SRAM presents “Riding Into The Digital Age” … are we ready?

Written by Tyler Benedict Sep 24, 2022 6:00 p.m. ET

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After releasing two phenomenal videos about hydraulic disc brakes, SRAM continues their Open Workings video series with this exploration of the growing electronics and integration found on modern bikes…and in our modern cycling lifestyle.

From Zwift and Strava to their suite of onboard diagnostics and automatic adjustments, it goes far beyond electronic shifting. Yes, we still appreciate a good mechanical group and mourn the loss of options at the high end, but it’s still exciting to see where it could take us.

Tyler Benedict

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Tyler Benedict is the Founder of Bikerumor.com. He has been writing about the latest bikes, components, and cycling technology for almost two decades. Prior to that, Tyler launched and built multiple sports nutrition brands and consumer goods companies, mostly as an excuse to travel to killer riding locations throughout North America.

Based in North Carolina, Tyler loves family adventure travel and is always on the lookout for the next shiny new part to make his bikes faster and lighter.

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alloycowboy

1 year ago

@SRAM… You need to rethink Flight Attendant because what it does is it gives a rider an unpredictable dynamic bicycle to manage because the bicycle is constantly trying to guess the terrain ahead based on the previous terrain ridden. It is essentially backward-looking bicycle management.

Ernest Fitzgerald

1 year ago

Am curious why so much of the video was an advertisement for Strava…. is there some tie-in between Strava and Sram? Or was it just a way to groom us for Sram’s digital integration?

whatever

1 year ago

HARD PASS! I have a bike with AXS, and really, it’s just one more thing to keep up with, and ti still just shifts gears. Not about to add to the add to the complexity, for more money, just to ride a bike.

Fabricio

1 year ago

Conclusions:

SRAM will buy Strava.

Even when AXS is electronic the only difference with the mechanic derailleurs is… just wireless, not better not worse, the same.

If you don’t know how a suspension works, you believe that just placing a battery on it will do magi?, anyway you must know basics and logic, isn’t so easy like plug and ride.

Many people with Power meters doesn’t know what those number means or how to improve them.

Many people buying the last and more expensive GPS when the simple one and cheaper will fill the 98% of numbers for a normal human being.

What happens when all these marvelous gadgets fail in the middle of nowhere?, maybe that’s the place that many need to be to understand that any of those gadgets are nothing without basic knowledge.

And by the way, I have AXS in my bike (not reverb, it is too much money for a post that One UP Components beat easily everywhere), but AXS was just because I want it to try, waiting years from XX1 11V until I knew that Eagle will coming and after that Eagle will coming wireless, but that battery is enough for me, just charge it every few weeks with my Edge 130 is enough electronics, suspensions and other gadgets are just trending for a while…..Who remember the +wheels??? how many around now???.

-2

Fitness

1 year ago

Love electronic shifting, getting on a mechanical bike after riding electronic for awhile is a big step backwards. It’s spoiled us

Freezer

1 year ago

Strava does spur you to ride faster. Not necessarily a good thing when you end up chasing DH times. Ask my orthopedic surgeon how I know…

Johnny

1 year ago

Engage palm to face….the philosophies of Grant Petersen are resonating more and more with me as bike companies try to convince people to make their bikes and lives more and more complicated by spending a lot of money. This is only reiterated by the fact that I see so many people out and about riding on poorly fitting bikes that were intended for elite level athletes falling way outside of the bell curve of even the more gifted general riding public. This serves as nothing more than a degree of gatekeeping and a layer of intimidation for people that may be entertaining the idea of getting into riding. Oblah dee….

grant petersen

1 year ago

Lots of ways to enjoy riding a bike, lots of tastes and styles. My personal concern, which I’m sure throngs will say should be “of no concern to me,” is that the promotion of electronic bicycles will automatically make normal bicycles seem archaic. This could conceivably be reinforced when bicycle shops have 90 percent electronic bikes, and only a few window dressing high-art outrageously expensive normal bikes, and a few super-entry level bicycles, which would be on the floor and technically available, but whose purpose would really be as launching points a notch or two up into electronics.
It is difficult, these days, without coming off like a cave man, to try to espouse or talk about bicycles that are truly simple and mechancial, and the satisfaction of operating the bikes, even when a successful instant shift isn’t guaranteed. That threatens people who’ve already bought, and they take it as a personal attack. Plus, it comes off as romanticizing the past for its archaic charm, or something, and that’s direspectful in its own way. “At the end of the day,” all we can do is watch the parade and hope for the best and deal with whatever comes down the pike. Right?