When I got my first road bike in 1985, it came with a 52/42 large chainring and a 13-18 (13-14-15-16-17-18) straight block 6 speed cassette. In the says of freewheels, I was able to quickly replace it for a 13-14-15-16-18-21) or something like that, and proceeded to use that 42-21 riding in the alps because that’s about as small as we had.
Then I got a 39-21
Soon I was able to get a 7 speed and things went to 39-23
I thinkt it was at the 2003 TdF when Tyler Hamilton broke his collarbone, the team put a 50-34 110 bcd chainring on his bike because he would not be able to stand out of the saddle and would have to sit down and ride seated. Doping aside, he finished 4th using that gearing.
If it made sense in the TdF it just work for me, so I went from the 39-25 small geat I had to 34-25. That felt way better. By 2010, I was on 34-27 and by 2014 I was using 34-32 any time I was doing any major climbs.
Now I use 34-32 all the time. My power has dropped substantially in the last 10 years, so it seems my rear cassettes are getting larger and my large chainring is poised to get smaller too!!!
What’s your stories of the evolution of your gearing?
Fortunately for those who came to riding in the last 5 years, OEM specs make a ton more sense than 40 years ago, when we just used the same massive gears that only worked if you hand the engine of Hinault and Lemond!!!
In high school I had a Sears 10speed which I always rode in the highest gear, figuring that the other nine were just for people who weren’t as strong. I was probably pedaling 4rpm up the local hills.
College was the 42/23. For my first trip to the Alps in '95: 39/27. The pros were still using 25s max. and climbing at 60rpm was the norm.
My gearing hasn’t changed much, aside from a compact crank. What has really changed my gearing choices is having a PM and seeing that spinning a lower gear can translate to more power than being overgeared.
When I did road and track races as a junior I used to train on an old bike my friends dad used to ride. I had my racer but this was my trainer. He called it the pig and it weighed a ton and had the gears on the down tube. Don’t know what gears were on it but the frame was too big for me as I had the seat all the way down and I could never spin on the hills.
Was a great bike and had some good rides on it as whenever I got on my racer for the fast rides it was awesome
Now I have a 36 on my roadie and can spin all the steepest pinches around here. Just comfort and enjoyment. I think a lot of progress since Armstrong and then froome about going at a lighter gear and higher cadence
Kids who start out now who have massive cross country gears on their bikes and eat a pile of carbs on their rides progress pretty fast
My first real bike was late 80s Pinarello Montello SLX. I still have it, but most of the paint has flaked off. I had a pro 53-42 crankset and with 13-19 freehub. I remember first seeing a corncob freewheel and having this feeling that when I could ride that, I will have arrived. So, that is what I bought for that bike and never looked back. I could ride that thing up and over anything. It looked so awesome.
I just bought a new road bike in December that came with a stock AXS setup: 48-35 up front and 10-33 in back.
I went from my OG 42-19 easy gear to a 35-33 easy gear. The new bike is almost 1:1. It is truly ridiculous. I thought about changing it out, but naaaa.
What’s your stories of the evolution of your gearing?
I think you also have to consider the drugs that the pros were using and how that influenced gearing choice, steroids in the 70s and 80s allowed them to push bigger gears, so long as their knees held up, while EPO facilitated the shift to high cadences.
Hard to imagine how a hobby cyclist could climb the Stelvio on a 42 front and anything less than a 23 on the back. Chapeau to you for managing, even if it’s just a fond memory now.
First decent bike was a handmade Reynolds steel frame racer with Suntour Superb Pro Group set. Up front it had 53/42 and a 6 speed cassette with, at best, a biggest sprocket of 21 teeth. Did an event here in the UK that had a climb with a section at 25%. Suffice to say the only way up was to get off and push. Now have a road bike with a 34 inner and 32 rear…I’d probably still need to get off and push though.
What’s your stories of the evolution of your gearing?
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I think you also have to consider the drugs that the pros were using and how that influenced gearing choice, steroids in the 70s and 80s allowed them to push bigger gears, so long as their knees held up, while EPO facilitated the shift to high cadences.
