A reader asked day before yesterday which electronic groupset to buy for road cycling. If we can stipulate that the grizzled vets on our forum are wiser and more discerning than your average cyclist, the results might seem surprising. In early returns, SRAM holds its own against Shimano.
SRAMmies have further cause for celebration as a new Force AXS group is here. This is a 1x and 2x update to Force eTap AXS and, thankfully, eTap is now gone from the title so I don’t have to keep remembering whether eTap goes in front of or behind AXS in the naming convention. It’s just Force AXS and to those who don’t remember, it’s pronounced “access.”
Pricing will be the same as the prior Force eTap AXS groupset and availability is now. You’ll see your favorite bike brands spec’ing this groupset and I presume some of these brands will announce availability of their bikes today.
If your attention wears or I bore you to death mid-article skip to the bottom for a pretty important accessory update for current SRAM electronic users; and I’m leaving cosmetics to the end as well, though cosmetics are a big part of this upgrade and while I don’t usually care about the look of a groupset this one is different.
This upgrade it substantial. Force AXS for 2023 is two things at once: the downstreaming of RED and the incorporation of new tech unveiled with the launch of Rival AXS last year. At the crankset this new groupset doesn’t borrow from RED, it is RED. It’s the SRAM RED crank (easily identifiable by the chain rings) with a new graphic treatment. That means substantial weight savings, better shifting and chain rings that will last the rest of your bike riding life. The rings are quieter and while I’ve been a fan of Force eTap AXS if you're riding it’s Flattop chain and chain rings you’re not going to sneak up on anyone. I haven’t ridden new Force AXS but SRAM says it’s now a quiet groupset.
Where new Force AXS upstreams Rival AXS is in the contour and operation of the shifters and hoods. Mind, some functionality was taken out of Rival AXS and that function has been taken out of Force AXS as well. But these were functions of dubious current value. For example, neither the Rival nor these new Force AXS shifters have Blip ports. Remember, the original Blips were wired, and allowed remote shifting when your hands were on the drops or tops. These were introduced in 2015 but in 2021 were replaced by wireless Blips which we’ve written about extensively. When SRAM launched Rival eTap AXS just under a year ago the ports for remote wired Blips were gone. That seemed like a feature lost at the time because of the large time gap between first sighting and eventual availability of wireless Blips (they began to trickle in about the time of Rival AXS’s launch). Fast forward a year and now Blip ports would seem archaic.
Discarding unnecessary functionality allows the hood to get slimmer. Above is the silhouette of the new Force AXS hood, considerably trimmed down from the prior. New Force AXS can onboard and control as many as 6 wireless Blips and I guess that’s a good time to mention that the AXS app has undergone an update. So SRAM says. We’ll see about that. As of one hour before the official launch of this groupset I’m still working on an AXS version that hasn’t had a functional change (beyond bug fixes) since December 7, 2022. I have never loved this app. What is promised is – among other enhancements – rear derailleur microadjust from the app (a feature that is backward compatible to all AXS groupsets). Perhaps I’ll write an AXS app versus eTube Project shootout. Neither of these companies can write an app as well as Wahoo but you never know – maybe the new AXS app solves the issues I have with it.
Another lost feature from the hoods is brake pad contact adjustment. The reason it’s gone is that you didn’t use it – perhaps because you didn’t know it existed – and because more clearance between the pads and rotors with this Force update renders that adjustment feature moot. What you did use is lever reach adjustment and that feature remains, but giving pad adjustment the heave-ho helps bring the profile of the hood down. Gone are the days of the first SRAM RED hydraulic hoods, way back in 2013, that stood up like tree stumps.
I am apprised that front derailleur shifting has seen a significant upgrade. This would be welcome.
I might be wrong about this, but I have an inkling we might expect The Long Goodbye of obvious Quarq branding on SRAM’s cranksets – at least those cranks destined to show up on bikes as original equipment. If I understand the thinking, and the strategy, it’s that SRAM just believes that all bikes above a certain level should have power meters. I think that level is probably, currently, at $5,000 and up, if we’re talking road or gravel electronically shifted complete bikes. I’ve been waiting for this and so far PMs have been spec’d on about 40 percent of the new Force AXS groupsets sold to OEs and retailers.
I think both SRAM and Shimano are tired of having their pedal businesses suffer from pedal based power meters picking off their customers. In Kona last year Shimano and SRAM were 1st and 6th in pedal use among contestants; while 3rd, 4th and 6th were pedal based PMs. About a third or all IRONMAN contestants were on power pedals. One way to nip that trend in the bud is to render power pedals unnecessary by having them arrive on all new complete bikes. The power meter in Force AXS is the familiar Quarq crank appendage on 2x but is built into the spindle on 1x.
Cassette options will range from 10-28 thru 10-36 on this groupset (always 12sp) and chain ring options – always a 13t differential remember – begin at 43/30 (on a 1x option) up to 50x37 and this larger gearing is new for Force. The most popular config is 48x35 and that means you can easily get gearing lower than 1:1 with a 35 front and 36 rear without giving up a tall gear on the other end (a 48x10 is about equal to an 53x11).
And now to the cosmetics! When I first began cycling Campagnolo was the thing. With the advent of Shimano’s index shifting and the slant parallelogram rear derailleur – which Shimano could use after Suntour’s patent ran out – cyclists did prove that function trumped brand. But Campy still remained the fashion king and I don’t think that has ever gone away. SRAM noticed. New Force AXS is made in what it calls Unicorn Grey (Unicorn because it’s a hard grey color to find in nature, except on Campy) and the branding treatment is what it calls Laser Foil.
There is a nickel-chrome finish to cassettes but the real show stopper is the rainbow chain and cassette options and take it from me: If you really want to appeal the girls (or guys) you will outfit your bike with this. The two things my wife digs about me most (I suspect) is my ability to work on her bike; and my Eagle rainbow cassette. Fair warning though: the rainbow cassette – while launched now – is only available at the RED level, which means $$$.
Finally, about that accessory I mentioned. It’s the quad battery charger. It features a USB C port and better, more functional, LED lights and of course the opportunity to charge up to 4 batteries (a full charge of all batteries in the charger take from 45min to 1hr). Please refer to our reader forum for the religio-political discussion on whether the batteries should attach to each discrete component versus 1 battery powering everything.
Of course this is primarily a road and gravel groupset, and I have no update on the launch of components one might like to see for TT and tri (pursuit levers/shifters and bar-end shifters).
