Advice on gearing for L'Etape

enda01

Hi, just joined. I note there is some excellent advice knocking around this forum excellent. Would greatly appreciate if you etape vets could advise on the gearing I will need to get up Ventoux. FYI: I'm not a novice to a bike - happy to ride for 3-4 h in a session - but neither am I an expert rider or racer. Main goal - get to finish in resonable time without halting or hiking on the steep gradients.

Toks

Hi mate and welcome to the forum. You haven't eally given us much to go on. You say you can ride 3-4 hours in a session and you're not a novice. What gearing to use will pretty much be defined by your levels of fitness. Someone who can ride for 3-4 hours on hilly terrain @12-14mph will need access to lower gears to survive an etape where else another person who could breeze through a sportiv at 17-19mph average won't need such low gears. A compact or triple cassette would be my advice for the first type of rider and a double cassette with low 39-25/26 or 27 gearing may be better for the fitter guy. Or the fit guy could lso opt for a compact. Hopefully others will chip in with advice too. If you haven't checked it out already this guy always has good advice and tips
http://www.etape.org.uk/

enda01

Thanks Toks. Yes, I know I didn't give much info. - don't want to bore with my average stats - but your advice covers the options, and I think I'm probably between the two standards you mention. Compact crankset up front for me I think. I guess as I start serious hill work later in year, I can adjust to a triple if I'm struggling.

Roadie Rods

I did the Ventoux thing last year - rode up 3 times in one day from each of the three ways up. I don't know the rest of the Etape course.

Personally, as more of a spinner than a grinder on the climbs, I would advise a 34-27 bottom gear. This was easily enough for me, giving my the knowledge that I had one gear left if I popped near the top when I was tired (ie third time up!) - my sister used the same gearing too and was happy with that too.

nick hanson

You CANNOT have too low a gear for the Ventoux.
Going back a few years (5,I think,I was going up it on 39x26 which,at the time was just about low enough for me (took me 1Hr35minsfrom Bedoin),but didn't have any spare gears left.
Now I run a compact,so when abroad I have the option of 34x26,& have been known to put a 29 on the back for the Dolomites,& still climb with a similar average speed.

jhop

It will be 34x29 for me on July 20th I find that at the end of a long hot day it is better to have something lower than that normally needed. It is not the steepness that gets to you but the length. In 2006 on Alpe D'huez in the ferocious heat after the other cols can't imagine anyone did not wish for something lower than what they actually had!!! Of course last year it was cooler but I was happier to be safe rather vthan sorry.

JamesB

There`s nowt to be lost in having a `just in case` lower gear eg 29 sprocket with a compact; you may need it, but if you dont what have you lost?

le_grimpeur

enda01 wrote:

Hi, just joined. I note there is some excellent advice knocking around this forum excellent. Would greatly appreciate if you etape vets could advise on the gearing I will need to get up Ventoux. FYI: I'm not a novice to a bike - happy to ride for 3-4 h in a session - but neither am I an expert rider or racer. Main goal - get to finish in resonable time without halting or hiking on the steep gradients.

I did the Etape last year, and apart from the advice given previously in respect of gearing, I would add the following

Try to do at least 3 100 mile rides (preferably 120) as this will add to your endurance, which belive me, you will need, and try to ride climbs in a higher gear than you normally do, so that you can go down a gear on your current bike.

During the Etape last year I could have done with a lower gear than the one I had (39x27)

Captain Fagor

nick hanson wrote:

You CANNOT have too low a gear for the Ventoux.

Completely agree. I have ridden each of the Ventoux routes, and used (perhaps needed) 30x27 from Bedoin and Maulacene. I managed with 39x27 from Sault, but that route is much easier and I was determined not to use the granny!

Kléber

It all depends how fit you are but I have a rule of thumb: if you have to ask about what gear you'll need, then it means you need a triple because you just don't have the experience of high mountains and their endless gradients.