Hard to imagine how a hobby cyclist could climb the Stelvio on a 42 front and anything less than a 23 on the back. Chapeau to you for managing, even if it’s just a fond memory now.
Interesting, but I’m not sure if I’m sold. I remember seeing a graph where at ~350w the peak pedal for was <100lbs, don’t remember the cadence, probably 90. Really that’s not a lot of force. Even if you go down to half, an absurdly low 45 rpm, that’s <200lb peak. Really we’re talking about an alternating one legged lift of either ~120lbs every second or ~60lbs every half second. Those are both highly aerobic activities. I can see the argument for steroids favoring low cadence and EPO favoring high, I’m just not sure if it explains the 60rpm to 100 rpm shift in the 1990’s.
I’ve never researched it, but I always assumed the low gears of yesteryear were a result of the poor shifting performance of early bikes. A 6-speed chain isn’t really able to ramp up from a 32t ring to a 52t ring, likewise with big jumps on the cassette. Furthermore, with only 12 total gears the jumps between them would need to be huge, like a 20rpm change from one gear to the next. And lastly, the stickyness of things. Singlespeeds had to be grinded, so the first shifting bikes were used by guys used to grinding, likewise for 10-speeds, and so on. Eventually it changes but adoption of tech is always slower than tech itself.
late 90s I had a mountain bike with a triple in front
Yeah in 1987 I bought a mountain bike with a triple. Before that way back in 1984, I bought a touring bike that also had a triple. I no longer have that bike but I DO have the six speed freewhile that I kept as a souvenir from the trip as I subsequently lent that bike to my sister (not exactly how she fit on it as she is 5’0" and I am 5’6") but she lent it to a house mate who totalled it in car crash (housemate was subsquently OK), I was just looking at the freewheel the other day and counted the teeth and it was a 30 tooth smallest gear.
So the tech was there in 1984. I believe my triple was a 52-42-32 or something like that and was probably a 110 bcd so it would be completely viable in 1984 to have a 50-34 110bcd set up with 13-30 rear cluster as effectively I had all of that on my touring bike…so it was probably myths from the pro peloton coupled with big jumps in 6 speed (if you did a 50-34 back then with a six speed 13-15-18-21-25-30) the jumps would be too massive for pro level racing so they were on 13-18 corn cobs as that is ideal if you have Hinault/Fignon level FTP on everything under 8 percent grade.
The problem was the rest of us did not have pro level FTPs, but road bikes were sold with pro specs. Over in the touring bike and mountain bike world we had gearing in the 80’s equivalent to what you have on the protour today
When I got my first road bike in 1985, it came with a 52/42 large chainring and a 13-18 (13-14-15-16-17-18) straight block 6 speed cassette. In the says of freewheels, I was able to quickly replace it for a 13-14-15-16-18-21) or something like that, and proceeded to use that 42-21 riding in the alps because that’s about as small as we had.
It was not even close to as small as what was available. It’s just as small as people were willing to use on “racing” bikes.
“Recreational” road bikes of that era typically came with clusters of 14-28 or thereabouts. Small rings were occasionally smaller than 42, like 38 or 40. Triples had never been especially popular, but they had been available since the dawn of time and were common on “touring” bikes (and, by '85, mountain bikes).
“Touring” variants of road derailleurs from the 1970s could usually handle cogs up to 32 or 34 teeth, and wrap somewhere around 35 teeth. And many of them were not clunkers: SunTour’s Cyclone GT series were gorgeous devices that weighed in similar to Campy’s top-end racing parts.
By the mid-80s, the “touring” derailleurs were seeing their market position obviated by “mountain” parts, usually configured for similar cog capacity by with often 40+ teeth of wrap.
So the tech was there in 1984. I believe my triple was a 52-42-32 or something like that and was probably a 110 bcd so it would be completely viable in 1984 to have a 50-34 110bcd set up with 13-30 rear cluster as effectively I had all of that on my touring bike…
110BCD was commonplace for triples at the time, but it was (and remains) uncommon for the small ring to be less than a 34T on that bolt circle.
