Rick Johnson

But my follow up offered a possible reason for that. Consider:



Manufacturers say, "we want to sell more disc brake bikes, make them
legal for cross racing."

Team owners say, "crap, even more stuff to buy!"

UCI says, "fine then we'll offset it so you don't have to buy so many
tires and wheels."



FWIW- I think banning tubulars would without question bring down the
cost of racing. This is one area the arms race has spun seriously out
of control. However, in the short term there would be much hue and cry
about all the expensive wheels they can't use. It's a change that would
surely have to be phased in.

Perhaps cutting down on the number of tires and wheels in use is
actually the first step... remember you heard it here first!



Rick

Rick Johnson

Bend, Oregon

Every revolutionary idea seems to evoke three stages of reaction...

One, it's completely impossible. 

Two, it's possible, but it's not worth doing. 

Three, I said it was a good idea all along.

Arthur C. Clarke

Whoops! Rick, I was going to thank you for your informed
reply (well... thanks anyway!) but I didn't know about the UCI
permitting disc brakes!

The whole argument about cost control just goes out the window.

Perhaps what the UCI should really do is ban tubulars! If the
UCI banned tubulars we'd all just go the the races with two wheelsets,
pre-ride the course then mount up the appropriate tires in 5-10 minutes.

-Brian

I agree, it does seem counterintuitive to
be going one way on tires and the other with brakes. Maybe they decided
to do one and the other was just an attempt to balance cost against it.

A possibility is that there was pressure
from industry to get disc brakes more widely adopted. That would assume
there is a profit incentive to selling more bikes with disc brakes.
After all where do you think disc brakes would be better received by
the market (after MTB of course) - for road use or cyclocross?

Rick

David Rosen wrote:

I don't get how limiting the tire width
does anyone any good. Now that disc brakes are legal, we will see a
huge upswing in disc technology and consequently in fork construction
and other parts to. The arms race has just been started again for
everyone who will want to upgrade or buy new bikes to compete. I can't
accept that tire size would be more of an arms race than the disc wars
will be. 

Just my $.02. Dave

* * *

My father asks : "Do you live here or ride bikes?"

http://liveorridebikes.blogspot.com

My life as a Crossniac:

www.crossniacs.com

Brian Johnson

Whoops! Rick, I was going to thank you for your informed reply
(well... thanks anyway!) but I didn't know about the UCI permitting
disc brakes!

The whole argument about cost control just goes out the window.

Perhaps what the UCI should really do is ban tubulars! If the UCI
banned tubulars we'd all just go the the races with two wheelsets,
pre-ride the course then mount up the appropriate tires in 5-10 minutes.

-Brian

> I agree, it does seem counterintuitive to be going one way on tires
> and the other with brakes. Maybe they decided to do one and the
> other was just an attempt to balance cost against it.
>
> A possibility is that there was pressure from industry to get disc
> brakes more widely adopted. That would assume there is a profit
> incentive to selling more bikes with disc brakes. After all where
> do you think disc brakes would be better received by the market
> (after MTB of course) - for road use or cyclocross?
>
> Rick

> David Rosen wrote:
>> I don't get how limiting the tire width does anyone any good. Now
>> that disc brakes are legal, we will see a huge upswing in disc
>> technology and consequently in fork construction and other parts
>> to. The arms race has just been started again for everyone who
>> will want to upgrade or buy new bikes to compete. I can't accept
>> that tire size would be more of an arms race than the disc wars
>> will be.
>> Just my $.02. Dave
>>

* * *
My father asks : "Do you live here or ride bikes?"
http://liveorridebikes.blogspot.com

My life as a Crossniac:
www.crossniacs.com