canklecat

Ever listen to Froome, in full context, in most video and audio interviews? The guy has a career as a diplomat ahead of him. He's typically very measured, rarely misspeaks himself or says anything careless.

That doesn't sell stories.

As a former reporter I can tell you what happens when you interview someone like that -- you look for one bit of colorful anecdote, anything to hang a lead paragraph on. You may not necessarily want to embarrass your subject and risk alienating him. But you need something to lead with. Otherwise it's just another "Yeah, I'm recovering well from that injury, had some setbacks and encouraging stuff from 2020, really happy to be with a new team for a fresh start, looking forward to taking another crack at that fifth TdF win" blah-blah-blah, cliched hundred-and-ten-percent-sportsing story.

Which is 99% of Froome's interviews. Unlike Bradley Wiggins, who mouths off at least half the time, to the delight of journalists and anguish of anyone mentioned by Wiggo.

Also, cycling journalism is heavily influenced by the Italian news media concept of polemica, which pretty much is what it sounds like -- courting controversy and puffing up news whenever possible to sell newspapers. Most cycling journals outside of Italy avoided polemica for years, but with the internet, BS sells. Look at the number of recent stories over the past year emphasizing the supposed personal rivalry between Wout van Aert and Mathieu van der Poel. Heck, just Google that phrase and you'll find dozens of hits.

Cycling News is based in Australia, which for years has tended to flirt a bit closer to the margins of tabloid journalism, and is owned by Future plc, one of those media conglomerates that markets itself *not* as publishers of objective news, but proponents of jazzed up lifestyle media outlets. They aren't quite Murdoch level, but I've seen this stuff before with another hobbyist website where I was a longtime moderator. When a new media conglomerate takes ownership they want to jazz things up. One way is to take that polemica-lite approach, finding that one colorful anecdote that might have been little more than a careless offhand comment out of a one hour interview and puffing it up to see how it floats in Google news rankings and shares on social media and discussion forums.

ls01

That explains why he went out of his way to identify the disks, and rotors, on the bike as being swiss stop manf. I thought it was odd to point that out twice.

ls01

If he wasn't From, they wouldn't tolerate it though. If it was John Johnson from Kansas he'd be packing his bags.

Trevtassie

Just loving the arm chair quarterbacks, dude has won 4 tour de France, you don't do that without having mad skills. If he says he needs to brake for 5 to 10 minutes on a descent, it ain't because he's being a scaredy cat, more because he'll die if he doesn't..

Greatestalltime

I hear many saying things like discs are “just fine”. I don’t see why someone would want something that wasn’t better when spending the kind of money we all spend.

Rubbing is unacceptable to me. I simply wouldn’t deal with it. Plus the extra set up maintenance. I know many say it’s not bad. It can’t be as easy as swapping pads.

That said, I’d love some for my rain bike or on a gravel bike if I got one.

colnago62

Doesn't sound like either of your friends are of the same value as Chris Froome. I doubt ISN is firing CF after building a whole team around him.

cybirr 

GCN had a similar opinion piece with short sound bites from a number of pros. One observation did stand out regarding disc versus rim. In the fast peloton, if everyone is using the same brake system, deceleration as a group is comparably uniform. With mixed tech in the tight pack there is more uncertainty as disc riders may have better stopping in wetter conditions. It wasn't a comment on with is better but an interesting observation.

WhyFi

Who says they're not better? In terms of braking performance, they are. Most of the "just fine," or "good enough," comments that I see/hear are in regards to rim brakes. See: "I can lock up a wheel with rim brakes, so discs can't be meaningfully better, durrrr."

The vast majority of the time, disc maintenance is much easier.

And then, like many others before you, actual experience would likely change your stance and a disc brake road bike purchase would be on the horizon.

big john

Not my friends. One guy is a professional freerider who couldn't keep bike sponsorship because he broke everything. Hard to use someone to sell your product when it keeps failing.
The other is an amateur drag racer. Not a paid position and easily replaced when talking smack about the team.

I just didn't think it was very professional for Froome to say negative things about the bike, although it was more specifically the components. Had he said the bikes were crap maybe Factor would have reconsidered their sponsorship, or at least had a team meeting.

ericcox

This whole debate is fascinating to me. I could see for a pro with a mechanic where rim brakes might be preferable. Speaking for myself, I've never had a set of rim brakes that I did not have to mess with at least occasionally. The cheaper the brakes, the more fiddly they were. The last set of rim brakes I had were quite good - I replaced a set of low-end Shimanos (somewhere below 105 level) with Ultegras. Those were easily the best rim brakes I ever had, but switching between aero wheels and my standard wheels was still a pain.

