS IS YOUR...

It all depends on the bike, tbh. I've ridden all the new Di2 stuff on a ton of different bikes, and I've found that chain sizing really matters. I've tested T-Type and the new Di2 back-to-back on the same bikes, and while SRAM does do a slightly better job of keeping the spazzing to a minimum, it's certainly not perfect. The dual-spring on Shimano takes about 5-6 lbs of force to break free when in the smallest cog on the cassette, and the SRAM T-Type clutch takes about 7.5-8 lbs to break free no matter what cog. The major difference...

The new hanger/ Dura Ace group was discussed on the Geek Warning podcast recently and they said the new hanger was to allow the smallest cog to sit further outboard (pushing into the space SRAMs "sandwich" design clamps the dropout) because the 13-speed cassette uses the same hub driver and chain as 12-speed (so cog spacing is also the same as 12sp).

"C hange your politics, fix your problems." Hadn't thought of that one yet. Thanks for the advice. Signed, Americans

@sspomer and @Jason_Schroeder I just listened to the recent Inside Line pod where y'all were perplexed by the Avinox haters. I wanted to provide some honest insight into this: for many of us, it's because they're higher power than Class 1 and we worry that they're going to jeopardize e-bike trail access. I'd like to see DJI and Specialized eat dirt since they don't care one iota about trail access dynamics. I'd love to hear you start calling Avinox (and others) out on being over 750 watts and not Class 1. It's maddening whenever there's a review that doesn't bring...

The weight transfer forward during braking improves the tire-to-round traction, which means that you can apply more brake force without skidding. The energy converted to heat will be higher if the front wheel is doing the heavy lifting. A bigger rotor provides more thermal mass and a larger radiator. I'm curious if the move to larger rear rotors on some DH bikes is more about tracks been janky enough that you just can't use the front brake as much? makes more sense to put the larger rotor where the most braking is done.

What do you mean amplify. Weight transfer gives you more grip. It only makes sense to have more braking power (i.e. bigger rotor) in the front. QED: literally every car on the road. If it has a rear weight bias (Porsche for example) or a near 50 50 split, the difference front to rear is smaller, but still present.