I just realized all of my shimano shifters downshift up to 3 gears! Woohoo! I knew my tiagra downshifted two, but didn't realize it was three. How sweet it is. Now I can play with triple upshifts on all of my bikes!

The downside is, shimano can only upshift 1 cog at a time. Not even ultegra or dura ace can multi upshift. XTR systems can, but it's only 2 at a time.

So, I'd have to go Di2, Campy Chorus or higher in order to get the multi upshift feature. For those of you with multi upshift systems, is that particular feature addictive? As in, it'd be really hard to go without now that you've tried it?

Banging out multiple single upshifts doesn't seem as convenient or elegant as doing so with a single lever movement. Shifting from small to big ring is closer to a 4 gear upshift so it's not equivalent. It seems like multi upshift would be a very cool feature which I'd have a hard time giving up once I had it. What's your experience?

Oh yeah, nothing like cresting a hill or roller on bottom of the cassette on the small ring, swinging both leavers at one time, and ending up on the next logical gear combo on the big ring for the decent..

Reverse is also true, hit the downshift levers and you are on the small ring on the next logical combo for the rear cassette.

Been doing that since I put Chorus on a bike in 2000.

Every indexed bike I have every owned used or uses Shimano. I never had much trouble clicking two or three times ... as a poster mentioned in another thread, I can click faster than the chain can wrap around a new cog, so it isn't really an issue.

As for hitting that perfect gear ... yeah it always feels good but it isn't always three-and-one.. It could be an upshift or a downshift. There are a few spots where I come off a slight decline and turn up a hill, and there, for me, si where it really matters, because there I want to carry the speed up the hill. Hitting just the right gear there is one of those meaningless momentary thrills that enrich a ride.

Often it is a three-up in the back one-down in the front, depending on which corner, how fast I am going, and how strong I feel ... but getting it right feels good.

I can upshift (to a harder gear) faster than my derailleur can keep up, no need for multiple upshift.

Why settle for less than optimal?

Upshifts on the cassette are as fast as I can click; furthermore, bike shifts faster than I can pick up speed. So no issue there.

But yeah, double/triple downshifts on the cassette are very nice. I tend to lose speed very fast going up a hill, and I run a 12-23.

I don't understand why this is even an issue. It's never occurred to me at any time that I wished I could up or downshift more than one gear at a time. Are people just lazy?

On my DT I can shift up or down seven gears at a time.

... and sometimes miss them all.

That's why I love indexing. At least I always end up In a gear.

I can roll the R'off grip shift thru 14 gear ratios, 1 follows the next, in relative size.

As long as it catches the final one, that's all that matters.

That seems pretty slow for the derailleur. Mine will skip all the way down or up 4 gears as easily as 1.

Price point mainly.

You're not exactly making the strongest case for friction.

If I can't multi upshift, at least I can multi quote.


One criticism I have read of multi shifts is that you can damage intermediate cogs if you shift consistently under pressure. I don't know if that's true or not. I still think I'd like multi shifting in both directions. I'll take the tip not to multi shift under full power though.

I used to not be a fan of campy in the past; it had a rep for being finicky and functionally inferior to shimano. I think they've come a long way in closing the gap. And their dual directional multi shifting is definitely a useful feature/upgrade. I'm surprised so few people want this feature. Shimano HAS to transfer this feature over to their mechanical groups!

If people don't want it, why should Shimano spend a penny on it?

And how smooth is that shift hu? When on earth would you need to upshift 4 times in a row? Even cresting a hill I go through the gears one by one, sure, sometimes in 3 second intervals, but I'd never want to do 4 simultaneous upshifts...

I can click through the entirety of my cassette upshifting in less than a second if I wanted to, why on earth would I ever need to do it faster than that?

Beat me too it! The old Mavic shifters on my 1985 Orbea are a joy to row across the gears with the 10 speed cassette I'm now running. So smooth, precise and quick.

It shifts smooth as a single shift. I can shift from the small to large in front and hit the right number of gears in the back to place me on the next logical step in gearing. Or the same in reverse: step down on the large in front and shift in the back to put me on the next logical gear.

The wonders of Italian engineering.


And I think you are exaggerating a bit about doing it in a second... unless you are still running 5 gears?
making 9 or 10 shifts in a second is not plausible.

