Shimano
Posted January 14, 2010
/ Shimano
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Lance is in the details.
Copy: Lance Armstrong is a man who understands there’s power in precision. This is an athlete who measures the height of his seat to the millimeter, his meals to the milligram, and his energy output to the milliwatt. So it’s easy to see why he’d choose to ride Shimano front-shifting technology. Just look at the teeth on one of our large chainrings. If you’ve never examined them up close, you might be surprised by how different each tooth is from all the rest. That’s because, depending on it’s position on the chainring, each tooth plays a unique role in the shifting process. So when we design our chainring, we individually shape each tooth to optimize that role. Fifty-three unique teeth, each specifically designed to work with one another, with our patented shifting pins, with the natural fluctuations of the rider’s power output – fifty-three teeth working together for a common glory. When we started engineering our chainring with this advanced tooth profile, nothing else like it existed. Of course, since then, many have tried to imitate it. But nobody’s come close. Because anyone can copy the shape of a tooth on a chainring – indeed, anyone can copy the shapes of all fifty-three – But unless you understand why – unless you understand how it all works within the system, it will never be anything more than a copy. After all, plenty of other cyclists measure the weight of their meals to the milligram these days. But there’s still only one Lance.
