Juan Foote

I don't ride hills a whole lot, in that I don't go to the mountains and ride the gaps, etc. but faced a similar concern to yours a couple of years ago swapping from a 32RC to a 28RC. What I have learned since that swap is that having the bail out gear was more of a mental thing for me than being something I really needed. I found that changing my style of attack on the hill helped out way more than the gear...in other words, instead of deciding to spin out the hill, I opted to grab a higher gear and push over the top.....Luckily this area is much more roller than any real climbs unless you take a drive. In retrospect having the lower gear was enabling me to be lazy.

himespau 

Yeah, you're going to need a road triple with a mountain cassette to get better gearing than is on your hybrid.

law086

That's a fair question, I'm sure hilly is different for everybody. I'm in eastern PA, my normal rides I climb about 100 ft per mile. So a 20 mile ride I'd climb a bit less than 2000 ft. Does that quality as hilly or am I just a wuss?

law086

That could very well be the same with me. My hills are mostly rolling too, but I have a few killers, and for those, depending how tired I am, I might drop down to my lowest gear. More so at the start of the season when I'm getting back in riding shape. I thinking going with the 11-32 on the back will be OK for me. We'll see. I'd rather error on the side of the lower gear than the other way around. I'll let you guys know how it goes. I'm hoping to get the bike by this weekend and go for my first ride on it.

MRT2

It depends. I wouldn't worry about whether your rides are especially hilly or not. The important point is, you needed to go all the way down to 23 gear inches to get over some of your tougher climbs. This isn't a competition, except maybe with yourself.

I ride a touring triple (26 - 36 - 48) with a road cassette (12 - 27) and I live in Southeastern Wisconsin. Not especially hilly, but it really depends what rides I do. Rides along or near Lake Michigan or South of Milwaukee tend to be very flat, with maybe 500' or less of climbing in a typical 20 or 25 mile ride. Head a little west of Lake Michigan, and you get into some rolling hills. Not exactly the Rockies, but challenging for me. Anyhow, my current setup gets me down to 26 gear inches. The bike came stock with a 12 - 25 cassette, which had a low gear of 28 gear inches. And on some of the longer or steeper climbs west and north of Milwaukee, I need a low gear smaller than 30 gear inches, or I am walking up some of those hills. (and I am not alone. on a group ride a couple of years ago, I ran into a number of people from the local cycling club who installed cassettes the size of dinner plates on their carbon fiber road bikes) Anyhow, this is what I need for Southeastern Wisconsin, which ranges in terrain from completely flat to rolling hills.

I recently took a vacation to the San francisco Bay area. If I lived there, I would absolutely switch out my road cassette for a full mountain setup. It doesn't matter that some 20 year old hipster can climb the steep mountain passes of Marin County on a single speed. For my age and fitness level, I couldn't do it.

spdracr39

I had the same thoughts when I moved to a road bike. It was slightly harder but you adjust quickly. The road geometry is easier to ride and the road bike is probably lighter also.

marimorimo

OP's concern is exactly what was on my mind when I bought my first road bike (just last week ). I also started on a Trek FX bike (a 7.4) and bad at hills. The first few months I was so bad at anything elevated even 1 meter that even the lowest gear on a triple was no help for me. Take note I actually live in a pancake-flat area and the "hills" are more like ramps! After a customizing my cranks and re-evaluating my pedaling technique, I improved and managed to decently climb some real, but not hard hills on the FX.

I next wanted a road bike but the model I wanted came in a 50-34 compact crank and 11-28 cassette. I was worried the 50T was too big of a ring for me and 34-28 didn't feel low enough. I'm more of spinner and hardly even use the 42T outer ring of my hybrid as I don't have the leg strength. So I had the LBS change the cassette to 11-32 at some expense since I needed to change to a long-cage RD as well to accommodate the wider cassette.

