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A photo gallery of 1980s Mavic SSC components

Les Woodland's book Cycling Heroes: The Golden Years is available in the print, Kindle eBook & audiobook versions. To get your copy, just click on the Amazon link on the right.

Our story:

While Mavic is best known for its rims, in the 1980s the company produced a group of superb components.

Two of the most famous riders who used those parts were Greg LeMond and Sean Kelly.

Greg LeMond won the 1989 Tour de France and World Road Championships on Mavic equipped bikes. Sean Kelly won so much, including the Tour de France points competition, Vuelta a España GC and points, and many classics.

While going through old boxes filled with souvenirs of my life in bicycle retail and wholesale, I came across a few pictures of Mavic parts & rims the company had sent to me for use in our catalogs. I have posted them below.

Our bicycle wholesale company, Torelli Imports, carried both Mavic rims and Mavic components. We also distributed Campagnolo. At one point in the late 1980s we were selling more Mavic components than Campagnolo.

Greg LeMond time-trialing in stage 4 of the 1989 Tour de France with a Mavic gruppo equipped bike.

Though we loved distributing Mavic, both for the quality of the parts and rims, and the competence of the staff we worked with, it came to an end in 1993. The manager of Mavic USA decided to go shop-direct and cut out the distributors.

Paris-Roubaix photo taken from a Mavic neutral suppot car.

Here's another Mavic race service support photo. Given the rider's PDM racing kit, we know this was taken between 1986 and 1992.

Given the jersey, this should be 1989. Perhaps this is Christian Jourdan.

A Mavic neutral support service car.

Here's one iteration of the Mavic SSC road group.

Here's the off-road group, which I don't believe I ever distributed.

Perhaps the best-loved Mavic components were the hubs. Their innovative design meant that tightening the quick-release skewers did not increase the load on the bearing.. The bearings were both sealed and removable.

Mavic 550 hubs. In various versions it was sold from 1975 until the early 1990s.

Here is the cassette version of the Mavic hubs.

Mavic derailleurs & hubs

The Mavic SSC rear derailleur. It was simple to completely disassemble and service. Also the cage could be moved for larger and smaller freewheels.

And here's the Mavic brake set.

Mavic rear cassette hub & sprocket

The Mavic 646 pedal with adjustable float. The float movement is adjusted and then fixed in either direction by use of indexed adjustments on the bottom of the pedal.

Mavic headset, bottom bracket and triple crank.

The Mavic 315 road headset, produced 1989 - 1999. The mountain version had a shorter top nut. The top nut had an integrated clamp system, lock down with and Allen bolt. It is believed Stronglight produced this for Mavic. The road headset had a 49mm stack height.

Mavic sealed bottom bracket. Perhaps the best bottom bracket ever made. It fits in any shell, not matter the threading or even if the threads are ruined. The frame must be prepped by using a special Mavic tool that puts a 45-degree chamfer on the side of the shell. The lock rings of the BB are then tightened against the outside of the shell.

Mavic 631 road crankset. Though it looks heavy, all unnecessary material has been removed from the back of the spider. The result is a lovely work of art.

Mavic groups used the finest non-index shift levers ever made, Simplex retrofriction levers. They have a clutch-spring that hold the lever in place, but give no resistance when pulling against the derailleur spring. The result, there is very little effort needed to shift gears, either up or down.

A mavic dynamo hub

Here's a Mavic Tri-spoke carbon 3G wheel.

Here's a clincher rim we never carried, the Energy M7 CD

And here's one we did carry, the Mach 2 CD2 sew-up rim.

Mavic M261 Ceramic clincher rims