-
marginal gains
But it's not a gain. Just the aero drag from adding a FD is going to lose more than being 3rpm away from your "optimal" cadence, e.g. let's take one of the fast men who wants to be at 90rpm:
58/12 at 90rpm = 34.5mph
inclination changes from -1% to +1%
58/12 at 86rpm = 33mph
down-shift to avoid bogging
58/13 at 93rpm = 33mphYour half-step offers
56/12 at 89rpm = 33mphbut who is that sensitive to cadence? Pursuit riders maybe🙂
gbj_tester-
Hang on, if you look at my graph of gear number versus ratio, you can see that all I'm doing is making the average step about the same as 19 to 18.
If that's a jump worth having at lower speed, surely there's a use for it at higher speed, no?
I mean, ideally you'd have a CVT that didn't add drag and weigh a ton, but since this provides what you say is more gears than you need for a mere 50g of extra chainring, what's not to like? The gears are there if you want them, otherwise a no-brainer to skip.
Also, imagine the system knew where not only cranks were in the rotation, but cassette too, and delayed shifts to the perfect moment for a seamless shift.
If every shift was so perfect the chain never jumped, you could maybe even have it shift for you, and just tell it how hard you want to go.
Someone jailbreak Di2!
Kimmo
I guess my pissweak legs and lazy respiration makes me overly sensitive to cadence...
But hey, ceramic bearings are a thing, so marginal gains here we come. It's just a matter of whether there's enough years left in capitalism.