SRAM invited a collection of editors from around the world to Mallorca, one of the Spanish Ballearic Islands in the Mediteranean Sea. The area has been long known as a haven for early season training due to its predictable climate—certainly more predictable than the inches of snow that lay on the ground at SRAM’s world headquarters in Chicago.

As such the company opted to make its SRAM RED re-launch at the foothills of Serra de Tramuntana, a spine along the island’s northeastern coast that was dusted with snow at its high peak—and getting more snow Thursday with a wet, cold and windy system moving in. No beachgoing in our Mediterranean excursion, unfortunately.

Luckily, the editors (as well as celebrity guests in American cyclo-cross star Tim Johnson and former Lance Armstrong lieutenant Chechu Rubiera) got out for a cool, dry ride Wednesday before the rains came. I came away from it with a few thoughts. (Read my full review of the group here.)

FRONT SHIFTING

Far and away our favorite advance in the new RED group comes in front-end shifting. For decades, the industry has put up with the act of shifting up to the big ring, trimming it to alignment, and dumping it off, perhaps with a spring return so violent that it flicks the chain beyond the inner ring and into your bottom bracket—and your expensive carbon fiber chainstay thanks to chainsuck.

In a unique twist, SRAM flew engineers Mark Santurbane and Chris Raymo to Mallorca. A company doesn’t fly its engineers in unless they have a story to tell. And with this front derailleur, designed by Santurbane, Yaw Technology is an exceptionally engineered solution that triathletes are gonna love. Why? It does three things FDs haven’t done before: shift without chain rub in any configuration, shift without need for trim, and shift without dropping inside. SRAM solves for ‘em all.

Instead of a derailleur that simply pushes and pulls out and in on the same plane, Santurbane created Yaw Technology, where the derailleur’s inward and outward motion arcs slightly (effectively changing yaw angle), so that when actuating a shift, the derailleur’s plates push evenly on the chainlinks and come to rest in direct line with the chain (whether it rests on the outer or inner chainring). The advance meant SRAM didn’t need trim anymore. So they eliminated it.

Result on the road? The first mechanical shifter that I could cross up with zero rub (not that anyone should ride in that manner). It was the first thing I did when we rolled out of Monnaber Nou Hotel for our ride.

Just throw it up into the big ring—quickly, or mindlessly if you like—and you’re done. No thinking, no hesitating.

Throw arc distance at the lever is about the same as on any previous SRAM front derailleur, which was already relatively short, fortunately. But in my current state (with a weak left arm having dislocated my elbow a month ago), I didn’t have a single issue with lifting the chain to the big ring. And I loved that I didn’t have to give it any extra shoves up to ensure the shift engaged, and didn’t have to wait for the audible grinding gears to trim it back. Just throw it up into the big ring—quickly, or mindlessly if you like—and you’re done. No thinking, no hesitating. On rolling terrain, moving from the big to small and back again is seamless—without concern about chain location in the back—which will make this set a hit on courses like Ironman Wisconsin. I love this advance and can’t wait to play with it more.

On downshifts, the spring action is as crisp as in previous iterations, but the new integrated Chain Spotter adds the peace of mind that I have on my own bikes with aftermarket chain catchers. The only difference was that with this one, it’s stock with the derailleur, not an aftermarket buy. Should it get jostled in any way, its design (being threaded into the front derailleur’s fixing bolt) means it won’t ever knock the front derailleur out of alignment.

Another “first” I noticed: the sound of silence. Indeed, listening to the group of riders as we hit the first hill, gears clicked. None hung up, none certainly grazed the front derailleur annoyingly (hallelujah!) and the new cassette hummed without the hollow ting that old RED PowerDome cassette was known for. I have to imagine the combination of new silent jockey wheels, the between-cog rubber elastomers, a newly-designed chain and re-design of the cassette itself—all working together as a single construct—contributed to this group not sounding like a snare drum ensemble.

BRAKING

While not as big a surprise as the front derailleur in terms of wholesale improvement, the brake calipers were a pleasant treat. Increasing stiffness these days isn’t top priority anymore; they’re all stiff enough to lock ‘em up under fair effort at the levers. Instead, the improvement comes in the management of lighter, more sensitive braking.

To that end, SRAM added a cam linkage—Aero Link—to the equation. The brakes were designed around the new wide rims we’re seeing from their partner company Zipp, as well as Bontrager, Enve, HED, et cetera. It was Zipp Firecrest 303s we tested them on, and the brake pads grabbed the rim braking surface perfectly level. We’ll be keen to put on a set of narrow standard wheels to see how it all lines up.

SHIFTING

Shifter shape, as we alluded to in our initial SRAM RED debut piece, has changed significantly. The lever was lengthened slightly, a feature we dig. As someone who rides mostly on the hoods, with the levers located in a relatively high position, the longer lever combined with SRAM’s high pivot makes for a brake lever I was able to feather further down the lever blade, allowing me to modulate with finesse. Add in that lever reach adjust, and you can put the lever exactly where you want with no added wrist wrap to get the fingers to—or around—the levers.