So the day came to pick up my new road bike and the first time I rode it (on a trainer at the shop), it was big revelation. The Shimano 105 drivetrain is sooo smooth. Pedaling a 50T chainring was MUCH easier than I expected. I have only been able to take it on a very short ride so far, but the road bike felt so much faster and easier to pedal than the FX hybrid. I don't know if it's the lighter weight, upgraded wheels, or better components, but I felt like I was pedaling a bike with a drivetrain doused with grease and fried in butter. I haven't had the chance to take it to the hills yet, but I already feel stupid for insisting on an 11-32 cassette (the LBS guy was against it). The way the bike felt and handled, I probably won't need the 32T gear unless I was doing a very long, steep climb.

Frankly I'm shocked at the difference in smoothness between by Trek FX 7.4 and my Pinarello road bike. The FX isn't a bad bike by any means--it's still fairly new (1000+ km only), has been assembled properly by the LBS, and I clean the chain regularly. It has a Deore RD and Acera FD. But the Pinarello with 105 RD and FD, and shifters felt like such a BIG step up. Are road bike drivetrains and components in general more efficient than others?

law086

Awesome feedback, thanks! In my case, I won't have the 105, but the Tiagra definitely seemed smooth as butter too!

MRT2

Hmm. Not really. I suspect you just got stronger. Gear inches don't really change. You can get a mountain setup with Deore LX or XT is that plenty smooth and high end, but geared a lot lower than a road bike because it is designed for climbing steep mountain grades.

himespau 

The placebo effect sure helps too.

MRT2

Yes, but, kind of a non sequitur. The smoothness of the shifters is great and all, and you might generate a little more power from a road bike if you can get low in the drops. But don't expect miracles. When I switched to my current bike from my old one, the stretched out riding position allowed me to go longer distances and the drop bars allowed me to get lower riding into the wind. And the new bike is geared higher than the old one allowing me to get some speed on rolling hills whereas on my old bike, with a 42 - 11 combo, I mostly just coasted on downhills.

But climbing is not really any different. My old bike was a little heavier, maybe by 4 or 5 lbs. But I weigh 250 lbs, so a difference of 4 or 5 lbs on a hill is really tiny.

Stucky

I live in the hills, too- and I started out with a road bike with a triple. After upgrading to a better bike, without a triple, I found that even though the gearing on the better bike wasn't as low as on the triple, it was no harder getting up the hills. As other posters have mentioned, the position and lighter weight of the good road bike helps.....and, when it come right down to it, no matter what your gear ratio, it's going to take a certain amount of strength to get up the hills- whether you have 28x34 and can spin your pedals really fast and go 4MPH; or whether you have 34x30 and spin slower, and still go 4MPH- I believe the effort will be close to the same.

I found too, that being forced to ride "harder gears", helped me to increase my strength. And my thoughts were: Even if climbing would be a little harder, having a good road bike would more than make up for it on the flats and rolling hills; allowing me to go faster/easier/further.

fietsbob

yes, work with the Dealer.. they can change components for you before you take the bike home..

Triple chainsets vs doubles , then even fit a smaller granny gear than is on the crank as shipped in it's box.

Jarrett2

In the pic, it looks like the Secteur Elite Double has a small cage rear derailleur:
Specialized Bicycle Components
It makes me wonder if it can really take an 11-32 cassette or not. But if the LBS says they can do it, so be it.

There is also this option:
Specialized Bicycle Components
Triple crank with 11-32 cassette on the Secteur. It's a less expensive groupset, but it gives you the gears.

I also went from a FX 7.2 to a Secteur. Due to the riding position, I found the hills easier on the Secteur even though I didn't have the depth of granny gears as I did on my FX. I suspect that a compact double with a 12-30 or 11-32 cassette would be fine in the type of hills you are talking about. If not at first, soon after you get accustomed to the bike.

Jarrett2

I just noticed this Secteur comes stock with 11-32:
Specialized Bicycle Components
I actually like my Sora groupset more than the Tiagra groupset I had on my last bike. Something about the ergonomics of the shifters.

MRT2

There is something to that. Jarrett2 calls it getting accustomed to the bike, but I would say it is as much getting used to riding hills.

