Velonews did a thing a long time ago and asked a bunch of us what we thought the best cycling innovation has been throughout our careers.  I can’t remember all the answers, but there were some pretty interesting one.

I said that I thought that clipless pedals were the best upgrade.  It would have been hard, at the time, to convince me that something better had come along.

That was until I read the article and Thurlow Rogers said that lycra shorts with synthetic chamois was his answer.  I was like, duh.  Of course he was right.

I would much rather be riding around with toe clips, with shorts with synthetic chamois, than clipless pedals and having to ride shorts with leather chamois.

When I think back upon it, I’m not sure how I got along with leather chamois.  They could be horrible.  Better shorts had better chamois, but the “maintenance” of the chamois was horrendous.

Washing the things was a hassle.  They would get all slick and slimy.  Then they would take forever to dry if the weather was humid.

I don’t know how many pairs of shorts I had that had blown out chamois.  There is nothing like riding with a hole in a leather chamois.  I used to buy replacement chamois and try to sew them in.  I’m not good enough with a sewing machine to accomplish that task with any type of success.  It was always a disaster.

I didn’t realize that Kucharik still replaced chamois.  Kucharik was the first pair of lycra bib shorts I ever rode in.  They will replace a leather chamois for $45. That seems like a crazy good deal.  I’m thinking about sending in a pair of chamois-less shorts to them and have them put in a leather one.  Then I can go back to memory lane and see if it is as bad as I remember.

So, clipless pedals would be #2.  If I had to pick more then Di2 shifting would probably be #3. For sure STI shifting on the brake levers.  Then Di2 shifting.  Shifting on the downtube wasn’t efficient and it could cost you a race.  It is strange thinking about how shifting in a race was part of the tactics.  Watching when your competitor was shifting was integral in one up sprints.   I don’t know how many races I won by jumping when the guy I was racing with was shifting.

Clincher tires have improved a bunch.  Sealing tires up tubelesss off-road is obviously a big innovation, but I’m sort of pre-dating that with the road comparisons.  There really weren’t MTB around when the chamois were leather.

I’m not sure about the frames.   Titanium has improved a ton, being lighter and stiffer. There wasn’t carbon around, so obviously that is a game charger, weight-wise.   Frames  have differently gotten way stiffer for the weight, but I probably could get along riding a 1978 Colnago Super frame with modern equipment.

Wheel technology is a big deal though.  The wheels we ride now are way faster than a 32 spoke wheel of yesteryear.  The lower spoke count and rim depth takes away a ton of wind resistance.  I used to race on 28 hole wheels, I ever had a 24 spoke front wheel when I was really young. They were light.  The rims would weight around 260 grams, but they were not reliable.  It was so easy denting a rim back then.

Anyway, that is my list off the top of my head this morning.  If I missed something, which I’m sure I did, just leave a comment.

This chamois doesn’t look thick enough to last very long.

I rode these pedals for a couple seasons. They are selling a bunch on eBay. You can’t use them unless you have the cranks though. I saw a new bag of pedal adaptors in my basement just a while ago.

Tucker is a messy drinker after running.

Yesterday’s post about innovation in cycling got a lot of responses from guys about what changed their riding experiences the most.  Innovation in the mechanical aspect of the sport is a big part of why it is appealing to some of us.

There was a comment from Aki and he said – “I tried to make up for my pedaling deficiencies by using technology. The first trick was the Leonard Nitz inspired right side bar end shifter. I could out jump others because I was in a lower gear then out sprint them because I was in a higher gear.”

I thought that was a good observation, but it wasn’t accurate.  My brother “inspired” the indexed bar shifter.

It was in the mid 80’s and I have already won cyclocross Nationals a couple times.  We were riding friction bar end shifters back then.  Then Shimano came out with their index shifting or SIS shifting. Index shifting is where there is a positive click, where you don’t have to adjust the gearing in the back manually.  This was in 1984 I think.

The first time I saw index shifting was on Greg Demgen’s bike.  He and Marianne Berglund had went to Japan for a Shimano race and when they returned, they both had SIS shifting on their bikes.  It was 6 speed back then.

I rode on the Levis Professional Team at the time and we were sponsored by Shimano, so soon we all were riding “the new” shifting.  This was pretty much the start of the demise of the domination of racing equipment by Campagnolo.

The Levis Team went defunct, so I started riding for Schwinn.  The Nabisco criterium series was going on then and that was a focus of the team, so we were racing a ton of criteriums. I started thinking about using my cross set up on my criterium bike.  But there were only fiction bar end shifters.

I was talking to my brother, Kris about it, and he went and took a pair of downtube SIS shifters and fabricated a mounting boss.  He flipped the right downtube shifter upside down  and all of a sudden we had a rear bar end shifter with index shifting.  My brother made other guys on my team some shifters.  I think that Tom Broznowski and maybe Alan McCormick (anyone know Alan rode the Tour of Spain?  I didn’t.) were riding them too.

Leonard “Harvery” Nitz,  was primarily a track racer, who rode for 7-11, and was going over to Japan to do the fall Shimano race there.  This was in the late 80’s.  I think Wayne Stetina called and asked me about getting Leonard a index shifter for the right side.  (We were riding just the left side shifters, with a normal downtube shifter for the front.)  I really don’t remember talking to Leonard about it, but maybe did.

Anyway, Kris was stoked about making a shifter for Leonard.   It didn’t take very long and then we shipped the shifter to Leonard, who I believe lived in Sacramento at the time.

Anyway, the next year, Velonews did an interview with Leonard and asked him about his right index bar end and he said that he came up with the idea and fabricated it himself in California. That was rubbish.  He knew full well that my brother made it and we sent it to him the year before.  It hurt my brother’s feeling at the time.

I’m not sure if it was the next year, but really soon, Shimano came out with STI shifting, which is the brake lever mounted shifting we all ride now.  I’ve always credited my brother with the idea of bar mounted shifted.  It wasn’t a big leap for the Japanese engineers at Shimano to take the index bar mounted shifting and moving it to the brake lever, which was more accessible in normal riding situations.

So, to answer Aki’s comment, no Harvey Nitz didn’t invent index bar shifting, my brother Kris did.  Now the record is straight, publically.

Shimano cleaned them up when they started producing them. I probably have an original one in my basement still.

Tucker came back a tad dirty last night on the walk.