Originally Posted by
dddd
I've known many fellow riders who missed rides due to either their cable having failed or because of an electric power failure.
On one recent morning ride, at our first re-group, the man I was speaking with collapsed with a full cardiac arrest incident as we were talking. We had an emergency-room doctor on our ride who actually was not present at that point because his cable had failed inside of his integrated shifter during the first few miles. It was only the arrival within a minute of a rider schooled in nursing care who was able to diagnose his condition and begin the correct life-sustaining actions.
And I have been at several rides where an arriving rider soon departed for home before even getting out of the parking lot because of no electrical power to his/her shifting aparatus.
And riders with downtube levers more often are able to maintain their shift cabling at home (versus down-time and skipped rides as integrated-shifted bikes sit in the shop).
Umm, what? DT cables can snap and leave the rider screwed too. Your doctor story, if it actually happened, is nothing but an unfortunate coincidence. He could have just as easily had an issue with his DT shifter, if the issue really was a cable. He could have caught his hand on the front tire on an aggressive shift and not even been on the ride.
And you are lamenting how hard it is for some to shift DT, but you are incapable of maintaining a modern shifter at home? I've set up and changed cables on any number of modern, STI/trigger/grip shifters. They're a half step more complicated than DTs, at absolute worst, if you can;t maintain them you can't maintain an indexed DT either.
Originally Posted by
dddd
It's hard for me to imagine where you are coming from with that statement.
Are you a CAT-# racer who needs the incremental cumulative benefit of every new "improvement" available?
Maybe you have a very good shop looking after your bike, visited regularly?
Again, I just don't know. Perhaps it's just that your riding position is off so that reaching down to shift greatly affects comfort or control, or that (for same reason) you find it difficult and uncomfortable to move quickly enough into and out of the seated position.
I do know that marketing plays huge, and that people tend to be creatures of habit.
Retrogrouchyness and the need to be different and unique from everyone is a very real thing too, and I'd far more believe that the people that insist upon DT fall into that category than the people that insist on the ubiquitous standard of the day.