I'm going on a tour in three weeks and am going to put the Shimano Alfine internal on it (don't want to spend on a Rohloff). My dilemma is whether to put the 8 speed internal on it now, and have it for the tour, or wait until September for the new 11 speed. Obvious difference is the price, the newer 11 speed is twice the price.
I've asked advice on other forums (Alfine internal 8 vs 11) and have been told by several that one advantage of the 8 speed is that it's tried and tested.
Any comments are welcome.
Finally, is there any reason why I shouldn't put a double sprocket at the front while using the 8-speed? Apologies if that's a silly question and isn't even possible! I want to ensure that I'll have a granny gear to manage hills when touring on a fully panniered bike. ta
I have to say first that I love cycling and regardless of if the riders are doped or not i'll watch. I ride my bike a lot. I try to do 200+ miles a week around Boone NC. I compete a little bit to. I believe the doping procedures in cycling right now are bad for cycling and here is why. Â 1.) The punishment for being caught is too broad. If a rider is caught injecting himself with EPO he is given two years sentencing. If a rider is caught using DHEA he is given a two year sentencing. I agree with the EPO punishment but I can't agree with the DHEA punishment because DHEA is legal to buy #1 and DHEA is prohibited to be taken in baseball #2. Also DHEA could contaminate other products on an assembly line possibly giving a false test. So basically, your taking a chance by shopping at GNC or shopping at any company that also manufactures DHEA. Â 2.) I do believe that its possible to ride a whole Tour De France completely clean. I would never want to do that myself because it would be torture. I also think if you truly had a clean tour the speed would be ridiculous by the time you hit the mountains. I say ridiculous because it wouldn't be worth watching. Â I think the system could be patched up to at least work better. Bicycle racing at the professional level is the hardest sport in the world. Why not let riders at the pro scene take DHEA? Its the weakest steroid out there, its legal to buy in the USA and its legal in MLB. It would solve the cases like Tom Zirbel were he maintains he in-jested a tainted supplement. It has been proven to not increase testo levels. The best part is all cyclists can afford it. So it doesn't differentiate between poor and rich people. Â The truth is there are labs in China that can make undetectable designer steroids. Now i'm not so sure if you can mask these to get underneath the biological passport system. I'm going to make an assumption that you can. This benefits people with money. Micro-dosing EPO benefits people with money. Blood transfusions benefit people with money or high powered teams. I'm all for trying to get rid of all of this in cycling. Just give cyclists their Oxygen Tents. Â I realize a lot of different people have a lot of different opinions on this subject. There seems to be a crowd of people who want to take out all doping products. I think this is completely unreasonable and unrealistic but benefits the riders with money. There is then a crowd of people who want to let riders dope anyways possible. This is business suicide and once again it benefits the riders who have the best doping programs or respond the best to numerous PEDs. Â Â Thoughts?
