Granny gears

[asterix]

For the moderately fit a triple is only really ever needed for heavily laden touring or MTB's.

A slight exaggeration?

If moderately fit cyclists on carbon bling with doubles insist on falling over on hills in front of me, I'd suggest they needed a triple, even if it does hurt their vanity.

 

[Chutzpah]

I have a granny gear on both my MTB and hybrid and I'm proud to use them.

I don't get any sort of "attitude" towards those that do.......

It's blooming hilly around here.

 

[Angelfishsolo]

Or even a 22-34 (I decided to upgrade my rear cog when the original gave up the ghost)

The first time I rode a MTB challenge I ran out of gears, puff and willpower halfway up a steep off-road climb about 30 miles into the ride. I ground to a halt, got off and started to push and the cramp hit my calves like I've never known it. I was so relieved to get back on where I could pedal and work the cramp out of my calves. Since then I simply don't care how slowly I'm going- if my legs are tired it's far better to sit and spin or even twiddle in a 22-32 combo!

 

[JamesMorgan]

For the moderately fit a triple is only really ever needed for heavily laden touring or MTB's.

I'm not convinced that that is completely true. From my experience discussion of different gear ratios often comes down to a discussion on optimum cadence. For me, my optimum cadence is 90. I run a triple (52:40:30) with a 11-32. At a cadence of 90, my optimum speed in my lowest gear is 6.8 mph. To get up a 10% gradient at 6.8 mph requires me to exert 350W. This is about my limit for an effort of 5 min (a hill of about 0.5 miles). Someone with the same fitness level but who prefers to cycle at a cadence of around 70 could get up the same hill with the same effort but using a compact double (50:34) with a 11-27 cassette. The beauty of flexible gearing is that you can choose the ideal ratios to suit your own preferred cycling style.

 

[GrumpyGregry]

The granny ring on my fast tourer/audax bike has two purposes....

On sub 200km rides it is there so I can glare at it and mentally scream "no effing way am I grovelling up any hill in that today. No. Effing. Way."

On 200km plus rides it is there so I can snick down into it and mentally scream "thank God I've got a granny gear to get me over this last range of hills"

Cogs for courses innit?

As to the moderately fit rider with their double and close ratio cassette... seems to me many mamils make very strange, i.e. unduly low, gear selection choices when climbing.

 

[snailracer]

...
As to the moderately fit rider with their double and close ratio cassette... seems to me many mamils make very strange, i.e. unduly low, gear selection choices when climbing.

I think the term "interval training" was invented purely to provide cover for incorrect gear choices

 

[aberal]

A slight exaggeration?

If moderately fit cyclists on carbon bling with doubles insist on falling over on hills in front of me, I'd suggest they needed a triple, even if it does hurt their vanity.

No. You've obviously got an incident in mind.

I wasn't there, but seems to me at a guess that they can't have been moderately fit and were probably turning a 42 at the front and a 21 at the rear. Or similar.

I've just done a quick bit of checking. A small triple chainring with 30 teeth with a 25 at the rear gives a lowest gear of 31.7. And 23 teeth at the rear gives a gear of 34.4 and 21 at the rear gives a gear of 37.7. A compact chainset with a small chainring of 34 teeth with 25 at the rear gives a lowest gear of 35.9, somewhere between the second and third gear of the triple chainring. A 34T with a 28 cog at the rear will give a low gear of 32.

So the triple in reality gives just two additional lower gears. Useful maybe (say) 1% of the time, on the steepest bit of the steepest hill, and even then you might be looking for an even lower gear. So to the question - do you "need" a triple to do a Sportive or long leisure rides, the answer is no.

There is only one real advantage in my view to a triple (other than the occasionally useful two lower gears

) and that is with a 52/42/30 chainring, the ratios will be much closer together than a 50/34 compact.

 

[ian turner]

The joke about calling it a granny ring is there are probably grannies who could beat the lot of you up a hill (though Beryl Burton regrettably didn't make it into her sixties but had she then...)

 

[aberal]

I'm not convinced that that is completely true. From my experience discussion of different gear ratios often comes down to a discussion on optimum cadence. For me, my optimum cadence is 90. I run a triple (52:40:30) with a 11-32. At a cadence of 90, my optimum speed in my lowest gear is 6.8 mph. To get up a 10% gradient at 6.8 mph requires me to exert 350W. This is about my limit for an effort of 5 min (a hill of about 0.5 miles). Someone with the same fitness level but who prefers to cycle at a cadence of around 70 could get up the same hill with the same effort but using a compact double (50:34) with a 11-27 cassette. The beauty of flexible gearing is that you can choose the ideal ratios to suit your own preferred cycling style.

That's just it - on the steepest bit of the steepest hill you may have to lower your cadence. But so what? That happens even with triples sometimes. Once, on my tourer with a 26 small chainring and 36 at the rear, half way up a hill in Tasmania in a sweltering heat, I had to drop to walking pace and probably half my normal cadence to prevent my eyeballs from popping out. At that point I had thought that I was going to have to get off and walk - as it was I made it to the top, simply by turning the gears slowly. You don't need to keep your cadence up, unless you're in a hurry.

 

[DaveyB1981]

+1 more

And another

Dave

 

[MacB]

I'm thinking about a new bike, specifically for sportives and long rides over lots of hills (the cotswolds on my doorstep) and some of the hills have got easier over time but not all of them, do I need: A triple chain ring? OR that 12-27 cassette just for that slightly lower gear...

Maybe the question that needs to be asked is why so many bikes are geared so high?

 

[Cubist]

Or even a 22-34 (I decided to upgrade my rear cog when the original gave up the ghost)

Go ten-speed and you can get an 11-36

 

[Angelfishsolo]

Not sure my rear mech could handle it. I would love it though

 

[Cubist]

There are other threads on this very subject if you do a search. It's horses for courses and really depends on your fitness level, but if you are even only moderately fit then the answer is no - you don't need a triple, but you might need a compact 34/50 at the front and look for maybe a 25 or 28 large cog at the rear. For the moderately fit a triple is only really ever needed for heavily laden touring or MTB's. Bearing in mind that a triple is typically 30 at the front the extra gears isn't really particularly useful except on mega steep bits and there are all sorts of disadvantages with the alignment of a front mech on a triple and adjusting the shifters as well as a bit of extra weight.

Having said all that - I don't agree with the sentiment of the OP. There are plenty of people who need to use or just prefer to have a triple at the front and no shame in that.

That's fine for you to say, but I'm talking about an average cyclist. On my compact I have a 50-36 with an MTB 11-32 cassette on it. My ride home is 6 miles all uphill with a 200 yard flat as the only respite, climbing 1000 feet, with an average of 6 percent for the first 5 miles, with a 20 percenter in the last half mile. I'm sure you may not want to seem like you're bragging, but here in the Pennines there are days when 34 28 would still be too tall. After 5 and a half miles climbing after a long day at work I want to be able to grind a granny up the last bit!


My next road bike will be a triple, and I will modify it to take an MTB cassette!

 

[Chris S]

I was walking home last night, up a long steep hill. There was a cyclist in front of me and I suddenly realized that I was gaining on him. I'd nearly caught up with him when he reached the brow and shot off in to the distance.

He'd obviously being using a very low ratio. What's the point? It would have been quicker to get off and push.

Looking back I might have been wrong about this - the cyclist could have been riding a fixie.

That might explain why it took him so long to get up the hill and then shot off when he did.

I still reckon he should have got off and pushed though!