Originally Posted by
teebox
All, update on the standing to pedal... can do it a little more than I could a month ago, except, I have to use this sparingly as I have no cartilage in my left knee (baseball catcher for 14 years) and the pressure on the knee creates, well, a helluva lot of pain.... had to come to a complete stop, dismount and "walk off" the pain on one attempt. So, I will continue to ease into it and in the meantime I will just grind hard uphill in the saddle.
I played softball for a few years in my 40s after a 20 year hiatus. I played catcher. Took me a whole season to be able to crouch behind the plate. At that point I had been a serious bike commuter for 15 years.
I do better on the hills now that I have more winter riding days these last two years. But there are still some days where I have to hop off and walk, although not as many.
Oh, and I almost never have to hop off my older MTB-based commuter. Between the granny gears and being able to sit upright, holding the aero bar's elbow pads, I can sit and spin up any hill even with a backpack full of clothes and groceries.
I am seriously thinking of putting a triple on my two road bikes.