The Gears - How They Work And How To Use Them - Canyon road bike Manual

58 GEARS
THE GEARS
The gears on your Canyon serve to adjust your pedal-
ling power to the slope of the road, wind conditions,
and the desired speed. The gears do not reduce the
physical work to be performed which remains the
same with the identical distance to be performed at
identical speed, but the pedalling force per crank ro-
tation. In other words: A low gear allows you to climb
steep hills with moderate pedalling force. You have to
pedal, however, relatively fast.
Downhill you switch to a high gear. Every turn of
the pedals takes you many metres forward at corre-
spondingly high speed. To ride economically you fre-
quently have to switch gears. As with a motor vehicle,
your „engine" wants to be kept within a certain speed
range, if it is to give its best performance.
On level ground your pedalling speed, also referred
to as cadence, should be higher than 60 strokes
a minute. Racing cyclists pedal at a rate between
90 and 110 strokes a minute on level ground. When
climbing uphill, your cadence will naturally fall off
somewhat. Your pedalling should always remain flu-
ent however. finely graduated adjustments as well as
an easy operability of modern bike gears are the best
preconditions for an efficient riding. In addition, it re-
duces chain and sprocket wear as well as the strain
on your knee joints.
Derailleur gears are the most effective type of trans-
mission on bikes. About 97 to 98 percent of the
pedalling force performed is transmitted to the rear
wheel with well-maintained and greased derailleur
gears. The control of the gear system as well as the
braking performance leave nothing to be desired.
With specially designed sprocket teeth, flexible
chains and clearcut lever positions, shifting gears
has become very easy.
Derailleur gears
Rear derailleur
front derailleur
Always wear straight-cut trousers or use
!
trouser clips or the like to make sure your
trousers do not get caught in the chain or chain-
rings, throwing you off your bike.
HOW THEY WORK AND HOW TO USE THEM
THE GEARS - HOW THEY WORk AND HOW TO USE
THEM
With road bikes the shift levers are integrated in the
brake lever. On a Campagnolo equipped bike moving
the small shift lever located behind the brake lever
inward by means of your index or middle finger shifts
the chain towards the larger sprockets. Pressing with
your thumb on the shifter located on the inward fac-
ing side of the brake lever mount, moves the chain
towards the next smaller sprocket.
With Shimano levers swivelling the entire brake lever
inward shifts the chain towards the larger sprockets.
Pressing only the small lever inward makes the chain
move towards the smaller sprockets.
With SRAM force doubletap levers there is only one
shifting lever positioned behind the brake lever. A
short tap to the inward moves the chain to a smaller
sprocket. Sweeping the shifting lever more in means
the derailleur shifts the chain to larger sprockets.
One tap can shift up to three gears.
With Shimano, SRAM and Campagnolo bar end shift-
ers for triathlon and time trial use the shifting lever is
pressed downward to move the chain to the smaller
sprockets to achieve a higher gear and to the smaller
chainrings to achieve a lower gear. By pulling the
shifting lever upward you can switch to the larger
sprockets and larger chainrings.
Keep on pedalling without force while you
i
shift. This will lead to a smooth and quiet
gear change and reduce the wear.
If your road racing bicycle is fitted with an
i
electronic shifting system Di2 from Shi-
mano, also read chapter "Shimano Di2".
GEARS 59
Campagnolo shift/brake lever
Shimano shift/brake lever
SRAM shift/brake lever
Bar end shift lever