Originally Posted by
Spikyho
You know when I ride to campus I only shift when I get stuck at lights, but now Ive started riding with some guys with more modern bikes and they just kill me with those extra gears. It seems like I can stay with them in my top gear but then they still have 2 more gears on their cassettes to just blow right past me
I'm confused. If all you need/want is a higher top gear, you can do that without increasing the number of speeds. Just get a new freewheel with smaller cogs. The main benefit of more gears is having smaller increments.
So we have the full picture, can you tell us what are you running now for your chainrings and freewheel? I haven't been your age for a long time, but even when I was I never rode the top end, and back then I rode with a lot of guys who raced. What exactly are they pushing these days?