Every road bike I ever had had the shifters on the down tube. These are pro road bikes though. If you are up right you cut into the wind and slow down. You have to reach all the way down to shift. plus brakes are "hooded" no extensions.

What on earth are you talking about- can you show a photo?

Pro riders use integrated shifters just like anyone else. If pro riders were all using downtube shifters for some bizarre reason, half the lycra-crad amateur crowd would be doing the same because fashion is such a big deal in cycling. Do you really think that when those guys are absolutely hammering it, they're going to reach down to their knees to fiddle around with 1980s shifting tech?

Here are a load of shifter setups from recent TdF bikes. You can see the paddles built into the brake levers, or in one case there's electronic shift buttons glued to handlebar next to the stem.

https://road.cc/content/tech-news/226185-tour-tech-2017-shifters-pros-are-using

The seat is a sliver. these are not comfort machines.

I'm fairly sure everyone here knows what a road saddle looks like. And they are called saddles. Only non-riders refer to them as 'seats'. UCI weight rules have meant that for at least the past decade, the idea of having to desperately save weight on a road bike is no longer an issue. Some pros have ridden with metal weights glued to their top tubes to bring them into regulation weight.

I do find the term saddle odd in reference to bicycles. It is attached to the seatpost which fits into the seat tube.

A seat supports all your weight, on a bike (just like a horse) part of your weight is on your feet so it's a saddle.  Why then a seat post and tube?  Good question!


As to your shifting problem is it a trim position?  These are part moves to improve chainline, though middle ring seems a strange place to have one.  Or could it be the button?  How many first-second shifts have you done reliably?

Quote from: Kavik on Thu, 11 June 2020, 00:19:43

I do find the term saddle odd in reference to bicycles. It is attached to the seatpost which fits into the seat tube.

A seat supports all your weight, on a bike (just like a horse) part of your weight is on your feet so it's a saddle.

Wow, that explanation was impressive.

Every road bike I ever had had the shifters on the down tube.

That was in the 80's, wasn't it? Modern road bikes don't have such shifters.

took my first real spill today.

Doing a tempo workout early this morning and the roads were still a little damp from last nights storm.  I was being cautious but i came up on a rough section of road around a curve and just lost traction over some of the bumbs and the bike slid out from under me.

Road rash all along my left side, ripped my favorite jersey and bibs and busted up my brake hood.  I don't think there are any mechanical problems with the bike but still might swing by the shop later and have them give it a once over to be safe. scraped the **** out of my brand new rims which im pretty blown about, but don't think theres any real damage to the rim brake track.

Pretty blown since i just threw in the towel on the workout, and felt like an idiot for not being more careful and for the damage to my bike + clothes.

Lesson learned I guess

Sorry to hear about the spill. Get some Tegaderm to treat the road rash, best thing you can use.

I may sound dumb, but I'd never heard of trimming before. I don't think my shifters have a trim position (there's no midway index point as I see in videos on the topic). My bike is a 2005 Giant OCR 3, so maybe my tech is old/cheap enough not to have it (?). I don't have any problems at all shifting from chain ring 1 to 2 or downshifting from any gear. It's only upshifting from 2 to 3 (outermost ring) that causes this issue, and it happens only intermittently. It was happening before I did any maintenance, so my tuning didn't improve or worsen the issue.

Don't know who's stupid, I read it as you having DI2!  I'm no expert as to when or at what level trim arrived, just aware it exists.

How can the cable not always have tension with traditional shifting... pretty sure it can't, other than if you're on the low stop which you can't be in the middle ring.  Maybe the clutch mechanism in the shifter doesn't engage?  That would make it really easy to move, the opposite of a dead person but maybe how you'd describe a dead gear lever.


Sorry to hear of your crash tentboy, wish I was wrong about needing the fatter tyres to protect the rims

I purchased my first road bike . It is incredibly light , so much so that there was a getting used to period. Also the shifting is intimidating at first but very easy to use after lap around the neighborhood. The front tire REFUSES to hold air so just be aware that you should buy a new bike tube when you purchase a bike also make sure you look over and adjust your brakes ! They don’t come ready to go after the box but the instructions do tell you how to manipulate them so that they work.