Velonews: In The News: Sram Single-ring Road Drivetrain Coming Soon?

<figure ><img title="121588" src="cdn.velonews.competitor.com121588 320x213.jpeg"Open ↗/><p>The Specialized Venge Lunch Race is designed around a 52-tooth single chainring. Though it was not promoted by SRAM, it is a hint that SRAM might move toward a single-ring drivetrain. Photo: Specialized</p></figure><p>It was only a matter of time. SRAM’s immensely successful XX1 mountain bike kit was turned into a cyclocross drivetrain one year ago, and since then, hints have been dropped about a similar road group. Then, on Thursday, Slowtwitch’s Herbert Krabel captured some photos of <a href="http://www.slowtwitch.com/Products/The_Dimond_of_Jordan_Rapp_4924.html" target="_blank">Jordan Rapp’s Dimond triathlon bike </a>with a 54-tooth SRAM X-Sync single chainring.</p>
<p>Two weeks ago, Zipp <a title="Zipp unveils thru-axle 202 and 303 wheels" href="velonews.competitor.comzipp unveils thru axle 202 303 wheels 362244"Open ↗target="_blank">launched new 202 and 303 wheelsets</a>, which were conspicuously compatible with an XD Driver Body — the key component in SRAM’s one-by drivetrains running a 10-tooth small cog. We later heard from an anonymous source close to SRAM that some SRAM triathletes had been using an XD Driver and a prototype 10-26 cassette. However, Krabel reports that Rapp’s bike is equipped with a standard SRAM 11-26 cassette on his Zipp 808 wheelset.</p>
<p>Rapp is using a SRAM Force CX1 rear derailleur, a derailleur that was designed to work with any SRAM 11-speed road shifters, so it should function seamlessly with Rapp’s SRAM R2C shifters.</p>
<p>SRAM’s trail of single-ring road drivetrain breadcrumbs has been somewhat public as Specialized introduced a single-ring road bike to its line-up late last year, the Venge Lunch Race (pictured), which has a 52-tooth X-Sync chainring.</p>
<p>Like we said after the Zipp launch, we expect to learn more about a SRAM single-ring road drivetrain in a couple of weeks at SRAM’s product launch.</p>
<p>The post <a rel="nofollow" href="velonews.competitor.comnews sram single ring road drivetrain coming soon 363971">InOpen ↗the News: SRAM single-ring road drivetrain coming soon?</a> appeared first on <a rel="nofollow" href="http://velonews.competitor.com">VeloNews.com</a>.</p>

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