On what hill did it force you to ride at your LOWEST cadence ever ?

[Deleted member 121159]

All my slowest cadences must have been on Ditchling Beacon, just before I could physically no longer turn the cranks in my lowest gear. Shortly after, I started walking, feeling like a hopeless loser.

What's the lowest gear?

 

[derrick]

Combre del sol, Calpe Spain. Did this four years ago,

View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XYW7B6jVTcU

 

[gbb]

Getting fed up of starting a sentence..I don't really ride anymore...but when I did, I would often take a road I'd never gone down before, mix up the route a but.
Somewhere between Oundle and Weldon, I took a t junction at speed, onto a B road I'd never used before, to be almost immediately confronted by a fairly short but very steep incline. No time to assess while already on the move, just planted my feet in the pedals and went for it.....ughhh, I very quickly found myself almost static, wrong gear, clipped in, wobbling desperately trying to keep my balance while I literally crawled over the top
I was very fit then, but it took me by surprise..

 

[iandg]

I cycled out to Barmouth from Stafford when I was 16 for a weekend's camping. Route home took in the Bwlch-y-Groes. I had 42 x28 and got off and walked. Does that count?

 

[slowmotion]

What's the lowest gear?

I call the easiest gear the "lowest" one.
The bike had Shimano 105 triple gearing. I swapped the smallest chainring from 30 to 28 teeth which broke Shimano rules. The lowest gear was then 28T on both the back and the front.

 

[TheDoctor]

Lagos de Covadonga climb in the Picos de Europa, June 2022.
It peaks out at 15%, but I didn't make it that far.
In my defence, I was utterly match-unfit and decided to have a bash on the spur of the moment.
I got nearly 16k up before admitting defeat and going back down from about 800m.
Even liberal use of Turbo mode didn't get my cadence high enough to continue.
Did I mention I'd hired an e-bike?
To make matters worse, earlier in that trip I'd knocked off the Puerto de Piedrasluengas at 1355m on a ruddy Brompton. The fact that I started that ride from our hotel at 1190m is utterly irrelevant.

 

[Deleted member 121159]

I call the easiest gear the "lowest" one.
The bike had Shimano 105 triple gearing. I swapped the smallest chainring from 30 to 28 teeth which broke Shimano rules. The lowest gear was then 28T on both the back and the front.

Sorry I meant what is your lowest gear but you answered my question anyway

 

[Mr Celine]

Dunno if this was my lowest ever cadence but I'd only had the garmin and cadence meter for 6 months.

2.9 mph with a cadence of 46 on a gradient of 21%, heart rate well in to the red. Needless to say I didn't trouble the time set by Pogi the day before, although I did make it all the way up without stopping. Mur de Huy, Belgium.

 

[slowmotion]

Sorry I meant what is your lowest gear but you answered my question anyway

The chainring might even have been 26T. I can't remember. The bike was nicked last year so I can't check either.
BTW, if you want low gears, Spa Cycles is the place to get replacement chainrings. They do loads of stuff for touring cyclists. I rate them highly.

 

[Tim Bennet.]

In the olden days (70s), I used to work in Eskdale. Being hill country, I had extra low gears fitted which back then were 52/42 at the front and a five speed 12 to a whopping 28 on the back. But youth was everything and it all worked okay.

So much so that returning from a cycle touring trip I chose the shortest route home via Wrynose and Hardknott without a second thought. The first climb from Little Langdale went okay but the climb out of the Duddon up Hardknott was a struggle. The red mist descended on my brain and it was an all out effort to prevent the ignominy of a foot down. To oppose the force of leg muscles on the pedals I pulled with all my might on the handlebars and managed to rotate me and the loaded bike backwards around the 'fixed' rear wheel, landing on my back in the road with the loaded bike on top. There was a very quick scrabble to undo my very tight toe straps as I could not only see an old A35 coming down the hairpins, but already smell the over cooked brakes.

 

[SWMc]

Col de La Loze from Meribel - there's a short section, maybe 100-150m of ~23% just before the route turns NE up the final ramp. Just checked back in my TrainingPeaks - 3.5 mph, 43 rpm, 245W. Think I had a SRAM 33/33 i.e. 1:1 at the time

 

[honeybadger]

Not sure of the cadence but I’m pretty sure it would have been very low (it went into auto pause several times) during a monster ride a friend and I did a few years ago. Set off in darkness from where we live (about 10miles south of Lancaster) and rode up to Cumbria to do some of the monster climbs. We did Birker fell, Hardknot, Wrynose and the Struggle. We then rode over to do Great Dunn fell and came home via Yorkshire. 200miles with 18000ft of climbing. All done on 52/36f and 11/28 out back

 

[Alex321]

Not sure of the cadence but I’m pretty sure it would have been very low (it went into auto pause several times) during a monster ride a friend and I did a few years ago. Set off in darkness from where we live (about 10miles south of Lancaster) and rode up to Cumbria to do some of the monster climbs. We did Birker fell, Hardknot, Wrynose and the Struggle. We then rode over to do Great Dunn fell and came home via Yorkshire. 2000miles with 18000ft of climbing. All done on 52/36f and 11/28 out back

View attachment 712414

Think you may have added a zero to the miles there

 

[honeybadger]

Think you may have added a zero to the miles there

Doh I’ll edit my post !