Few people riding today can remember a time when there was anything other than two high-end road groups: Shimano and Campagnolo. The truth is, there were others. Suntour was a long-standing group that went by the wayside thanks to a little help from a bigger, more powerful Shimano. In fact, the Japanese SunTour company developed the slanting parallelogram rear derailleur in 1964. This design revolutionized rear shifting because it enabled the jockey wheel to track the angle of the free wheel and thereby maintain a constant distance between the jockey wheel and the gear cluster (it wasn't called a cassette back then!). It wasn't until SunTour's patent expired in 1984 that Shimano and Campagnolo were able to incorporate this same technology into their rear derailleur designs.
Other companies that once prospered as group manufacturers were Simplex (French) and Sachs-Huret (French). But due to quality concerns, rapid technology changes and demands from consumers (like index shifting), and the increased popularity of mountain biking, only Campanolo and Shimano survived to offer high-end road groups. Until now.
The Chicago-based SRAM company provided glimpses of their first road group at the 2005 Interbike. Sealed up in a glass cubicle, the one example had a lot of tongues wagging and a lot of mouths watering. At Cadence, we saw the first road-going versions of the SRAM Force group (SRAM's top-of-the-line racing group) on Scott Zwizanski's Sierra Nevada-Kodak Team Merckx bike back in May, 2006. On a local Tuesday night ride, on which Scott and some fellow teammates joined us, the first thing we noticed about the SRAM Force group was how shifting resonated, especially with the team's allotment of Mavic Cosmic Carbon wheelsets. Everytime a rider shifted under extreme load it sounded as if a gun shot had been fired! Scott and his teammates reassured us that, loud as it may be, the SRAM Force groups were phenomenal when shifting under load, especially when climbing: a climb that cannot be made with other rear derailleurs. In fact, they all confessed, if there were just one thing they could point out as being truly remarkable about the SRAM group, it was how well it shifted under load.
SRAM introduces two new road-going groups for 2006: SRAM Force (SRAM's top-of-the-line group) and SRAM Rival, an Ultegra level race worthy group. Both groups feature SRAM's "DoubleTap" controls which provide a one-motion, one-solution shift control for front and rear derailleur shifts. In short, the DoubleTap feature of SRAM's product line delivers extremely smooth and refined up- and downshifts in one motion. Contrary to Campagnolo and Shimano, which require two levers to shift up and down, SRAM uses just the one brake lever for each of the front and rear derailleurs to deliver smooth and powerful shifting in one swoop. Whether you shift up or down is determined by how far you twist the brake lever.
The weight of the complete SRAM Force group rivals that of the Dura-Ace group and Force is sure to gain significant traction in the road side of cycling componentry. SRAM has worked out a number of OEM relationships for 2006 and 2007 which are certain to bring a lot of brand recognition, especially through SRAM's ties with some of the domestic manufacturers. At Cadence we've already had great feedback from our customers who've "made the leap." We certainly expect that SRAM will not be another brand to fall by the wayside along with many others in the illustrious history of innovative cycling products.