Most groupsets now have dedicated disc brakes, and there still plenty of 'non-series' disc brakes around too, with options for electronic and mechanical shifting. Shimano says these are its first discs designed specifically for road bikes, rather than being adapted from mountain bike brakes. Disc brakes have numerous advantages over rim brakes: they're less affected by water; they're unaffected by rim damage and they provide finer control over braking power than is possible with rim brakes.
Hydraulic brakes also self-centre and automatically compensate for pad wear, neither of which you get with cables, and both of which are real benefits. With the R components, Shimano introduced its first Ultegra-labelled disc brakes, with variants at the hydraulic levers for mechanical and electronic shifting. Like the previous non-series disc brakes they use Shimano's Flat-Mount standard for a tidy appearance. The first Shimano level disc brakes were pretty good, but with the new hydraulic system, the R lever and the R calliper, Shimano has upped its game significantly.
They're still quite expensive as an upgrade, but definitely one to look out for if you're in the market for a new disc-braked road bike. The new R lever is a full redesign and it's a much better overall shape. The extra width of the lever at the bottom meant that the bottom of the hood sat away from the bar tape a bit; it was noticeable close up but not really an issue. The brakes work brilliantly out of the box, and they're almost entirely fuss-free. These brakes bite when you'd expect them to in the lever travel, and from there there's masses of stopping power available as and when you need it.
The reach is adjustable, but there's also a new, smaller lever R that should be ideal for those with smaller hands. The amount of effort you have to put in to control your speed on the steep, loose back road descents round here is genuinely a revelation compared to rim brakes or mechanical disc brakes.
Read our review of the Shimano R hydraulic disc brakes. If you're happy with 10 sprockets on your back wheel, but want hydraulic disc brakes, then Shimano has these brakes for you, matching the colour and styling of the rest of the Tiagra ensemble. These level 'non-series' hydraulic disc brakes are based on the RS hydraulic brakes with mechanical shifting below , but have a new ergonomically shaped hood design. To save weight, and keep the cost down, the brake levers are aluminium rather than carbon fibre.
There's 10mm of reach adjustment so you can tune the lever to your hands. The lever shape looks very much like that of the speed RS hydraulic lever, although the BR-RS lever is speed rather than speed. Tiagra is currently Shimano's only speed road system, so while they're not startlingly cheaper than , they were the only game in town if you wanted to upgrade a speed-equipped bike to hydraulic stoppers until the proper Tiagra brakes were launched.
The system comprised brake calipers, disc rotors and brake levers, and you could combine them with either Dura-Ace Di2 or Ultegra Di2 speed groupsets. Shimano's road disc brake system has been designed for use with mm or mm rotors, with the idea being that users can choose the size to suit their weight and intended use.
The rotors are designed to combat overheating with fins and grooves. They are CenterLock only, there's no 6-bolt option. These are now very hard to find. On the off-chance that you want these particular brakes rather than the many other speed options Shimano now offers, we suggest searching eBay.
But what if you don't want Di2 with your hydraulic disc brakes? Shimano was listening, and RS was the result. It offers mechanical gear shifting with hydraulic disc brakes. Shimano has included a mineral oil reservoir and brake system in the mechanical lever while managing to keep that lever compact.
The lever features a 10mm reach adjustment to customise the fit for people with smaller or larger hand. GRX isn't a single groupset, it's a collection a 'series' in Shimano-speak of components at different quality levels that share similar colouring and styling so that bike manufacturers can mix them to tailor their gravel bikes.
These correspond to Shimano's Ultegra, and Tiagra levels respectively. As with Tiagra, RX has the same ratio of cable pull to sideways movement as the more expensive, speed systems, so you can, in theory, mix them all. All have new details designed to make it easier to keep your hands firmly on the hoods as you rattle over rough surfaces. The GRX chainsets are available with double or single chainrings, which is a first for a drop-bar offering from Shimano.
There's no RX chainset though. Instead there's a variant of the RX chainset with speed spacing. Shimano has moved the chain line out 2. Similarly there are no RX derailleurs; you use the RX derailleurs with the RX shifters, brakes and chainset if you want a mid-priced speed bike. Both the RX and RX rear derailleurs are available in versions for single and double chainrings. The single-ring derailleurs will shift up to tooth sprocket, while the double-ring derailleurs go up 34 teeth or 36 teeth in the case of RX All the GRX derailleurs have clutch mechanisms to reduce chain slap when riding off-road.
All GRX brake calipers are flat mount. There are no specific GRX cassettes, chains, bottom brackets or brake rotors; you just use the ones from the equivalent road or mountain bike groupsets. The flagship GRX level is equivalent to Ultegra road components in quality, but has a host of details and options offered nowhere else in Shimano's range. These include:.