Many triples of that era used two bolt circles, with the larger (such as 110mm) for the two big rings, and a separate smaller circle (commonly 74mm) for the inner ring. This allowed for down to about a 24T. 110BCD triples that mounted all three chainrings to a single bolt circle did exist, though.
As far the the “tech being there”, it was there long before that. Rear derailleurs with a mostly-modern dual-pulley jockey+tensioner cage topology were available even before the first world war. And the tech in that era was largely driven by the demands of cyclotourists, so widening the gear ranges was a big emphasis.
just for Boulder Peak tri last year, with its 16% grade on Old Stage Hill, put on 34x30 and it wasn’t enough ;-(
still walked part of the climb…
walked it on my first Boulder Peak in 1999, but was riding a Schwinn Continental 40lb bike in those days.
after the Schwinn, got my old bike from SA and started riding in CO with 42-21 on a six-speed. One ride up Deer Creek and I realized that wasn’t going to work… rode 39-25 for many years until I got old.
My first dedicated triathlon bike in 1989 had 39-25 as the smallest gear combination and as a person in their early 40’s that was fine. By 2000 when I moved to a very hilly area, I found I was struggling on the steepest hills near home. I changed to a compact set of chainrings (50/34) and an 11-28 cassette, which at that time was the easiest gear in the Dura Ace range.
As I aged into my late 60’s and now mid-70’s I kept searching for easier solutions to hill climbing without adding too much weight to the cassette. I discovered the ZTTO brand of lightweight cassettes and now both my training road bikes and one training tri bike have a compact crank combined with 11-36 teeth cassettes that enable me to keep cycling in my area.
I attribute these cassettes to my longevity on the bike because without them, at age 75, I would be less inclined to go out on training rides. However, I must caution that most road bike rear derailleurs are not designed to cope with a 36 tooth cog so you need to be adept at setting it up initially.
Not sure because it’s been a while. The first bike I bought new was a 1972 Peugeot U0-8. I think the chainrings were 52x45 and the freewheel (5sp) was 14x24. Black plastic Simplex derailleurs. Mafac brakes. Can’t remember any of the other components.
Old and in the way
That’s what I heard him say…
Edit: Currently using 34x50 or 36x52 and an 11x25 or 11x29 depending.
Some 10 or 11 years ago I got back into cycling after many years off, but still had my race bike from the 90’s, complete with 53-42 and 12-21 or 12-23 cassette. I decided it would be fun to go and ride up the only Hors Category mountain that I have near me - 1000m of elevation gain in around 20km, but with some flat and slightly downhill sections, so probably topping out at around 20% gradient. Being at 1600m the top was extremely windy, and it was a headwind blowing straight down some of the steepest sections. I wouldn’t let the gear beat me, and made it up, but had a bad back for weeks afterwards. Next time I ride it I will be on my 50-34 with 12-25 and will enjoy it immensely!!
I work at a bike shop in Boulder. I’m 56 and when I’m out riding I see so many riders my age or older still pushing the wrong gearing up hills. I want to tell them to come see me but I’m afraid it’ll come off as an insult or a sales pitch.
I think there’s a stubbornness to change and they think they’re giving in to weakness rather than gaining a mechanical advantage, which is part of cycling.
Let’s not get started on the stem risers slapped on old race bikes, comfort saddles and padded bar tape while still riding on 23mm tires.
Things have changed so much for the better in cycling if you’re open to it.
I’m just not sure if it explains the 60rpm to 100 rpm shift in the 1990’s.
I’m not sure that there was a 60rpm to 100rpm shift in the 1990s that needs to be explained.
If those 80s racers were well-optimized cyclists, and pedaling at extremely low cadences was actually more optimal for them, you’d expect them to self-select significantly lower cadences than modern riders in general. Not just on extremely steep climbs when they bottomed out the gearing.
