Different Cassette?

[aicabsolut]

The answers you were given were based on your terrain. Momentum is a huge factor on rolling hills and you can use a much higher gear to get over them. A 20 mile long grade like the coast California mtns or the Sierras requires you to grind up. I can easily ride at 3-4 miles an hour at a comfortable cadence because I've chosen the right gear, not too low, not too high (you have to be Goldilocks). Factor in the horrible potholes in many of those roads and that they are steepest at the top, and those extra low gears can be really important. And, a 30 min climb isn't all that long for some areas.

aicabsolute, road racers of your ilk (as in the types of races you do) need completely different gears than the average rider. Your discussions were focused on answers for you, your terrain in your corner of the universe.

One of the routes I routinely do has an upward trend for about 7 miles. It takes me about 25min. I am pretty much the only one I know who races on a compact crankset. My teammate with a triple on her WSD bike never touches her granny ring or the top half of her cassette when she's in the middle. For my "corner of the universe," I use easier gears than the average rider. I also was getting advice on gearing from good climbers. My conversation with them was about determining a rig that I could take with a friend to the Bay Area, for example, and survive a full day of riding. FWIW, racers would never race on anything close to a 1:1 gear ratio. They weren't advising me on how to race out in Cali, but what they thought was the lowest practical gear combo I (or anyone--in their opinion) ought to put on a climbing road bike. The only ultra-distance cyclist I know who still does those rides (she does things like rides out to and climbs Mt Etna on her bike) runs a standard crankset and something like an 11-25 in the back. She's a billy goat.

Based on Aggie's latest post, maybe the rest of you are more on point than I was. However, it wasn't totally clear from her original post what she was climbing exactly. I also feel like there's some huge war going on between those who use light gearing and have to make mountain bike component modifications and those of us who stick with more stock setups. Most of the time here, the latter group is being attacked by the former (who somehow feels as though they've been attacked first). You all take it too personally. Just because some of us advocate one approach doesn't mean that we're saying the rest of you don't deserve to be on road bikes. Good grief.

In addition, many of my comments (here and on violette's thread) take cost into account. That is something I consider strongly when making component changes. What's the easiest and cheapest thing to try out first? A cassette that will work with no other changes. Next? Depending on the group, either going for smaller rings or something like the large range cassette. Because of my place in the sport, I wouldn't consider a mtn bike cassette personally, but I could get pretty close if I ran Campy, so I still support cassette and derailleur changes. Lastly, the most cost would involve an entire group overhaul (from double to triple or from shimano to campy or whatever).

Since the OP doesn't do the monster climbs very often, I figured she'd want a change that I'd advocate for newer riders. Go with an inexpensive change that will let you hang on, and if you want to do that type of riding more often, then go with the next level of change if you don't just get better at it from practice. There's also the consideration that a good climbing rig might become kind of annoying for the more frequent rides on flatter ground, especially if you remove some of the harder end. Remember that part of the question here was if she was going to lose much high end for descending. That means she'd like to optimally keep her big ring and some high end on the cassette.