I live in Raleigh in a pretty hilly part of town. Lots of short little climbs and hills. My road bike rides if I stay in the neighborhood are from 60 to 100 feet per mile, and usually short hills of 6 to 11% grade from 1min to 3min long.

For the TT bike I usually will ride it to get out of town for tempo/SS work to where it's more like 50 to 60 feet per mile of some 3 to 8% little hills. Or use it in-town to go KOM hunting.

I think it depends on a combination of factors.

-How strong you are (w/kg)
-what the purpose of these rides are (fun, or Z2, etc..)
-how comfortable you are climbing out of saddle
- how much attention you pay to what gear you're using when you were riding around on a 2x equipped bike

I'll say in-town it takes a solid rider to be able to get around on a 54t with 11-28. I ride with some guys who are strong AF, but bigger weight wise. I really don't see many of them being able to handle a 54/28 combo on these short hills here.

I've in the past exported my ride to Excel and did a "countif" to see how long I spent under certain speeds. Which would correlate to a gear ratio and cadence combo.

I get by fine with it, but it's a purpose machine for TT. So I make it work.

Thanks for the reply! I did Raleigh 70.3 a few years back and thought it was similar to Austin. Great city.


I probably should’ve been more specific. If I go to 1x, I would use the SRAM 1x12 so I’d have a 48 or 50 in the front.

I've got 1x on my mtb. Love it on that bike.

Still running 2x on my road and tri bikes.
There are some steep climbs around but if you stick to the main climbs (360, 620), 1x is probably enough