Back to the Future Cycling Gear
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In honor of Back to the Future day, we present the most forward-looking cycling gear and trends from October 1985, the month Marty McFly pointed his DeLorean to 2015.
1985 Trek 2000
Gracing the cover of the October 1985 issue is the Trek 2000. It was the company’s top-of-the line race bike and first aluminum bike. In contrast to the increasingly popular welded oversized aluminum Klein (a brand Trek would buy in 1995) and Cannondale bikes, Trek used smaller-diameter (one claimed advantage: more aerodynamic than bigger tubes) True Temper T2 tubes and internally-lugged bonded construction. This internal-lug and bonded-tube technique was the progenitor of Trek’s OCLV carbon construction method, used on its 2016 Madone race bike, claimed to be the most aerodynamic road bike in the world.
7-Eleven Back Cycling
Big corporations trying to hitch themselves to cycling as a way to show they care about your health? Not much is different today, except maybe someone might point out to 7-Eleven that one of those bike-safety seminars they sponsored should probably encourage the kid to wear a helmet.
Bio-Pace!
In 1985, Shimano was pitching its Bio-Pace oval rings as a way to improve the efficiency of the pedal stroke. Bio-Pace was widely rejected and would soon become known as one of Shimano’s biggest missteps. In 2015, Chris Froome won the Tour de France with Osymmetric ovalized rings (mounted to Shimano Dura Ace cranks). The difference? The “big” part of the oval on Shimano’s Bio-Pace was at about 12 and 6 o’clock; with modern oval rings, the big part is at about 3 and 9 o’clock.
We Were Stronger—Or Worked Harder
This Campagnolo freewheel has seven cogs, the biggest has only 20 tooth. Compare that to today’s 11-speed SRAM 10-42 cassette. But, the frustration of new standards was the same as today: special tools, new frame dimensions. Then, as today, aerodynamics was seen as a way to improve performance, and sometimes aerodynamic benefits come with aesthetic drawbacks.
Crash Pads
Did anyone survive a crash in 1985? The Cinelli Crash Hat (great product name, BTW) was marketed as a “soft helmet,” which essentially means a bit of fake leather and a few millimeters of low-density open-cell foam. Basically, this “helmet” offers only the equivalent of the padding inside a modern helmet.
Hollywood Knocks
While Breaking Away (1979) is perhaps the seminal cycling movie, American Flyers released in 1985 stank up the box office (interestingly, Steve Tesich wrote both screenplays). Perhaps frightened by American Flyers’ poor performance, few major studios have released a cycling-related movie. Recently, though, Belov’s beard has returned to racing.
Bike Packing Was Just Bike Touring
In 1985, road touring was hot. Take a skinny-tired road bike and load it up by putting all the weight to the outside of the bike and explore America’s scenic byways. Today touring is hot again, but it’s adventure touring, away from the roads and deeper into quieter, less explored areas. The bikes have fatter tires, and the bags and weight are more centralized. Plus we have stiffer bikes, better brakes; and equipment that’s lighter, stronger, smaller and more efficient. One thing hasn’t changed: everyone loves a great value.
Mixed Bag
Specialized, started with components before making bikes, and was one of the first bike brands to push house-brand components. Equipping a Specialized crank on a higher-end bike and not a Shimano or Campagnolo to match the group, raised eyebrows. Back then it was okay for Trek to spec a Specialized crank (Trek’s 1986 catalog description of the 760 road bike calls out the “top-of-the-line” Specialized crank). These days, almost every major bike brand has an extensive house brand component division and parts groups are broken up, mixed and matched. And there’s no way Trek would equip their bikes with anything from its rival, Specialized.
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