Gearing 34-34 enough?

mcstumpy

Hi

I'm tweaking a flat bar road bike with wider tyre clearance to take part in the Lakeland Monster Miles adventure cross this year.

I have 35mm cx tyres, and all the bits for the drive train - long cage derailleur, chain and 11-34 cassette. Crankset is 50/34.

But I now realise my derailleur could take a 36t sprocket. I don't really want to have to sell on the cassette and buy an 11-36.... so just looking for reassurance that a low gear of 34-34 is plenty for the steeper gravel/ trails.

I mainly road bike and find a 34-28 on road gets me up most hills (except for the wall of Talla in last week's tour o the borders :oops:

Thanks

keezx

Its almost impossible to give advices about gearing, it all depends on your fitness and capabilities which we don't really know....

N0bodyOfTheGoat

http://sheldonbrown.com/gear-calc.html

Not a great deal in it in gear inches, ~27 vs ~26, depending upon the size of the tyres used.

Gearing is very personal, depends on you, depends on what you're trying to ride over.

mcstumpy

Yeah, appreciate it's v subjective. I've sold on my 11-34 and ordered an 11-36, at least that way I'm covered if I need a bail out.