As we roll into 2022 and we begin contemplating the validity of at least one of our New Year’s resolutions, it is time to focus on what’s really important. The one thing you’ve been doing it all for: the training rides in not-so-great conditions, saying no to that second serving at dinner. I’m talking about your one main event this year. The one that you starred and circled on the calendar.
Whether it is a stage race, a three day bike packing adventure or Wednesday Night Worlds. This is the one commitment getting you up early in the morning, ready to slay.
It's All About Control
With all things being equal in acceleration and top speed, races are won by the person that can slow down faster.
Imagine being able to stop on a dime or to overtake another racer because you’re 100% confident your braking point is ten feet later than the guy you’re riding shoulder to shoulder with.
After eight years of helping cyclists go faster with less energy, it might come as a surprise to find a product from Kogel that’s made to slow you down. Now Kogel enters an era of making you slower to go faster.
How We Got Here
Brakes are critical for racing results: going fast is important, but being able to slow down fast before a turn or cliff is equally just as important.
This fact goes back to old racing cars and played a big role in the epic Ford vs Ferrari battle in the 60s. Carrol Shelby knew that better brakes were the ticket to winning the 24 hours of LeMans.
Pad compounds, heat management, disc size and number of pistons affect performance and should be matched to your riding conditions.
While bicycle brakes do not cope with the speed and constant torture of car racing, our brakes are designed to be the lightest solution that will fit the purpose.
Skinny brakes on bikes heat up easily and cool down relatively quickly because they are 100% exposed to the elements.
This benefit of exposure immediately brings another problem: contamination. And, unlike your family car, we like to take our mountain bikes into the mud and add a grinding paste to the equation.
Our Entrance Into The Brake-Pad World Cup
Start diving into all the variables and ‘best brake pad’ becomes a complicated puzzle to solve. Best for your riding environment makes it a little more palatable.
We have worked closely with our manufacturer to design two sintered compounds specifically for different scenarios:
Kratos (the Greek god of strength) is a harder compound, best suited for environments with lots of contamination.
Bia (the god of Force) is a softer compound focused on instant bite and quiet performance.
We started our development journey with two scenarios in mind:a cross country race with tons of short, instant braking, keeping a good amount of heat in the pads versus a road race with plenty of climbing and descending, where sometimes you don’t touch the brakes for minutes and then a ton of heat builds up on a long descent.
To call the two compounds “road” and “off-road” would be selling them short, Kratos will be great for long winter rides if you live in Northern Europe and Bia is already a crowd favorite with our team on the dusty trails around our West Texas HQ.
Kogel Is New to Brakes, Not Ceramics
The next decision was made to add a Ceramic Barrier to minimize heat transfer between the pads (where heat is good) and pistons and fluid (where heat is bad).
The addition of this buffer not only stops the transfer of heat into the brake system, but it will actually reflect heat back into the pads, getting them to the optimal temperature quicker.
We are super stoked to finally release this new product line to you, our friends and family of the Kogel Collective. Expect to see Kogel Brake Pads appear on our athletes' bikes in the weeks and months to come.
Our first release covers most of the current Shimano and Sram brakes. Please send a message to ard@kogel.cc to let us know if you have any questions or would like to have additional models added to the collection.