Both double and single-ring chainsets are available in mm, The electronic-shifting version of GRX boasts the same feature set as RX, but with click-whirr shifting. Both double and single-ring chainsets are available in mm, mm, If you want the widest possible gear range from your GRX set-up, then you want the speed RX derailleurs because the rear unit will shift up to a tooth largest sprocket, the greatest capability of any Shimano drop-bar rear deraiilleur.
For more details straight from the source, check out Shimano's website. Explore the complete archive of reviews of groupsets on road. Here's the pick of readers' comments from previous versions of this article, with your usual blend of knowledge, experience and opinion.
Seriously though, what colour do you want your groupset to be? Is your car's steering wheel green???? Far too late, as this article is a bit of a classic - but kudos for use of the word "gert". Lush Somerset word-smithing. I'd always assumed it was some sort of Japanese linguistic thing - ichi-maru-go one-oh-five or hyaku-go one hundred and five might mean something. The internet is rather shy regarding the origin on the groupset name. The only vaguely plausible story I managed to find is that when they thinking of names for the groupset, Levi jeans were absolutely massive in Japan, the whole country was going crazy, and Shimano cashed in by naming the groupset hoping to attracting some of the cache of the jeans.
You really need to get out more. I bought a bike recently that came dressed with I had all good intentions of stripping it, putting it on another bike and selling it on, then I rode with it. The shifting is just incredible. It's so light and never misses.
Braking is excellent too. Cranks - I switched to a few years ago, and it's fairly standard across the Shimano range, something I'm gutted Campag seems to have dropped. Although I truly love the Chorus on my race bike, I think it'll end up getting phased out, as Shimano really does have an edge.
I've already upgrade the wheels to 11 speed compatible so that's not an issue. The cable routing from the hoods is a bit irritating as my front light shines off it and the hoods are are a bit fat for my stubby little fingers so brake reach is an issue. Also, the cranks are pretty beefy and I'm fancying a slightly shorter crank length although I don't really know if I'll notice the difference. I also have cheapo tektro brakes and peope tell me that the brakes are signifficantly better.
But then it all works and is in pretty good condition so am I just being lured towards shiny stuff. I have an old Felt road bike with shiny Ultegra , which just refuses to die and still shifts very nicely indeed. It's my second-favourite groupset after current Campag Chorus. Ultegra was great. Put me right off Shimano. The new Ultegra looks pretty nice though, in an understated way. I have DA, it's fantastic, I also have triple as it happens I find it's more than fine, it's usually down to the operators who don't set up their gear properly that have problems with that series.
If you like road. As a subscriber you can read road. The revenue from adverts helps to fund our site. Your subscription will help us to do more. In the past, cable-operated, caliper rim brakes were the only type used on most road bikes, but recent years have seen road bike braking options expand to take in direct-mount rim calipers , hydraulic rim calipers these remain exceptionally rare , cable-operated disc brakes and hydraulic disc brakes.
Hydraulic disc brakes are generally considered to be the best all-round option, but which type of brake is best for you is dependent on a number of factors. Understanding how road disc brakes work will help you decide. The derailleurs are the mechanisms — sometimes mech for short — that move the chain from one gear to the next.
The front derailleur does the job for the front chainrings, while the rear derailleur does it for the cassette; both are controlled by the shifters. The cassette is the cluster of sprockets mounted on the rear wheel. So, if there are 10 sprockets, you have a speed groupset; 11 sprockets is an speed groupset, and so on. Having more sprockets not only provides you with a wider range of gears but also means the jumps between them tend to be smaller.
For road bikes with a double crankset, t is probably the most common cassette range, but Shimano, SRAM and Campagnolo all offer a huge range of choices to suit your riding. More expensive chains also often have smoother, more durable and more corrosion-resistant coatings than their cheaper counterparts.
Note that a chain is a wear item and should be replaced at regular intervals. Failure to do this will accelerate wear on your cassette and chainrings, but you can extend chain life by cleaning it regularly and only using the best chain lubes for your bike. The bottom bracket contains the bearings on which the crankset spins and it fits into your frame. Threaded bottom brackets screw into your frame on threads.
Press-fit bottom brackets, as the name suggests, are pressed into the frame and held in place by friction. Generally speaking, press-fit bottom brackets are less convenient than threaded ones when it comes to maintenance and compatibility, but many manufacturers favour them for purported weight and stiffness benefits, as well as ease of manufacturing. Does paying more always bring you improved performance?
Maybe, but the higher up the range you go, the smaller those performance benefits become, and the increments become less noticeable, while the kit gets a lot more expensive. Second-tier groupsets Shimano Ultegra, Campagnolo Chorus, SRAM Force are generally as good in functional terms as the pro-level components and considerably cheaper, but they weigh fractionally more and have fewer exotic shiny bits.
Pick two. With all the road groupsets, the more you spend, the lighter they get. The amount of weight that you save for your money diminishes dramatically at the upper end, though. These weight differences are the result of more expensive materials and refined, or more time-consuming, manufacturing processes.
