Originally Posted by
livedarklions
From my perspective, you have this backwards. Most people spin a lower gear because they can't push the big one. Most people also don't have anywhere near the endurance I have and I believe I'm about as fast as I can expect to be at my age and weight. I'm cruising in the flat between 20 and 24 mph. RPMs are costly from a CV standpoint, and that represents wasted energy. I don't know why I'd want to pedal more to produce the same result, but I'm sure it would adversely affect my endurance.
That sense of power is my emotional response to my ability to apply a lot of torque. In essence, you asked me what happens when I try to ride without applying so much torque. I lose that sense of power and riding seems dull, mechanical, and uninspiring. I'm not sure I can convey why this occurs except to say being able to get a really big burst of speed by just pedaling 1-2 rpm faster in the high gear is instantly exhilarating and I'm not close to being able to duplicate that by rapidly drastically increasing my rpms in a lower gear. I know there are people who do, I'm never going to be one of them.
I'm going to bow out of any more discussion of this on this thread. Suffice it to say that my general strategy is to apply maximum torque on each rpm and obviously, that strategy is less effective in lower gears. You are so immersed in a strategy of maintaining a cadence that that seems weird, where I care so little about my cadence that I've never measured it.
It's all good. You obviously like to push big torque at a very low cadence. You are riding for pleasure, so there's no reason to change. But I just find it interesting as you are so far away from even a conventional "masher". Most people (as in pretty much everyone else) would find your cadence painful. 24 mph in your 53/11 is just over 60 rpm and at 20 mph it is around 51 rpm!
As for people spinning a lower gear because they can't push a big one is not quite right either. What most people do (including you) is ride at a cadence that feels comfortable for them. The only difference is that most people prefer a cadence in the 70-90 rpm range and it's the faster guys who tend to ride at a higher cadence.