• A Product Review

    Time for another review of some of the gear I am running this year. I am a firm believer that if a product works really well to tell as many people as possible. Well, the Hayes El Camino disc brake set is one of those products. I received these brakes to use at that "one race" up in Canada. But as we all know, I didn't go. That's another story. Anyway, I got about a week on these brakes before I ended up using them to take first at the 3rd Annual Iowa 24 Hour Mountain Bike Race.


    The El Camino might just be an endurance racers "must have" brake set up. Why? Well, it's light weight, durable, and has many on the fly adjustments. Most noted is the dial on the front of the lever. This adjusts the power. What is great about this feature is that as you fatigue later in the races, you can turn that dial to get more braking power with less effort on your part. Brilliant! So at the Iowa 24 when my hands and arms started to get tired I just turned the dial and instantly got awesome brake feed back.

    The other dial on the inside on the lever allows you to adjust brake lever reach on the fly. If you have huge hands or tiny hands, the lever can be adjusted for you.

    Oh yeah, and the fluid reservoir is in the brake lever. How did they do that? Amazing!


    Also got to love the tiny caliper! The calier is dual piston, so that means that both pads move when the lever is squeezed. The power and modulation that comes out of this brakes is amazing. There is more open air space in the El Camino which helps air flow thru and cool the brakes. It's also really, really easy to center up the caliper for rub-free riding.

    Overall, the Hayes El Camino is tops on my list. Yeah, the price on the brakes set is pretty steep, but you get what you pay for. If you can drop the coin, I recommend it.

    For more info on the brakes check out the Hayes El Camino site.

    If you have specific questions, please ask them in the "Comments " section.

    Time for work.