AERODYNAMICS

SRAM hearkened the aerodynamics of the group’s parts, and it’s a nice effort to tuck some bolts out of the wind. The brakeset is scaled quite dramatically, such that looking at the front brake on a fork shows that it’s truly pretty svelte; the bulky A-frame anchor is gone, and the caliper itself takes up less frontal real estate. Likewise, the front derailleur has been scaled down by a rotation of the cable fixing bold to the trailing edge, and out of the wind. Small improvements compared to water bottles and the like, but SRAM’s the first to actually consider it. And as SRAM Road Product Manager Bill Keith said, they compliment the aesthetics of today’s aero road bikes. Svelte.

American cyclocross star Tim Johnson celebrating

WHAT THE PROS THINK

A few athletes were part of the prototyping of the new groupset, among them Chechu Rubiera and Lance Armstrong. “We built 10 “stealth” groups with no decals, and guys like Chechu, Lance, Rory Sutherland and a few riders had it on their at-home bikes for feedback,” Keith said. And they got feedback. Rubiera and American cyclo cross star Tim Johnson were on hand to ride with journalists in Mallorca during our testing. We wondered what these guys thought.

“It’s not an imaginary advance because they took six grams out of it—it works, and it’s really fast.”

Johnson’s wife Lyne Bessette (also an accomplished cross pro) has done quite a few triathlons, including winning Savageman a few years ago. So he knows a little about the sport. Plus, having just flown over following the UCI Cyclo Cross World Championships, he knows a bit about crank-turning (that’s him doing the skyward kiss of celebration after the finishing sprint in yesterday’s ride).

“It’s funny to get excited about a front derailleur,” Johnson said. “It’s a piece of the puzzle, but it’s not as important as the way the hoods are or how the brakes work, never mind shifting. Then you ride it, and it is important. It’s not an imaginary advance because they took six grams out of it—it works, and it’s really fast. For me, we switch from small to big chainring a ton in a cross race. To battle cross-up, this is the one that’ll do it best. If you love being in the big chainring, you can be in a 26 or 28 and it won’t rub. That’s a real advantage.”

Rubiera added that he had it on a bike he used for two months, and was surprised how fast it works. “Normally in a race you don’t twist the chain so much because maybe you’ll be in trouble if you drop the chain. So I tried everything you’re not supposed to do in a race, and I couldn’t drop the chain. It was a nice surprise. It’s the best front derailleur I’ve ever used.”

Johnson also noted the noise—or lack thereof.

“When we went out on the ride, it was 20 guys with carbon wheels, no wind, shifting—and it was quiet, the whole ride,” he said. “There wasn’t clanging and everything. You can tell the system just works well. It was always about being the lightest. Now it’s just … nice.”

He also dug the Chain Spotter, for the same reasons he needs one on his cross bike; not just race security, but travel security.

If you’re new to cycling and shifting, cable tension is complicated, you’re already stressed about the race and getting your bike in transition super early, it’s something you don’t want to have to think about,” Johnson said. “Making it in this way, having the Chain Spotter set up, at a race, any number of things like the bike being banged in shipping could suddenly make it important.”

Finally, Johnson saw the immediate benefit of SRAM’s Quarq RED crankset, a new unit that has an LED sensor, a visible ID and now the new Qalvin iPhone app that helps determine connectivity. We will detail this unit in a future piece next week, but the unit brings a new level of ease of utility.

“You’ve got a sport that’s concerned about making that power output smooth, steady and consistent and controlled” Johnson said. “To have a system that’s not complicated, easy to service with a battery that’s user-changeable? I mean, a lot of people aren’t gonna go to the trouble to pull the SRM off their bike, because they don’t know how it got on there in the first place! Then they gotta go to a bike shop, and that’s a $200 process to ship it back and forth, then put it on again. This is much, much better.”

While there’s not an a urgency to place the new group with the long-course triathletes that SRAM sponsors, there certainly is for the short-course set. “With the perfomance advantage, yes, it makes sense for us to get them under the ITU guys, Keith said. SRAM Global Brand Manager Gaetan Vetois confirmed the company is aiming to get its apex athletes—Alistair and Jonny Brownlee, Jan Frodeno, Emma Snowsill, and Javier Gomez, to name a few, on the new RED for their first debut at the ITU World Championship Series opener in Sydney (April 14 and 15).

SRAM spent a bit more time with the press to explain the advances in the new Quarq RED crankset. Check in later for a bit of detail about the first ANT+ -compatible crankset with left-right power data, how it’s derived and what makes the crankset one of the most user-friendly setups on the market.

Don’t miss our full photo gallery.