yeah I ride a 1x9 on my hard tail 29r right now. it's a 28t chain ring and 11-34 on the back. With the 29r roll out and the hard tail action long rides (20+ miles) can get a little brutal. I think 1x11 with the 650b roll out is damn near perfect.

 

yeah the extra spread of the 11 speed cassettes is glorious. and it's starting to trickle down to realistic price points. I'm usually on a 1x10 on 650b wheels- 34t with 11-36 cassette. I have a 30t that I swap on the front if I ever head to high elevations or plan on doing massive climbs.

 

what are you riding now?

front/rear gear and tire size.

I have a 12-28 cassette on my carbonbike and it is low enough for most anything around here. if you live in the mountains, I could see wanting something a little higher even with a compact crank.

 

I enjoy the look on triathlete faces when I discuss the finer points of "looking pro".

 

LOL.


Speaking of which, how do I choose a jersey/short?

Also: bib vs short?

I don't feel like a bib would be comfortable. I hate suspenders.

 

Buy one/try it on, if you like it, buy more.

I have 5 pairs of shorts, one pair of cheap-ish bibs, and one pair of $$$ Castelli bibs. I should have just bought bibs from the start. No elastic around the waist makes bibs significantly more comfortable. You don't notice the straps on the bike.

 

 

Oh right, I forgot to post my "new" bike.



C-dale six13 (~2008?). Dunno about the gearing, I'll have to count the teeth. I just know that it's inadequate for the hill coming into work, and my commute is like 90% of the road bike's duty. On the MTB, I like to spin smallest gear on the front and second biggest on the rear coming up the hill. On the road bike best I can get to feels like the equivalent of middle sprocket up front and middle sprocket out back on the MTB.

 

the other option is to just jump out of the saddle and attack the hill.

Ive been doing that on my commutes the last few days. Im getting faster at it too.

If I was sitting and spinning a slower, mash cadence I would shift up 2 or 3 gears and get up and keep the slower cadence (~50-60rpm based on feel)

 

Change gearing or attack. Mentally there are some days when you don't want to attack, and or if your nursing knees or whatever.

I used to love my 20/34 on my MTB, sure you could walk up as fast but staying on the bike on super steep terrain was the challenge.

Try a smaller front inner or a cassette with a larger last rear cog.
Smaller front changes all your ratios and can be a pain, new cassette with a larger rear will cost more and again you'll typically get different tooth counts on the other gears not just the largest.

Shimano offered MegaRange for MTB's and that freewheel/cassette while functional had a huge jump to the largest ring. It looks funny but it worked.

Find what suits your riding. If you were in Kansas a nice tight cassette with tiny increments would suit being able to hit your target cadence. Living in Durango you'd want a huge range but then you lose the ability to incrementally choose your rpm.

 

Welcome to road-cycling elitism. Enjoy your stay.

 

 

I have a shimano megarange on my mtb. The big ring on the back means I pretty much never downshift into the small ring in the front, unless I'm toast on a steep hill, then its actually faster to walk the bike than sit and spin, the ratio ends up that retarded. I think its like 28/34.

 

Johan has some big ring power !

Now flip up your cycling cap and watch some real roadie riding. PS - that's real denim, not a pair of denim bibs, and real mustaches complete with manly flowing hairstyles........

 

This.

That moment, late in a ride, where the elastic waistband is cutting into your abdomen and you feel like every 30 seconds you need to sit up straight and readjust where the waistband sits?

Doesn't happen with bibs.

 

The only problem with my Castelli bibs is that I now hate wearing every other pair of shorts I own.

 

Good bibs will do that to you. When winter rolls around you feel the same way about the bib knickers you're gonna buy.

At the elite level, even the women wear bibs, bewbs and all.

 

The worst part about riding MTB is not wearing my nice bibs because I don't want to tear them up.

 

mtbros, who has a dropper seatpost and what do you have?

I've just gone clipless on my mountain bike (which is ******* awesome, i might add), and now I really have the lust for a dropper post. So many trails around here that are down/uphill so I'm just leaving my seat in the middle for now, which really kills my pedal efficiency.

I've found some KS i7R's for a good deal, and read back and forth reviews like any other dropper. I can get this one new for ~$220 and it has a 2 year warranty.

should i can haz?

 

I've ridden a bunch of RockShox Reverbs... the newer ones have much better reliability vs. the older ones. The Reverb seems to be the gold standard of function, reliability not so much.

I also have spent time on a Fox DOSS- they are super reliable but heavy, expensive, clunky, 3 position(instead of infinite) and the lever is ****.


I hear good things about KS, but never have used one.

Just keep your old seatpost for the times when you need to warranty the dropper. Wait- maybe just buy two because you'll never be able to ride without one again.