umd

My point is that if you jump 17 to 19 and skip the 18 or jump 16 to 18 and skip the 17 you still have the same jump at some point. There is nothing magical about the 18 that makes it any better to have or lose than the 16 or 17. Unless you have a "corncob" you are going to have a 2T jump somewhere and you are going to have to sacrifice some optimum cadence regardless.

umd

Until you are already in an aero tuck and have to close a gap at 50mph...

TheKillerPenguin

I honestly don't think I've ever been in a situation where closing a gap required an 11t.

umd

Required... maybe not, but I was doing 130 rpm already and I was pretty much at my limit since I had just been gapped at the top of the climb. Maybe I would have been able to catch back on without (spinning a lower gear even faster) it but at the time I certainly felt that if I didn't have it that would have been it right there. That allowed me to make the front part of the split in the field whereas many people right behind me did not. Unfortunately I got popped on the climb on the next lap and suffered to the finish mostly by myself. I was already in an aero tuck trying to catch up but was not gaining on the field, pedaling allowed me to bump my speed up fast enough to make it and 130rpm is not exactly mashing. I hit 52 on that descent, and for every other lap I don't think I went over 45.

ridethecliche

Well, here's the thing:

You can anticipate the shift when you need to shift to the little ring, and you can drop a few gears in the back. Everyone makes such a huge deal of this, but I never saw an issue on the 50/34 setup I raced and trained with last year.

In crits, you never shift up in front so no issues there.
In a road race, you'll be able to see where the hills are so you can anticipate the climbs.

The tooth difference is pretty much a moot point since you can shift in a split second and make up for it...

umd

I wouldn't say never



Most people shifted to get up this 10% hill... some people did not.

ridethecliche

52-25 should be more than enough to get up that out of the saddle. It's a what, 20 second hill?

TheKillerPenguin

Fair enough! Being 175lbs and a fairly good climber, I can usually use my weight to my advantage when I'm detached, and catch back on without much pedaling required.

umd

Sure, a few times... do it for an hour and get back to me...

Some guys in the 3s did it but most everyone shifted.

Half the lap was uphill with increasing grade so every lap from the bottom corner to the top was about a minute at ~6w/kg. Every lap for me was little ring from around the start/finish to the top of the climb then big ring from the top corner down the back straight, down the descent, through the bottom corner, accelerate hard out of the bottom corner, slight lull around the start/finish, shift to little ring, repeat... I was actually feeling pretty good until the damn cramp, power climbing is something I am relatively good at. If I had a compact with a lower cassette maybe I would have done the whole thing in my big ring but the shifting wasn't a problem until after I cramped and lost the pack anyway.

Edit: note that this is not the same race as the one I am talking about with KP. This was a crit on Saturday and that was a circuit on Sunday, although they are both part of the same stage race.

Edit2: yeah, about 20 seconds for the steep part of the climb from corner to corner. I did about 500W average (7.7W/kg) with 700W+ accelerations pretty much every lap. That was a hard crit course. Every field that day was completely shattered.

ridethecliche

Yeah, but still, I don't think you'd lose out too much if you had a 52/36 setup. If it was dialed in and with a dog fang you'd be golden.

I use a dog fang on my SRM for multiple reasons, but I still get 'chain slip' when I'm shifting to the little ring and am cross chained. The chain skates on the little ring for a few seconds at times. I guess that's because of the cheap 9/10 speed rings. I'll get god chainrings soon. Maybe I'll throw the ones from my 105 crank on the SRM because I'm having a really hard time selling that crankset.

What I'd get for that crankset would probably be the same as I'd pay for a new set of rings, so I might as well just use them, eh?

San Rensho 

The whole idea of gearing is to have the closest possible gears in the speed range that you will be riding in. That optimizes both speed and endurance. Now the 18 falls in that area precisely where you will be riding a lot of the time.

Yes, you can "get away" with just about anything, heck just ride a fixie, then you will have to mash or over spin most of the time. But the point of multispeed derailer gears is to have the right gear all the time.

umd

I was just saying that there are crit courses where it makes sense to shift, not that it would be a problem...

umd

I guess that is where we will have to agree to disagree.

ted ward

Having a broad "powerband" is really a strength in racing. I've never heard anyone complain about gaps in gearing after they were dropped. The 18t is good for training, but I would rarely use it in races (thats what we're talking about here, right?)

Brian Ratliff

Eh. Tempest in a teapot. If you are always on the flat and racing a standard crank, it makes little sense to carry an 11, 25/26 tooth cog - you'll never use them. 11 is too high for all but the pro sprinters, and a 25/26 is too low. If you have climbs and descents, then the 11 (for the descents), 25/26 (for the climbs) make sense again.

There is a gap in the ratios between 15 and 17, and another between 17 and 19. Just a fact. Graph it out if you don't believe me. Efficiency is the name of the game, and keeping a constant cadence plays towards efficiency. If you don't need the extremes of the cassette, then ditch those gears and put them somewhere in the middle.

I was thinking about this the other day. The ideal two cassettes for racing would be a 12-23 for flat races and an 11-25 for hilly. A 12-25 is the "do everything" cassette, with the bottom half optimized for flat and the upper half for climbing.

YMCA

I sure haven't and I guarantee I've been in much faster races than most posters on this board.

Learn the art of pedaling and large gear ratios become less useful in anything below ProTour.

umd

YMCA, not being argumentative, but what would you recommend I should have done in the situation I decscribed a few posts ago?

YMCA

Tuck

Was not many years ago, Pro's were using top gears of 52x13, or sometimes a 12. And the speeds they were hitting tended to be much higher than what any local amateur race is hitting nowadays. It was all about souplesse.

If I go over 45mph, I'm not pedaling, so my 50x12 is plenty.

135rpms on 50x12 is 45mph, no big deal turning rpm's like that unless your saddle is too high

umd

I was tucked. Not the hanging off the front of the bike tuck that some guys do, I'm not comfortable with that. Maybe that's the solution, but as tucked as I was comfortable with I only got up to about 45 and I needed to go faster than that if I was going to catch the group.

I probably could have spun a 53x12 to have gotten up to speed. Of course if I wasn't getting dropped in the first place it would not have been an issue...

San Rensho 

You don't ride around 25 mph in a race at aboput 100 rpm? You wouldn't downshift to that gear before a turn, then get on it while you are still in the saddle and accelerate out of the corner in it?

roy5000x2

great idea or best idea?

YMCA

I love an 18. Probably my favorite cog of all time.

MtnRide

I loves me my 11-26/compact. Never gotta change gears out or think about it before a race; I'm covered. (I don't do crits tho; I road race on a bi-weekly basis.)
1. I like to train on the gears I'm gonna race, and there's some pretty steep hills around here, like 8 mph @ 5W/kg for 25 min.
2. I love it so much I won't get a quarq until they finally intro the compact version. I figure descending's mostly about positioning/skill and I produce well below 80% of a pro's power output, so why bother with the tall end. Looking back, I've found some >140rpm pedaling sessions on downhills, but don't remember them in particular.
3. Managed to catch the pack with a several minute deficit on a downhill/flat after a crash with this gearing. But I'm a wuss and clearly need a skirt.