I deplore this trend towards 11T cassettes for everything. even with a 44T front, 11T is rather tall gear, and running rings and sprockets that small is guaranteed to wear stuff out faster. its a proven fact that using larger sprockets at the same ratio is more efficient... instead of a 32:12, running a 48:18 is smoother, quieter, and less friction. there's also less force in the chain for a given effort using the bigger ring, so the chain has less wear which leads to 'stretch' which leads to eating sprockets.


I have a 'hybrid' with a 48-38-28 front, and changed the back from an 11-32 to a 13-26 (8 speed), which provides more useful gears to me. I'm overweight and out of shape, and have 58 year old knees that ache if I mash on them, but I can't maintain a very good spin rate either.