Also.... if the hills (especially the toughest) occur near the end of the ride, conserve your legs for those hills. Then, celebrate on the descent and crank up your speed a few notches.

Most of the tought hills that I do don't allow for this strategy. When I startedd this thread earlier in the summer I was really getting into tough climbs. My lowest gearing n my Tarmac is 30/25 - when I get to anything 8% or greater I am there and there isn't anything left. High RPM spinning is not happening either. One climb I did about a month ago started at 10% for about 1 mile and then back to 8% for a total of 10 miles. I end up in the bottom gear from the get go.

I don't know its grade, but that sounds like a hill near our house. It starts and ends steep, about 1 mile long, and there's not much time before I reach the lowest gear. On the Surly LHT, I could spin in the lowest gear up the hill, at a very slow, almost walking, speed. On the Roubaix, I was pushing hard in the lowest gear, my HR was scary high, my legs were burning. On both bikes I had to stop twice but I wasn't in pain on the LHT--- and that was at the end of 50 miles.