I messed around a bit with the gearing and found my front derailleur needs adjustment (made a thread on that and need to try and squeeze in the adjustment before Saturday).
Originally Posted by
JusticeZero
Use music; find a BPM list (easily googled) and look up some songs you know. If you recognize any songs that you've heard a lot that are in the ballpark of 90-96 or 180-190 BPM, get it in your head and pedal to the beat. After a bit of riding at a pace like that, you'll find it much more natural to pop into a halfway decent cadence naturally.
Well duh, I should have figured that out. I have a looping studio on my ipod for guitar practice, I just set it at 80bpm and went to town. I was doing great--it was slower than I thought! Then I got home and realized I was counting wrong, counting every pedal push and not revolution. So now I know what 40 rpm feels like and what to avoid
Thanks for all the advice, cadence sensor is mounted and ready, just need to try it out a bit and see how it works. Even when I no longer need the cadence sensor the speedometer is really accurate and I can download my routes.
28 miles sounds like a long way, but it should be a bit easier seeing how I'll be on pavement instead of gravel and won't be lugging a trailer with 70 lbs of kids.