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Old 05-06-17, 05:20 PM
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gfk_velo
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Campagnolo Off Road kit was generally very robust and worked well.
Unfortunately for Campagnolo, they missed the styling zeitgeist and suffered badly as a result.

At the time, I was the National Sales Manager in the UK for their biggest importer here & the general feeling was that there was nothing at all wrong with most of the product in a technical sense but the thumbshifters and brake levers were too bulky by comparison to the items coming out of the Far East and the infamous "Bullet" twist-grip shift was not the best idea ever, using as it did, the whole grip rather than just the inboard end, as SRAM did.

The other thing that proved to be an obstacle was the shift in bicycle assembly to the Far East which was gathering pace at the time, whilst Campagnolo, then as now, were focussed on keeping manufacture in Europe - in fact at that time, almost exclusively in Italy.

By 1996, the Off Road groups were all gone although the rims remained for a few more years - these are still very highly sought after. Campagnolo turned their attention instead to complete wheels and so became the first manufacturer to offer a complete range of built wheels for road cycling.
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