In most jobs, aimlessly browsing Instagram on the clock is anywhere from frowned upon (ie: Member of Parliament) to a sackable offence (bus driver/nuclear safety technician).
But in this job, it does sometimes pay dividends, as when I happened upon a short reel of Unbound Gravel and Traka winner, Rosa Klöser’s bike from The Rift, a gravel race in Iceland, something curious caught my eye.
Under her Hammerhead bike computer there was something sticking out that disrupts the relatively smooth flow of the computer mount; a single SRAM satellite shifter blip. Closer inspection, and a little more digging around on Instagram, reveals more, with a pair of blips attached underneath; one behind the other.
Easily missed, but that's a gear shifter under the computer. (Image credit: Rosa Klöser)
These satellite shifters from SRAM are totally wireless, and are usually placed either underneath the tops of the bars to allow riders to shift when climbing, or commonly when riding over the cobbles at Paris-Roubaix, or they’re placed in the crook of the drops for sprinters to allow them to shift up and down without having to reach for the paddles or shifter hoods.
I reached out to SRAM to see what was going on in this case, as the blips can also be used to control the Hammerhead computer screens, which it was suggested by my colleague Tom might make life easier over the rough basalt roads of Iceland. They are, in this case, being used for shifting however:
“Good catch! It’s for the gears indeed, it allows her to shift while staying in a more aero position.”
While the UCI has banned the ‘puppy paws’ position on the road, where a rider supports their weight on their forearms on the tops of the bars, hands lolling in space over the front wheel, things are less draconian in the gravel world, and while Unbound banned aero bars years ago, riders are still free to do whatever they can to get aero on smoother sections of the course.
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Placing a pair of blips under her bike computer allows Klöser to stay in this aero, forearms-on-bars position without having to reach out to the hoods each time she wants to shift, and also likely encourages using the computer itself as a hand-hold, stabilising aid.
This isn't a new hack for Klöser however, as interrogation of our Unbound tech gallery reveals her race bike this year for Kansas' big day out had a single shifter installed under the computer too.
And here's a better look, with two shifters underneath, on a different event (Image credit: Rosa Klöser)
Here's Klöser's unbound bike, with what looks like a single shifter under the computer. Feel free to email our associate editor Josh and berate him for missing that at the time. (Image credit: Ethan Glading)
Will joined the Cyclingnews team as a reviews writer in 2022, having previously written for Cyclist, BikeRadar and Advntr. He’s tried his hand at most cycling disciplines, from the standard mix of road, gravel, and mountain bike, to the more unusual like bike polo and tracklocross. He’s made his own bike frames, covered tech news from the biggest races on the planet, and published countless premium galleries thanks to his excellent photographic eye. Also, given he doesn’t ever ride indoors he’s become a real expert on foul-weather riding gear. His collection of bikes is a real smorgasbord, with everything from vintage-style steel tourers through to superlight flat bar hill climb machines.
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