FJS

Toks wrote:

A compact or triple cassette would be my advice for the first type of rider and a double cassette with low 39-25/26 or 27 gearing may be better for the fitter guy. Or the fit guy could lso opt for a compact. Hopefully others will chip in with advice too.

I tend to disagree with this very prevalent view that a places a double, compact and triple in an order fitting with orders of levels of fitness. A compact and a triple offer almost the same gear at the lower end, but serve really different purposes. In a normal Etape, or mountain sportive like the Marmotte, with only long climbs and long descents (and a bit of flat) a compact would be fine, but this year there is quite a bit of rolling hilly terrain, and a 40-ish front ring would be very useful there. I would pick a triple over a compact to give you that option. If a 39x27 is the ideal gear for you (instead of just 'managing' with it) on the Ventoux, you would not need to ask.
Just like in the UK I can't really see a compact being the best solution anywhere. Well, not in gear choice, I agree a triple doesn't look very good.

dombo6

I did the etape last year on a triple 52/39/30 with a standard 12-25 cassette. For training I did several 70-100 mile hilly rides around Surrey, regular club runs with my Addiscombe Road club and the Dragon Ride. In normal riding the 30 chain ring never gets used. However after 90 or so miles of the Dragon we had to climb Bwlch a second time. First time, early in the ride I breezed up it in 39x21. Second time, towards the end I needed the granny ring.
In the etape you have climbs of 15 miles or so. They do not undulate, giving you a respite. They just go up so you have no momentum keeping you going, just constant pedalling. I'd say over half the people I saw had triples and all were in the granny ring going up Tourmalet and Hautacam (of course I may not have seen the guys on standard doubles as they were probably too far ahead!). 30x25 is a great bailout gear as it keeps you on the bike. I finished it in just over 8 hours. The Dragon howver, with the same amount of vertical climbing, and 20 miles extra distance, took me an hour less. And I only used the triple that one time, on Bwlch 2.
So, for the etape, I'd use a triple.

Captain Fagor

FJS wrote:

Just like in the UK I can't really see a compact being the best solution anywhere. Well, not in gear choice, I agree a triple doesn't look very good.

Veering off topic, I know, but I changed one of my double chainset bikes to a compact a year or two ago. To my surprise found it to be quite a nice set-up for the lumpy terrain in my vicinity. I mean, how often do you find yourself spinning 53x11,12,13 or 14?

In my eyes, the only downside of the compact is that some of the gears which I would normally ride are in a poor chainline zone. I usually solve this by going on to the "big-ish" ring and going faster! And you can draw comfort from having some nice small gears as insurance.

Anyway, back to the big hills.....

enda01

Guess I started all this. I've lapped up the different opinions - there's value in all. Thanks for participating.

italiaandyf

I'm also doing the etape this year - I've just changed my bike over from a compact 50/34 with a 12-25 to a triple 30/42/53 with a 13-26 in preparation. Also have scheduled in a 100mile + ride every month to build up the endurance.

millmead9

Interested in your option andyfaden. Have been considering something similar but not technically minded.... :? How did you go about it? Was it just a case of swapping crankset or did you have to replace front and/or rear derailleurs as well?

normanp

This will be my 5th Etape & as a middling sportive rider I agree that you can't go too low. Currently on 30/39/52 with 12-27. The 39/52 classic combination is great for all sorts of terrain, the 30 gives the bail out when it gets too steep or when there in nothing left in the legs (I've found that there never is anything left on the last mountain). On Alpe d'Huez I noticed a lot of very fit looking riders flaked out / cramped and virtually unable to turn the cranks - I just span on gently.. A friend who is much stronger is using 34/50 with 13-29 - which has nearly as low bottom gear. Of course my times have been 'slow' (always bronze)...

benvrackie

I know the original question was about riding L'Etape, however I did Ventoux from Bedoin
a couple of years ago. Bike had a triple with 30 - 25 . I'm not a competitive cyclist just
enjoy cycling. I do about 100 - 130 miles a week between spring and autumn. The 30 -25
was fine but it was still quite tough it's a long haul but it was enjoyable too.