Saturday News And Views

New 520% range SRAM Eagle

A rare SN&V featuring some late-breaking news that didn't fit into the FN&V. Enjoy!

SRAM Announces Tweaked Eagle With Wider Range:

SRAM tweaked its flagship Eagle offerings and debuted them Thursday of this past week. Now with an increase to a 52T rear cog, the claimed range overall for the cassette is a whopping 520%.

First impression? That looks like a Mega-Range cassette cog slapped onto a 10-42T 11 speed cassette. And.......that's pretty much what it is. That's marketing, and marketing is what SRAM is all about. They win on that front everytime. But keep in mind, this is a 10 tooth jump to that 52T cog. SRAM had to do some engineering to get that to work, because they had reached the physical limitations of their old design for rear derailleurs.

Chain wrap has never been great on SRAM mtb groups. Once rear cog sizes swelled to above 42T, their way of doing the upper jockey wheel to cassette cog clearance was not working well. Mechanics complained about how the system was finicky, consumers complained about not being able to do certain things they used to be able to do with older drive trains. (Back pedaling being the main one) Part of that is the nature of 1X, but SRAM design was also at fault.

So, SRAM addressed this by altering the rear derailleur geometry so that the derailleur wraps the chain more around the bigger cogs. They also reduced the distance of the upper jockey wheel to the larger rings. This should have the effect of producing a more stable drive train, smoother low gear shifts, and keep the chain on if you back pedal. Note- it should do these things. 

There still is that massive 10 tooth jump from the 42T to the 52T. That's going to be a challenge under tension. That chain line with a wrapped chain in the bigger cogs should also prove to be strange in other ways. Wear for one. I'll be interested to see one of these in the future.

A 'one-and-done'? Possibly.....

Iowa's Ride Director Abandons Ship For Arizona Ride:

Last year a big shocker concerning former RAGBRAI director, T.J. Juskiewicz, happened when T.J. and his crew left RAGBRAI to form a competing ride dubbed "Iowa's Ride". This left a sort of 'civil war' between groups raging as to which ride to do, because at first these rides were to happen simultaneously. Then cooler heads ruled the day when Iowa's Ride decided to move to the week before RAGBRAI and an uneasy truce was struck between the competing rides. Of course, the COVID-19 deal threw a wrench in everyone's plans when both rides ended up being cancelled for 2020.

Now a new bombshell. On Thursday, an article appearing on the "Little Village" site, a news source for the Iowa City-Cedar Rapids region, stated that T.J. Juskiewicz had resigned from Iowa's Ride to take a position as executive director of El Tour de Tucson, as reported in the "Arizona Star", a major morning news paper serving Tuscon and the surrounding area.

It was not clear what the future of Iowa's Ride might be after 2021, but Juskiewicz did allude to the ride being held next Summer and said he planned on being there to do it in Iowa on the originally proposed route.

Comments: With '2020 Is Cancelled' dealing a blow to the as-yet-to-be-ridden Iowa's Ride, and RAGBRAI holding the 'tradition card', all this hullabaloo is not helping Iowa's Ride, nor its credibility, which was largely on the shoulders of Mr. Juskiewicz. One has to wonder if Iowa's Ride will happen at all now. And the future? Yeah..... I suppose anything is possible, but with the pandemic still unchecked and with a future unknown, does any of this even matter? Hard to say.....

Teravail Rutlands in 700c X 47mm size.

Poofy Tires Are Fun!

I think it was Steve Fuller who said something to the effect that a 38mm wide tire for gravel used to be considered big, but now anything below 42-43mm is too small. He mentioned 700c X 45mm as being 'normal' size for gravel travel now. We were musing on tires during our ride last weekend.

It is that way, isn't it? When you find the joy in riding a bigger volume tire, preferably tubeless, at a decent, low-ish pressure, well, it is awful hard to convince yourself that going narrower is better, and of course- it isn't better. It certainly isn't more fun! That's for sure.

But getting yourself to allow for the possibilities of 'wider is better' is not easy. I remember when WTB introduced the Riddler at 45mm wide and I thought, "Wow! That's maybe too big!" And now I look at that tire and shrug my shoulders. "No biggie!". Just an average tire these days. Isn't that odd?

So when I heard about Teravail's 700 X 47mm offerings, well.....I had to try that out! And now that I have, just a wee bit, I have to say, "Man! Those are sweet tires to ride!" The cushy width, the fast speed, and the more capable volume of those tires is amazing. And they are really fast. It isn't just me talking. I proved it on my roll-out test Thursday, into a head wind, and they out rolled several narrower tires I have tried. Impressive!

These wider tires are really getting quite good, and that is addictive. I just cannot see myself riding 40's, or even anything narrower anymore. Why? They ride worse and are not as stable. I'm with Steve on this matter. Wider, higher volume tires are just plain more fun.