In addition to further machining, hole-drilling and high precision, more expensive components often use materials such as carbon fibre, titanium, lightweight aluminium and ceramic bearings to achieve the pinnacle in low weight and performance. Durability does improve with price, but our experience is that durability also plateaus at the second-tier options, and in some ways, actually starts to decline at the most expensive option.
The more expensive technical components are built with greater precision, refinement and materials that lend themselves to greater longevity. This is apparent in derailleurs and shifters where the cheaper options will develop play and slop over time, while the better parts often remain like new. Wear items, such as cassettes and chainrings, however, are often the reverse of this.
Cheaper options are made of heavier but more durable steels, while the more expensive versions are sometimes made from lighter but softer aluminium or titanium alloys.
In addition to the benefits of reduced weight, more expensive groupsets find other ways of increasing performance. Most noticeably, higher-priced options provide a smoother, more precise and in some cases quicker shift between gears. Another performance example is increased crankset stiffness to provide crisper shifting and more efficient power transfer from the pedals to the rear wheel. Braking raises an entire new list of benefits as prices go up. Simply put, more expensive brakes are stronger, offer better feel and control, and stop you with less hand force required.
This difference is much more apparent with rim brakes, though. Shimano first launched Di2 electronic shifting at the Dura-Ace level, before trickling it down to Ultegra. The same is true of more mundane details — Dura-Ace was the first to get reach adjustment using a built-in screw rather than ugly shims, a feature now found all the way down to Claris level. This means that if you ever wish to change your chainring sizes, you can do so without needing a new crankset.
There are differences in the precise amount of cable pulled by different rim brake levers too, so you may not get optimal performance if you move up the hierarchy when you replace individual parts. That said, groupsets of a given brand are generally designed to work with each other, providing they share the same number of gears.
Shimano speed with Shimano speed, Campagnolo speed with Campagnolo speed. Shimano, for example, maintains very detailed compatibility charts. Jack Luke is the deputy editor at BikeRadar and has been fettling with bikes for his whole life.
Always in search of the hippest new niche in cycling, Jack is a self-confessed gravel dork, fixie-botherer, tandem-evangelist and hill climb try hard.
Jack thinks nothing of bikepacking after work to sleep in a ditch or taking on a daft challenge for the BikeRadar YouTube channel.
He is also a regular contributor to the BikeRadar podcast. With a near encyclopaedic knowledge of cycling tech, ranging from the most esoteric retro niche to the most cutting-edge modern kit, Jack takes pride in his ability to seek out stories that would otherwise go unreported. He is also particularly fond of tan-wall tyres, dynamo lights, cup and cone bearings, and skids. Top of the range gears will be lighter and smoother to use.
One thing to watch out for when comparing bikes is whether the full groupset is being used. If you are buying a bike which has, for instance, Shimano gears on it Shimano make brakes, gear levers, front and rear derailleurs, cranks, chainrings and bottom brackets.
So basically all of the running gear on the bike. Some bike manufacturers will fit the full groupset, others will fit Shimano front and rear derailleurs but use their own brakes and cranks to save a few pounds. So if you are comparing bikes be sure to check how much of the groupset the bike actually uses. Gear technology is moving pretty quickly at the moment. The current standard for road bikes is 11 speed.
That means 11 gears on the back and two on the front giving 22 gears in total. However there are 12 speed options available and some people are experimenting with single chainrings at the front 1x setups. If you buy a 9 or 10 speed bike it will be very expensive to upgrade to 11 speed later on as you will need new shifters, and maybe a new rear wheel, as well as a new derailleur, chain and cassette.
So if you can afford 11 speed go for it. If you plan on using your bike a lot, and keeping it more than a year or two, then you will end up having to replace bits. The first things to go other than brake pads are normally the chain, cassette and rear derailleur. If you ride your bike during the winter, or commute on it then things will wear out more quickly as dirt from the roads wears away the parts.
So if you regularly ride dirty gritty roads think about whether you really need that top of the range Dura-Ace setup. Most of the road we sell use Shimano gears.
The mechanical gears use a cable and springs to change the gears. The Di2 gears use electric switches which are much more precise and need less tuning to keep running smoothly. There are also disc and rim brake versions of most Shimano gears available.
SRAM gears are less common than Shimano but do come fitted on a number of bikes we sell. In particular SRAM gears are finding their way onto a lot of gravel, adventure and cyclocross bikes as they make 1x versions of most of their gears. This means using a single chainring at the front and a wider gear range at the back. The levers on SRAM gears do work slightly different from Shimano with a double-tap system for shifting which take a little bit of getting used to if you are used to Shimano.
Campagnolo are the classic Italian gear manufacturers. Responsible for many of the innovations that modern gears are based on Campagnolo still make cutting edge, race winning, equipment. Italian road bikes have long been seen as something a bit special, something with a little extra class.
If you are going to have an Italian road bike then it needs to come with Campagnolo. My message Close. Electric Road Bikes.
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