Ok, now I am intrigued with this single finger braking malarkey. From what I gather the benifits are potentially improved control and less hand fatigue.

I don't really want to read a four-page discussion on it though, so how do you go about setting it up?

Do you keep the shifter in the same place and put the brake on the other side, leaving a gap between the shifter clamp and grip? Cheers.

Yes – then you can cover the brakes easily, even when pushing uphill in the rain.

BIG pic here – http://www.flickr.com/photos/11871535@N02/4134475094/sizes/o/

Yes

shift both sifter and brake lever inwards. Gap depends on where you ike to 'grip' the grip

like this:

If you can remove the shifter windows then you can switch the position or the shifter and brake levers round which means you can keep your shifters where your thumbs can reach but have your brake levers as far inboard as bar diameter/sweep allows.

Could be I have freakishly long thumbs, but like MS I moved everything inwards.

shifter windows are utterly pointless IMHO

set your leversso you can lay your finger on the blade without curling your hand round to reach it

Coolio, I shall be having a go with that.

unless you ride shore loads then its a different lever/body position.

🙂 🙂

jedi??

that makes no sense.

i just set it all up further towards the stem so when my hands are in normal position on the bar the braking point is lined up with index finger. that's it really.

I use my middle finger. It helps to start with good brakes though 🙂

and brant, i'm a permanent brake coverer as well – probably as a direct influence of seeing JMC riding up a hill on Dirt, covering the brakes at all times 🙂

I just use me middle finger, levers/shifters in conventional position. Juicy 7s adjusted right in close to the bars, and I have little hands -dunnno if that makes any difference

Brant's pic looks oddly like he's pushing downhill.

With the back brake on.

van haeln, riding ladders etc requires a different position on a bike and lever position 🙂

jedi –
what happens if you have a trail with a mix of stuff. you dontstop and rearrage your controls for every stunt. that`d be absurd.

its a new excuse for not riding ladders though. 'sorry lads i've not got the right allen key and my brake levers are making my body position all wrong so i cant ride that shore today'

i'll have to keep that one fo hangover days. its an instant classic.

for xc your levers might be more horizontal than for dh/shore but i dont think it would harm your ability to ride skinnies or ladders. its a mental game more than anything.

van halen,
for riding skinnys etc.. your entire riding position is different. your levers need to be in a position to accomodate this.
i had this conversation with ian warby etc… and when i showed them why etc… they all understood

i had this conversation with ian warby etc… and when i showed them why etc… they all understood

😆

index finger: meet brake lever. end of.

hand position affects body position loads

I cannot believe that there is a serious discussion about how to use 1 less finger to pull a brake lever? FFS.

its a good discussion.

put your lever at 6oclock and see how it affects your body position

Not much to it, as long as you have a decent setup already. I setup my brakes so index and middle finger just about fit onto the end of the lever then go ride. Normal riding I use index for rear brake and middle for front (dunno why, I only noticed it when I saw pics of me riding) and thats fine for 90% of stuff. The occasional "ooooo shhhhhhiii…" emergency stop moments I use 2 fingers. If you need more than 2 fingers your brakes probably aren't strong enough/setup right. Where your shifters go depends on what they are but I'd get brakes right first then figure out where to put shifters.

As above. Note that SRAM and XT shifters (the only two I've had) have two different positions where the clamp attaches to the shifter body. Set your brake lever up as per MrNutt's photo then work out whether shifter needs to be inboard or outboard and use the appropriate clamp bolt hole.

Very occasionally find my Mono Minis a bit underpowered on long steep descents so have the levers set a bit little further out so I can use two fingers if needed to ease the pressure on the index finger.