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SS riding effects on geared riding

2K views 24 replies 23 participants last post by  hsakkire 
#1 ·
I have been doing the off-road SS thing for about 9 months, with some touches of 1x9.
When I used the 1x9, I found myself keeping it in a gear similar to the SS, especially when climbing. I preferred to stand for the majority of climbs. I only shifted when I was on the flats. Otherwise, I was stuck in one gear. Now both MTBs are in SS mode!!

Now, I find myself converting my "road" bike to a 2x1, because I have two front chainrings and I want to climb some hills, occasionally.

With nine months of SS, I feel like whatever spin I had is slowly going away, but now I feel that I have more power.

How has riding SS effected your geared riding? Or do you even ride geared anymore?
 
#2 ·
when i ride geared i find that I always have to tell myself to shift. I will be spinning away on the flats when I realize that i can actually shift to a harder gear. Then I find myself coming out of a corner in too hard of a gear, standing and mashing for awhile to get back up to my comfort spin and settle in again.

Off course after a little time on a geared bike i find myself reaching for my shifter on the SS whenever I need to speed up and catch someone. Muscle memory is a *****.
 
#5 ·
I have been doing the off-road SS thing for about 9 months, with some touches of 1x9.
When I used the 1x9, I found myself keeping it in a gear similar to the SS, especially when climbing. I preferred to stand for the majority of climbs. I only shifted when I was on the flats. Otherwise, I was stuck in one gear. Now both MTBs are in SS mode!!

Now, I find myself converting my "road" bike to a 2x1, because I have two front chainrings and I want to climb some hills, occasionally.

With nine months of SS, I feel like whatever spin I had is slowly going away, but now I feel that I have more power.

How has riding SS effected your geared riding? Or do you even ride geared anymore?
I tend to speed up when approaching hills and charge up them til I am about to stall before dropping to a lower "spinning" gear.
 
#7 ·
I don't down shift when preparing for a hill, I get myself in higher gears and put a max of momentum in the beginning, then slowly downgrade as the climb goes on... If I downgrade. Heavy bikes are good at keeping momentum when climbing :thumbsup:

David
 
#11 ·
I think that I used to be pretty good at timing shifts, but now I'm useless at it. My rides are spilt about 50/50 geared/ss, but on the geared bike the only time I shift now is to gear up on flats. On hills I stand and mash my way up, and occasionally I'm geared too high and then I'm hooped.
 
#13 ·
I ss from nov-march, occasionally getting in a road ride and less frequently still, a geared ride. I find ss helps my core and upper body strength considerably yet doesn't provide the same cardio workout quality as my geared bike. shifting/not shifting takes very little time to readjust.
 
#15 ·
I built up a SS in Jan of '07 and put gears on it for a few weeks prior to and for the Hut Trip that summer. Went back to SS as soon as I got home, and that was the last time I have ridden gears off-road (except for demo days or test rides) since. I do ride gears on the road, but tend to ride a bit taller than I did years ago. I work better at a slightly harder/slower effort when climbing anyway... I still like having gears on the road, but a totally different experience. SS is the way to go off-road for me.
 
#21 ·
Two of my three bikes are singlespeed: the mtb is a simple singlespeed, and the commuter is a simpler fixed gear. I have the mtb geared a bit higher that most, and the fixed gear geared a bit lower than most, so I end up spinning 120+ RPM when commuting. It provides a nice enough balance between anaerobic and aerobic workouts.

And then I hop on the geared road bike, and I keep forgetting to shift. I'd rather spin hella fast on the flats and then charge up the hills. I'm thinking I'll see some intervals on the road bike soon, though. I hate having to actually train for races.
 
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