We "busted the cherry" (can I say that?) on our rear-only Avid descending 15 miles or so through the Pisgah National Forest on Highway 276 from the Blue Ridge Parkway to Brevard through the Pisgah National Forest on a rain-soaked winding mountain road with the temperatures hovering around 50 degrees.

Although not quite broken-in after a couple shake-down rides at home, the Avid's performance was incredible... offering precise modulation, exceptional feedback, and enough pure stopping power to all but eliminate the need for using the front brake on 6% - 9% grades as we set-up for the entry to each turn. Once the novelty of having a rear brake at my disposal that "felt" like our Campy Chorus caliper brakes but with 10x the stopping power wore off -- noting that Debbie noticed the same improvements in stopping power and gained immediately confidence in the Avid's performance on the rain-soaked descent -- its use was returned to the normal duties as far as the front-to-back brake bias that I would normally employ on most descents, but with the knowledge that there was tons of stopping power in reserve.

In fact, the only concern I would have for a person using the Avid rear disc for the first time on wet roads would be if they had a bad habit of braking through turns (vs. before entering turns) and unintentionally skidded the rear wheel. Of course, the Avids have so much stopping power that a fat fist on the brake lever could also induce a rear wheel skid on dry pavement, underscoring the importance of getting a feel for how a brake like the the Avid works on familiar terrain before tackling challenging braking situations.