Gearing for Beginners

[garagegirl]

What's a good chainring / cassette combo for a beginning racer, who has no road racing experience?
I bought my bike used, and it has a 50 and 39 up front, and a 12 to 32 8 spd cassette.
I'm thinking of replacing the 50 with a 47 or 46, but I'm not sure if I should change the cassette to something like 12-27. Suggestions?

[thatguy]

Well, do you mean ROAD racing or cyclocross? For 'cross, what you have is just fine. After half a dozen races maybe you'll get a better sense of what you might want to change.

For road racing, I would keep the 50 ring and try swapping the cassette for a 11-25 or 12-25. This is the quickest and cheapest way to get the gearing needed for road racing. Unless you have MONSTER hills where you live, you shouldn't need a gear smaller than 39 up front (smaller number = smaller gear) and 25 or 26 in the rear (bigger number = smaller gear).

[garagegirl]

For cross. On the couple of training rides I did, the 50 seemed to big. I also think the jumps between gears on the cassette are just a bit too big.
I said I didn't have any previous road racing exp. just to let you know I'm a complete beginner.

[danimal]

this last year was most first year racing cross (but my second racing road) and i did fine with my cross bike setup with a compact crank in the front (50, 34) and a 12-26 SRAM cassette in the back (also great because SRAM cassettes and chains are pretty cheap). i never felt like i needed anything smaller than my 34-26 in a race because if i'm using my granny gear i've probably already been lapped, but i know there were a few races with long paved sections where i definetely used my big ring (and everybodywith a single ring in the front was spinning out as i was passing them)

[kartoffel]

A 12-32 is pretty wide for cyclocross. 12-26 will give closer ratios without sacrificing much on the low end.

A 50 tooth big ring is really huge for cyclocross, but if you ride on the road it will come in handy. May as well keep it on there for now in case you do group rides with roadies. My tallest gear is a 46x12 and it takes a bit of spinning to hang with fast road bikes in a tailwind.

[arctic hawk]

For cross. On the couple of training rides I did, the 50 seemed to big. I also think the jumps between gears on the cassette are just a bit too big.
I said I didn't have any previous road racing exp. just to let you know I'm a complete beginner.
I started off just like you. No experience in racing whatsoever! 50 is definitely too large, at least for me. I started off with a 53/39 which was deadly for a total noob! But i did get that "I am going to die" feeling in the race. Over the years, I switched to a compact double 50/34 ... which became 46/34 ... which might become 46/36 this season....
Still, I have never raced a pure road race & still barely do any training for it. I still get that "I am going to die" feeling :D

[bitterken]

Ah, welcome to the two-wheeled crack factory that is 'cross racing! The road season has started, but I'm already thinking about fall...

Anyways, you'll prob end up running the 39 in front for the entire race except perhaps the sprint start...so I'd keep the 12-32 and see if that works for you.

Your options if you want to change anything depends on your fitness, the courses you'll be racing, what type of cranks you have (e.g. 130 BCD, 135 BCD, or 110 BCD, etc.), what size cassette your hub can take (8sp, 9sp, etc.) and what the max size cog your RD can fit (e.g. a short cage road RD takes a max of 27 or 28.)

FWIW, the standard gearing these days seems to be 46-36 to 48-38 up front and 12-25 to 12-27 in back. My first season of racing I used a 46-36 and a 9sp 12-26 SRAM cassette. Last season I tried a 50 big ring, but didn't end up using it much. This season I'm going to try a single 42 up front and a 12-27 in back.

Good luck!

[thatguy]

^^^^ This is why I think you should try a few races and figure out what you need. Do the whole race in the small ring, it's all good.

FWIW, here in Florida the courses are all flat (surprise). Since I favor a slower cadence (70 or so) in cross than on the road, I did all the races with a 48 front 12-26 rear. This was probably overkill, and next year I'll probably run a 44. I've found moving your saddle forward a little bit and getting up over the pedals will allow you float over the bumps a little better. There's no way I could spin 100+ rpm in races like I do on the road.