I finally got a disc brake bike last fall. I now have about 1700 miles with it. I did center the pads once shortly after I got it, and I keep the braking surface clean, but otherwise they've given me far less problems than any rim brake set up. That said, the joy of the rim brake was being able to adjust on the fly if I needed to.

If I were a more capable / serious cyclist, maybe I'd resist discs, but from my current experience, I can't imagine going back.*

*We'll see how I feel after I set up my new wheels with swiss stop rotors.

noodle soup

I guess Froome doesn't understand the difference between "constant" and "intermittent".

Greatestalltime

Disc brakes are easier to maintain? Doesn’t seem like it. Swap pads with two screws vs ??? Cleaning my rims and pads after a wet ride isn’t great though.

If the performance (which I know is better) outweighs the rubbing and the complexity then maybe you’re right. I can’t see how, but as you said maybe if I tried I’d know.

The good enough was referring to setting them up and getting them to perform. Froome likely has a good mechanic and he’s not happy. I’m sure you’ve seen the Durander guy. He’s pretty convincing.

noodle soup

That method of "testing" tells you nothing about how well the brakes will perform.

Rides4Beer

Sounds like he needs better mechanics

I haven't had any issues with over 20,000 miles on disc brakes.

Also don't care at all what the pros think or do, discs work for me, never going back.

msu2001la

If Froome really is overheating disc brakes to the point of warping them on long descents, rim brakes on carbon wheels are definitely not the answer. Froome is a great bike racer, but this is total nonsense.

WhyFi

vs one screw? Here's the entire process:

Take your wheel off.
Remove a retention pin and one screw. remove the pads.
Gently push the pistons back in with a tire lever or something similar.
Put in new pads.
Put in the screw and retention pin.
Put your wheel back in.
Pump the brake lever a few times.
Done. It's so easy and fast that I can't justify a bike maintenance beer

You don't need to monkey with alignment or toe in or fiddle with adjustments for pad clearance, etc.

Getting noise from the brakes in wet, sloppy weather is common. It's a minor annoyance, at worst, and comic relief, at best. For the noise to rise above the threshold of minor annoyance, you have to be riding in such **** conditions that you've got far, far bigger concerns, in which case having your brakes honk like a flock of geese is kind of funny.

Having your rotor kiss the pads in dry weather usually means that either a) your rotor needs a little love from the Park truing lever posted above (very fast, very easy) or b) your rotors have gotten very hot under heavy braking and have expanded/warped enough to kiss the pads. I can't speak for other rotors, but Shimano IceTech rotors typically cool enough to stop making noise within a minute or so. It should also be noted that rubbing like this is not akin to rim brake dragging - it's just noise, it's not the watt-sapping bogeyman that you can point to as blame for getting dropped.

Again, reading between the lines, and with the benefit of experience, it seems to me that Froome is *****ing about an annoyance (noise), not an actual problem. As far as Durianrider, I've seen him enough to know that I he's not worth the time.

fooferdoggie 

some brakes I don't even need to remove the wheel. my magura's I just popped the pads out and pushed the pistons in and put the new ones in after a good degreaser spray.

SoSmellyAir

True. I was only talking about checking remaining pad life.

SoSmellyAir

I think most would understand "constant" in the context of "braking" to mean "frequent", rather than describing a situation where the brake is engaged throughout the entire period, i.e., "dragging" the brakes.

phrantic09

As someone who’s owned both, I think disc brakes are unequivocally better in all regards than rim when it comes to braking quality and consistency. Just because they may not be right for you doesn’t negate that. My old Felt Z4 Disc was infinitely better braking than my R3. The R3 stops “fine” with carbon clinchers in the dry, but it’s scary AF when a rainstorm sneaks up on you.

mack_turtle

I don't think Chris Froome's opinion on disc brakes has anything to do with my riding experience. interesting take, though. the technology does have a way to go.

tyrion

Peak Torque agrees with Froome, putting 4 times the heat (compared to mountain biking) into a smaller system (than MB) is problematic:

Greatestalltime

What about bleeding? Adding fluid?

I wish I had talked to you last year. I was replacing a bike after a car wreck and had a chance to get a DE Rosa Protos directly from the De Rosa warehouse/factory that belonged to team Nippos. One of their actual replacements-not a replica—and for the same price as the regular rim brake one because they were out of stock. I was directly dealing with Christiano De Rosa via email.

I didn’t because it was disc. Doh!!! Oh well got a pretty sweet F8 from elsewhere.

WhyFi

A waste of 5 minutes.

SoSmellyAir

While I have no personal experience with disc brakes on a bike, everything I have read to date points to the above being indisputably true, and I have not said anything to the contrary. I was only asking those who do have such experience how easy or difficult it is to verify that there is sufficient pad life before a ride.