Originally Posted by Grasschopper
I will add to this. As I posted a few days back I got the Ritchey WCS compact cranks and put them on my Salsa along with a 12-27 cassette. This replaced an Ultegra triple with a 12-25 cassette. I have had 2 rides on the combo, 20 miles on Thursday and 50 miles today. At first I thought I was going to have some issues but after today I think I like it. Normally when I am in the middle of my middle ring on the triple I would be doing like 14-20 MPH. On the compact this range is right where you need to be thinking about changing rings. On the small ring I can do about MPH before I spin out. There are 2 gears left on the cassette but if I shift into them I am rubbing the big ring with the chain. When in the big ring I find that I probably shouldn't use as much of the cassette as I do because my chain is pretty angled but cross chaining a bit I can get a gear that gets me about 14 mph. I only use this gear if I know I will be going faster soon...if I am going to spend much time there or the climb is longer and or steeper ahead I will drop to the small ring. It is a chain and does take a little getting used to but I think I am pretty comfortable with the gears now. There is plenty on both the low and high ends of the range and I think the double will make me faster since I will be in the big ring and pushing a bit more over rollers so as not to cross chain too much. Avg speed for 50.46 miles today was 16.5 mph with some good climbing, a few stop lights, and signs and one brief rest stop to refill my bottles and chew a Powerbar, that is up a bit from my last long ride.
Plus it just looks better on the bike than a triple.
I've done exactly the same thing, went from a FSA Team Issue carbon triple with a 12-25 cassette to Ritchey WCS compact double crank with a 12-27 cassette on my KHS Flite 2000. I had it out today for my second ride since the change and I find that I can cruise just a fast as I could in the big ring on the triple and that I can take hills at a higher speed than I could before by staying in the big ring on the Ritchey - about a 2 mph increase, but none of the hills I rode today were long ones, so staying in the big ring (50) wasn't an issue. The ride was 27 miles on my favorite route with a mix of flats and hills (about 75% flats) and I averaged 20.05 mph which is my second best time this year. I like the Ritchey WCS compact crank, and I agree that it does look good, especially since I have WCS seat post, stem and bars, which kind of ties everything together.