Originally Posted by
cyclinfool
Maybe I missed it but you did not mention what your current cassettes are. You may find that a compact with a 28 low gear is equivalent or close to what you are currently riding.
You can run the numbers on this calculator:
http://sheldonbrown.com/gears/
Sorry I should have mentioned. We both got 50/39/30 triples with 11/27 cassettes. These were our first bikes after returning to riding about 6 years ago. This is almost embarrassing but early on we were both noticing that the hills were still harder than on bikes we used on vacation (VBT - I think their standard uprights use MTB gearing) so we switched out the front 30s for 28s.
I have been tempted to switch back to the stock 30 because the 28 is out of spec and my wife occasionally drops the chain off the small ring and I have to put it back on.
Originally Posted by
stapfam
But have you been able to try a compact geared bike up your steeper hills? The jump between the 50 and 34 is something you get used to so will not be a problem. First road bike with a triple and low gear was 30/26. I was blowing first few times up the steep hill in our area and never got any easier. Then I got a compact with 34/27 and eventually tried that hill. It was hard with the compact but no harder than with the triple but it was faster. Different quality of bike I know but the gearing was something I did get used to. Bought my last bike only a few months ago and a compact 50/34 with a 12/25 cassette. That is not a hill bike for me but will be when the Tiagra 30t goes on it.
I think this is where I am. We recently traveled in California and rented a few road bikes at various places. We were surprised that the compact doubles seemed doable on some pretty nasty (for us) hills. Like you say, you end up taking them faster with more stress. Maybe the light bike weight helps as well. For this reason I am tempted to go with the bike that feels good to me but am interested in the issue of swapping cassettes if I end up with a double and want a bit more range.
From what I am reading here I will probably have some flexibility in that regard and should just explore the options with the LBS.