MRT2

Sometimes I wonder why we are stuck with the standard road compact double on road bikes. While I am happy with my triple, if I were to switch to a double, I think I might try something like a 46 - 30 or 46 - 34 compact double, with either a 12 - 28 or 12 - 30 cassette. IMO and for the kind of riding I do, it provides far more useful gear combinations using the big chainring than a 50 - 34.

mulveyr 

Well, we're not really stuck with them in most cases. Realistically, most recreational riders would be far better off with cyclocross style drivetrain ranges. ( Don't get me started about LBS's who try to get people who have ridden 10 miles in 10 years on bikes with 50/11-25 drivetrains... ) The problem of course is that a lot of customers don't realize that there are more practical options, and dealers seem reticent to point out that they can swap out components all day long to build up a bike that's actually appropriate for the rider.

hueyhoolihan

that's hilly.

Drew Eckhardt 

Yup. You probably want a road bike with a triple crank.

Nope. Assuming you weigh 150 pounds you'd need to drop from a 38 pound bike to 16 to make up for the gearing loss going from a 30 inner ring to a 34. Heavier people would need a bigger change.

Road triples can accept an inner ring down to 24T, and mountain bikes go lower.

All this is very dependent on how much you weigh, how fit you are, an what your hills are like. As a fit climber weighing under 140 pounds with single digit body fat 39x25 is an ample low gear for the Colorado Rockies where civil engineers keep sustained grades under 6% so cars don't slide down them in the winter. With 65 pounds of middle aged spread just riding 100 miles a week you'd need something easier than 26x30 to climb at the same cadence.

Individual tolerance to lower cadences also varies. Training and Racing with a Power Meter discusses a racer who got dropped every time he had to spend more than 5 minutes at his one-hour power with a cadence under 70.

jon c. 

I have a road triple and never use the lower ring. Except when I visit my brother in N. Carolina. At home, I have a few hills that are steep and a couple that are long, but none that are both. If you have both, it's an easy enough conversion to do.

raceboy

I live in an area where there are some decent hills and was worried about the same thing. Would it be harder for me to get up a hill on a road bike double vs a hybrid triple? It turned out not to be a big deal. The first few climbs were slightly tougher on the road bike but I chalk that up to learning how to ride the double. Now I switch bikes back and forth and get up the hills with no real trouble. I will say that I have the opportunity to climb enough and have become reasonably strong and good at it.

I find grabbing a cup of coffee at the bottom of my steepest local climb has more effect on my ability to squirt up the hill than the bike I am riding! Placebo effect as someone else mentioned!

Camilo

He can do all the cassette swapping in the world, but unless he finds a road bike with a triple crank, he won't get anywhere near the low gearing he has now.

OP: re-start your search and look only for road bikes that have a triple crank. Typical road triple cranks are 50-40-30 or thereabouts. Combine that with a cassette equal to what you have now, you still won't have a low of a lowest gear, but you will probably be within an acceptable range given that the road bike will be lighter and more efficient to ride.

Your road triple bike might be Shimano Sora component group, but Sora works fine and the gearing ratios are more important than anything in your case, I think.

Don't be afraid to find a good, used (but modern) bike with a triple. It can still be serviced by your favorite bike shop if need be. But again, from what you've written, the triple crank seems to be critical.

Also, don't pay any attention to people who relate that they don't need the low gears or that you should just get stronger. That's BS. You know what gears you need or want (based on your current bike). Get the gears you need, not what others say you need.

Low gears, if you need them, really make riding a lot more fun that struggling.

gerard2013

So how has the new bike (and gearing) worked out?

bakes1

Very cool.
I am new to the sport and 6 weeks ago I ditched my old 24 speed Trek comfort bike and after a bit of research bought the Specialized Secteur Elite.
I love the new bike and there is not one thing I regret about the switch. My rides are only moderately hilly but even on the occasional big hill I have always been able to find a comfortable gear even when I am not 100% or just plain dragging that day.
I don't know what level you are at but as a novice I immediately experienced an average speed difference of about 2.0 mph when I made the switch.
I couldn't get my old Trek much above 14.5 mph on a 15 mile ride and these days I average 18 mph on the same route.
Good luck and I hope you up end getting the Secteur.