Pressing a button 10X to get through the cassette is not convenient.

I agree. Mechanical multi upshift is a definite design advantage for campy. Shimano is ubiquitous though so most cyclists don't know what they're missing.

I've used shimano exclusively, but campy and sram have shown they can innovate and offer features that shimano can't or won't for whatever reason (legal, financial).

I can pop off 9 shifts very quickly on the stand but while riding? I think it would surely take more than a second.

Get Di2. Or Chorus for that matter. I have a bike with each. Shimano wins out on Campag on the availability of spares and consumables and their price-also SAG wrenches tend to know Shimano systems and around here know little about Campag.

Di2 is also great because for lord knows whatever reason...Shimano puts a crapload of dead useless throw into the lever on only their road parts. XTR is click-shift, Shimano road you have to swing the lever quite a bit to get to the click, but only after you release the lever is there the shift.

The more steep and rolling your terrain, the more useful it is.

This floored me.

"Dude, I can push a button once ... even two times. But pushing a button several times??? Come on."

Whatever. I am not about to argue personal preference. All I know is that I never had any issue shifting ... Ever. I even mastered friction shifting with downtube shifters on a half-step triple with six cogs.

If some riders regularly shift ten or eleven cogs at once ... wonderful. Buy Campy. Live it up.

i get the feeling sometimes that people start trying to say what they like, then explain why they like it, than start to explain why it is the highest human achievement .... it's just a shifter. It's just a bike. I am not saying people exaggerate the benefits of what they have ...

Just for kicks, walk up to a photographer somewhere. Read his neck strap. If it says "Canon" say "I like Nikon." If it says Nikon, say, "I hear Canon is better."

Then come back a read a few threads here.

Dude WTF are you talking about Pentax is clearly superior. (No but seriously, I never realized cameras were that monopolized or... bi-opolipized by canon and nikon... That's nuts.)

And yes, pushing a button many times is obviously harder than pushing it once... (I'm agreeing with the rest of your post.)

That's an interesting take. My impression is that 6800 ultegra requires very little throw for both front and rear shifts. At least compared to their 'lower end' groups.

Yes, yet another advantage of campy shifting: shifts are completed before you release the lever. Very clever. If only campy had a larger marketing budget. Then, far more people would be aware of their design advantages. However, I respect their decision to source labor from Europe. Outsourcing to Asia would likely have led to their ideas and manufacturing techniques being stolen within a few weeks, if not days, or even hours. They give up market share and price point to maintain control over their intellectual property.

I do think dual direction multi shifting is especially useful for rolling terrain.

I'm leaning towards Ultegra Di2 for my next system. It's more or less affordable and the weight penalty compared to mechanical is now negligible. I suspect however that once I buy shimano will release 12 speed wireless within weeks after my purchase. :-)

Shimano has lessened the amount of dead space throw from 10s to 11s....but coming from Di2 mouse clicks, or Shimano's MTB groups, or from Campag...there's still a ton of wasted lever throw in 11s IMHO.

I've noticed on mine, the upshifts are far more precise than the multi-down. I occasionally have to go back and nudge the downshifts if I don't push the trigger far enough after the last click.

I'm fine with clicking through upshifts. Just not that many times I have to rapidly upshift, compared to wanting to rapidly downshift.

You don't even need to spend Chorus money to get Ultrashift. I'm building a bike with Athena 11 and the shifters are NOS Athena carbon levers from 2010. I put the entire group together for just over $400 and that includes a carbon UT crankset.

You can run 10 speed with 2010 Ultrashift levers, or swap a right index cam and front ratchet into a 2014 Chorus lever.

Other mix-and-match options exist for 11 cogs.

Yes. It allows dropping from big to small ring and ending up in the next lower gear in one motion regardless of how wide the rings are and how narrow the cassette is.

For example, with 50-34 x 13-14-15-16-17-18-19-21-23 when you're riding 50x21 and eschewing the fully cross-chained combinations 34x15 five cogs away is the next lower gear, with 34x16 four cogs away a hair easier than 50x23. Shove both your thumb buttons at the same time on most Campagnolo levers made since 1992 and you're there, not

CLICK-release-click-release-click-release-click-release (and maybe click-release)