hbsyncro

anybody else running xtr cranks and front and rear derailuers? all the cx bikes i see have road cranks. just curious.

Saddle Up

I'm running mostly XT, XTR is a bit of over kill for my purposes. I went with a road crank instead of mountain. For the same cost a road crank is lighter and narrower resulting in a better chain line for my cross bike that has 130mm rear spacing not 135mm mountain bike spacing. Mountain bike cranks don't provide as many chainring size choices either.

cs1

Most cross bikes I've seen are using road parts quite successfully. IMO XTR is nice but overkill. Heck 105 works as well as Ultegra and it's cheaper. Good luck on whatever you choose.

knobster

The MTB XTR crank doesn't make much sense for cross racing. The best setup I've seen is a single chainring up front. Most race oriented cross bikes come with a cross compact double. This is not a road crank as you'd spin out of it going anywhere over 30 mph.
An MTB crank would be even worse and in most cross racing, it's faster to dismount and run than it would be to try and climb a hill.

Rosso Corsa

MTB hubs and 9 speed chain, the rest road/cross stuff for me.

hbsyncro

i guess i should have been more specific in the original post. i ALREADY have xtr cranks, fd and rd. bought the bike like that so i guess its not overkill. i am running two chainrings. the granny ring spot is empty. this is my main bike and two rings seem to work well (i do ride it on the road). got it up to 45 mph the other day and continuing to pedal was not on my mind. big ring says r-48 and small ring says m9 r 36. i did a couple of races last season and it worked fine keeping it on the 36 ring, although i don't know that much about cross. cassette is an ultegra 12-27. i like the xtr components on my bike, especially because i seem to be the only one who has em. i bought the bike used (barely) and it was an insane deal. specialized s-works m4, not sure what year, but its probably at least 5 years old. my favorite ride is on the road for 15 miles, turn off and do a 20 mile dirt loop and then return on the road.

knobster

Post a pic, we'd like to see it.

Yeah, looks like it's setup just like any other cross bike then. That XTR stuff is pretty light also. While I wouldn't go out and build a bike this way, no sense in changing it. Especially if it works.