I’ve never researched it, but I always assumed the low gears of yesteryear were a result of the poor shifting performance of early bikes.
Wider gear ranges introduce additional geometry challenges to shifting, although I think it’s an overstated issue.
For example, most drivetrain designs can be adapted to considerable increases in chain wrap without major consequences to shift quality. And front shifting up through ~10-tooth jumps has always been relatively slick, regardless of chain and chainring tech. So I think it’s very difficult to use “poor shifting” to explain the era when the front range on racing bikes was less than 10 teeth, or why triples were not used to add range (or allow tighter steps over whatever the racer considered a “tolerable” range).
Some of it was probably technological divergence coupling with tradition. When derailleurs started being widely accepted to racing in the 1930s, there were probably actual good reasons to avoid the “touring” models: most notably is probably that their geometry was not designed to facilitate ultra-fast wheel swaps, and this was an era of many flats.
Many other reasons that racers came up with to avoid touring models (such as friction caused by the S-curve of the chain going through two pulley wheels) are more suspect. But it’s not surprising that people would come up with them, regardless of how true they were: humans tend to come up with explanations to justify the existence of categories, and these explanations provide a lot of momentum for the continued existence of the categories. (I’d argue that this phenomenon is present in how modern cyclists have described the simultaneous existence of “aero” and “climbing” road bikes.)
A lot of it was probably just racing culture in and of itself, though. Pretty much everybody who raced back then says that they wouldn’t want to be caught dead on a rear cluster without a sufficiently corn-cob-esque aesthetic, and definitely not on a triple.
A 6-speed chain isn’t really able to ramp up from a 32t ring to a 52t ring
Amusingly, doubles with 20-tooth jumps were actual commonplace in western European cyclotouring communities in the mid-20th century. Here’s a page from a Cyclo catalog from 1930 advertising a 44-24 chainring pairing.
My 1x road setup has a lower gear than any road bike I owned before 2010.
I wonder how much powermeters have changed the gearing people use. Before a powermeter (and hr to a lesser degree), riders paced their effort to the terrain. Now we’ve learned to smooth out the effort to be more consistent overall. Of course this doesn’t apply to sustained climbs, which were always done just about as hard the gears necessitated.
This is one of the best responses/posts I’ve seen here. I have no notes, just saying thank you for sharing this knowledge
I do have an answer for you about why triple chainrings weren’t used. You’d get laughed out of a group ride showing up with a triple. Winning a race with a triple wouldn’t have any “panache”. It’s almost like aero helmets in road racing. Measurably better, but not the status quo. Or as you said, “racing culture”.
First road bike at age 12 when I started was a 42-28 low and I rode that for a long time though it took me a while to climb my local mountain that had some sustained 8 percent sections. Later on, I was young, skinny and fit and used a 38-24 all through my racing years, but still got caught out on a couple of Utah mountains with steep sections. I did not do a lot of serious climbing for years and years until I discovered the Owens Valley California climbs when I lived in the California high desert.
In 2008 I climbed Onion Valley pretty comfortably with a 40-28.
In my late 40s until now in my mid-50s, cycling is climbing for me. Except for a little tri-bike maintenance riding, I look for the biggest and/or steepest mountains I can find. Lots of days climbing 7-12,000 feet. To do that, I climb at 140 -200 watts. Which means I need a minimum of 30-36 for two to three hours of climbing and 24-36 for the 10,000+ days.
All this culminated with me climbing Mauna Kea in Hawaii. I used a 24-42. Before you laugh, I want you to imagine climbing sustained gravel sections above 10000 feet with loose traction followed by grades up to 13 percent, with a headwind, above 13,000 feet. I rode the whole way and never had to walk.
My local training hill has some 16 percent sections that require a 18-20 inch gear to keep the watts in reason and spin.
The easiest way to pick out a novice climber is to pass him while he is “spinning” 50 rpm up a hill and has a couple of cogs still to use. I roll my eyes and shout encouragement while I spin at 80.
