Fascinating.

Tha American and European market of the late 80's couldn't be more different. It is interesting to see the American press so puzzled about what Campag was doing.

To those on this side of the Atlantic, it was evident: Index shifting was perhaps something for begginers, those with experience using road bikes couldn't care less. If need be, an indexed system could only be accepted if the usual flexibility in terms of freewheel and chain choices remained the same. Under such premise, it could be tollerated to have some kind of click telling of the wherabaouts of a shift, but it was absolutely necessary to have full control over the whole range of motion of the shifter. That was what Synchro was all about. Still, most riders in Europe used it in friction well into the 1990s, until they gradually changed to handlebar shifting.

Same with the market segmentation of Croce D'Aune. This was just the Super Record substitute. SR was racing gear, one notch cheaper than C-Record, pretty faffless - non-nonsense stuff. That market was substantial in Europe: on the one hand, young cyclists getting up the racing scene ladder with the hope of becoming a pro someday. On the other, 30 somethings and up going to amateur races (my father was one of those at the time). Again, none of them could care less about indexing. It was all gearing choices and parts that could be thrown into a drawer in a room smelling of tube glue and liniment and then called back to action the day before a race with no hint of doubt about reliabilty. Compatibility? I beg your pardon??? This isn't a computer, is it?

Think of them as the negationists of system integration... opening a Shimano Tech Manual and seeing all those solid and dotted lines, those "use only in combination with..." rubbed them the wrong way. There was another less imporatnt thing they disliked: Painted parts (how am I suppossed to clean this, boy?) and funny looking parts (think dropped parallelograms - I'm not going to ride this bicycle at the circus, lad). Therefore the importance of substituting the SR mech by another one with the parallelogram along the mounting bolt-cage pivot line. It was also considered stronger and stiffer. And therefore the toothed gear and rod titling mechanism of the Cd'A groupset, which by the way, was partially resurrected as "3D Embrace" for the 12 speed Campag rear mechs.

Anothe interesting fact is how many Cd'A groupsets Campag made and Sold. We're talking north of 300 000 over 3 years of production. It wasn't specced on ready to sell bicycles. That wasn't how this particular market segment worked. It was bought as a kit to dress a frame or just in parts to upgrade or replace stuff on existing bicycles.

The brakes were controversial though, that was true even in continental Europe!