SRAM Force 22 and Zipp 30s
Force 22 updated with Quarq
Patrick Brady did that thing where he wrote the story I was gonna write, so I didn’t have to, but should have, but just look at his…it’s true, my rain bike has been built up with Force 22 since the summer of 14. I just updated it with a Quarq for a story late this spring too. There’s a reason Patrick contributes to our magazine, we’re on the same wave length about most bike things; music too, and travel bikes, but we don’t discuss politics.
It used to be that any time you purchased one of a component manufacturer’s second-tier groups, you gave up significant amounts of performance. Sure, you got to keep a few sawbucks, but in the bargain you got something that was heavier, didn’t shift as well, didn’t stop as well and didn’t last as long. Remind me not to buy a car from that guy. Shimano could be particularly egregious with this, and went so far to use a wider spacing between cassette cogs just to make sure the shifting wasn’t as good as that found on Dura-Ace.
The Force 22 group costs $1176, down from $1400 or so when it was first released. The same value applies to the Zipp 30 wheels…ridden the shit out of them in the rain and they’re doing just fine and at under $1K for a wheelset.