I am doing the Markleeville Death Ride (Sierra Nevada south of Lake Tahoe) this year and am dithering about gearing. Here are my bike options:
1. Compact (50/34) crank with either 13-29 or 13-26 2. 53/39 crank with 13-29
I have never gotten into the 29 with the 53/39 around here (the hills of western Wisconsin) and have about 1400 miles since March plus ~500 trainer "miles" since Jan. 1. I will have 2000+ road miles in by the time of the ride including a back-to-back century weekend.
The compact with the 13-29 appears to the safe choice given the unknowns (altitude, climbs, etc...). Any suggestions from those that have done this kind of riding before?
The rolling hills of Wisconsin will ill prepare you for the Death Ride but here goes. Use the lowest gearing you can put on the thing. Bu the time you've climbed Monitor Pass the second time-especially if you've taken the little jaunt into the deasert-you'll need it. They don't call it The Death Ride for nothing.
"philcycles" <[email hidden]> wrote in message news:[email hidden]...
Quoted message said:
App said:
I am doing the Markleeville Death Ride (Sierra Nevada south of Lake Tahoe) this year and am dithering about gearing. Here are my bike options:
1. Compact (50/34) crank with either 13-29 or 13-26 2. 53/39 crank with 13-29
I have never gotten into the 29 with the 53/39 around here (the hills of western Wisconsin) and have about 1400 miles since March plus ~500 trainer "miles" since Jan. 1. I will have 2000+ road miles in by the time of the ride including a back-to-back century weekend.
The compact with the 13-29 appears to the safe choice given the unknowns (altitude, climbs, etc...). Any suggestions from those that have done this kind of riding before?
The rolling hills of Wisconsin will ill prepare you for the Death Ride but
here goes. Use the lowest gearing you can put on the thing. Bu the time you've climbed Monitor Pass the second time-especially if you've taken the little jaunt into the deasert-you'll need it. They don't call it The Death Ride for nothing. Phil Brown
Having done the DR 3 times I cannot say that I have ever heard a rider complain about having too low of a gear. If you have too low of a gear, you don't have to use it. Most of the people I see on the DR spend hours plugging along at 5 mph. With a drive ratio of 34:29 this results in a cadence of about 50. I am okay with 50 standing but find it hard when in the saddle. The first time I did the DR I had a double and a fairly large cassette. I don't recall exactly what gears I had but probably a standard 53/39 crank and the biggest cog might have been a 29. I finished all 5 passes but got a triple for the two times.
Consider cadence, power and speed. If you have some feel for what power you can generate for long periods of time, you could fool around with one of the bike calculators such as: http://www.kreuzotter.de/english/espeed.htm
The rolling hills of Wisconsin will ill prepare you for the Death Ride
Eloquently understated.
The standard "Death Ride" modification to a Shimano 9-speed road bike is to put on an XT derailleur and a 34t cassette. Posers have even been known to adopt this setup to ... pose.
OP mentioned a 29t which sounds like Campy 10 so I'm not sure how that would shift a 9-speed Shimano cassette.
