Speaker: Bikes have evolved constantly over the years and are almost unrecognizable from
the velocipedes of the Victorian era.
What are the bike paths that have had the biggest impact on cycling?
What are the parts that have changed cycling for the better?
In this video is our top list of the most important bike innovations so far.
[music] The derailleur.
These days we might take the ability to change gear for granted, but it's hard to imagine
that gearing only really came into racing in the 1930s, with the invention of the derailleur.
Prior to that, riders basically only really had one gear.
Although there was the option to take your wheel out, spin it around with another cog
on the back, and use that, effectively giving you two gears.
Although to do this you had to stop, take your wheel out and- well, slow and far from
ideal.
Something I found out firsthand when trying to emulate Tulio Campagnolo on the Croce D'Aune.
In the rain.
[music] Rear derailleur allowed riders to change gear
on the go.
This meant they could tackle steeper gradients, a wider variety of gradients.
It also made racing faster.
Sound, the speed of light and the cosmic microwave background have always existed.
In that respect, it's hard to imagine that pedals haven't also, but they only came into
existence in 1863.
Prior to this, bikes were known as velocipedes.
You had to use your feet, kind of like a balanced bike, but for adults.
The invention of the pedal is attributed to Pierre Lallement, who claims to have come
up with the pedal and rotary cranks that would be attached to the front wheel to drive the
machine.
At the time, this would have been a huge technological leap forward and paved the way for the modern
bikes we started to see later on.
A cool nerdy tech detail, and that is that on modern pedals the left-hand pedal has a
reverse thread.
This is to stop it coming undone.
This wasn't always the case.
This actually came about as a design solution.
People continuously undoing their left-hand pedal while they were cycling along.
Power meters, bike power meters first became available in the late 1980s.
The first commercially available portable unit was the SRM, or Schoberer Rad Meßtechnik
or Schoberer's bike measuring technology, invented by the German Ulrich Schoberer.
Power meters have had a huge impact on the sport of cycling.
Not only do they allow riders to perfectly pace their efforts in time trials or long
climbs, they've also allowed coaches to analyse and quantify athlete performances, which has
led to better structured and more efficient training.
Carbon fiber frames.
Carbon fiber is the most widely used material in performance bike frame manufacturing today.
This is for good reason.
It allows frames to be lighter, stiffer, more corrosion resistant than steel.
Also you can mold it into pretty much any shape you want.
The first notable example is the Look KG86, which Greg LeMond used to win the 1986 Tour
de France.
Carbon fiber was a huge leap forward in materials technology.
The fact that you could mold it into almost any shape meant that bike designers could
make bikes far more aerodynamic than ever before, and this led to designs such as the
Lotus 110 Superbike that Chris Boardman used in the Hour Record.
However, it might be hard to believe this now, but riders weren't initially convinced
of the durability of the new composite material.
It wasn't until the Mapei team in the 90s dominated the cobbled classics riding the
carbon fiber Colnago C40 that the material really took off.
STI shifters.
Now we might take changing gear on a bike for granted, but we also take changing gear
on our handlebars for granted as well.
Prior to 1990, you would have had to have used down tube shifters in order to change
gear- or so I'm told by the older GCN presenters.
STI shifters, or Shimano Total Integration shifters to give them their full name, allowed
you to change gear on your brake levers rather than having to reach down onto your down tube,
something which made responding to attacks in races or having to change gear when you
were on a climb much easier.
Just simply click with your hands and you're away.
On the topic of shifting we also have to talk about electronic gears.
Shimano's Di2 system debuted in 2009.
With Di2, a light press of a simple button resulted in quick, precise and consistent
shifting.
Technically, the first electronic group set was the ill-fated Mavic Zap in 1992.
This proved too unreliable and it never really caught on.
With Di2 the system stuck and other brands subsequently took note.
With Campagnolo bringing out EPS and SRAM with its eTap system.
Electronic shifting has become the default option for performance road bikes.
Although there are still some specialist applications where mechanical gears are favored, electronic
shifting has brought smoothness, reliability, speed and consistency to changing gear.
Now we're going to go back in time again to 1887.
If you were one of the people who was riding a bike around then, then you probably would
have been shaken around a lot, because pneumatic tires hadn't been invented until then.
The man behind the invention, John Boyd Dunlop.
Yes, the founder of Dunlop Tires.
The pneumatic tires came about because Dunlop wanted to create an invention which would
stop his son getting headaches from bouncing around on rough roads.
No wonder.
Big thanks, John, for coming up with the invention that would allow us to all ride around far
more smoothly.
We are forever grateful for that and the green flash trainers.
Our next big technological innovation is a controversial one.
Disc brakes, they certainly haven't been without their detractors.
It's taken a while to convince most of the pro peloton that they are indeed the future.
The same could be said about other innovations in this list, such as carbon fiber frames
when they were first introduced.
It wasn't until 2017 that Marcel Kittel took the first pro victory on disc brakes.
Since then, there have been countless of these.
We've even seen summit finishes from the likes of Alaphilippe and Nairo Quintana won on disc
brakes.
Disc breaks offer far more consistent braking in all weather conditions, more power and
more modulation.
It's a vastly improved system over rim-brake technology.
In this respect, they are without doubt the future of braking.
Our final entry on this list is the safety bicycle.
What on earth is the safety bicycle?
I hear you ask.
Prior to its invention, in 1885 people rode around on these.
Yes, penny-farthings.
John Kemp Starley set about designing a bike that was safer and more efficient than the
penny-farthing.
The result was the safety bicycle.
The bike which defined the shape of the modern bikes we see today, with its diamond-shaped
frame.
In this regard, we owe a lot to Starley.
He is the father of the modern bicycle design, and probably the most important inventor you've
never heard of.
That is of course unless you've heard of him.
Next time you're on a bike ride [unintelligible 00:09:15] cap or helmet to Starley.
We owe him a lot.
That was our top list of the most important bike parts that have changed the world.
What did we miss?
Let us know on social media or in the comments.
Also, what about the next 10 innovations?
What are going to be the biggest innovations in the future?
You've got any ideas?
We'd like to hear those too.
I'm going to go now for a bike ride.
Bye. [00:09:45] [END OF AUDIO]