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I’ll have to see how it goes. I’ve got the 44t on the way now to make 63GI. Might only be on for a couple of weeks, but I’d rather that than be walking up the hills. Sounds like I should manage the bigger chainring soon enough tho. Although I reckon if you’re talking about an audax season, you’ve probably got a fair few more miles in your legs than I do!
Nef
67" was the lowest I went. That got me up most things in a long Audax season. Generally ground to a halt at ~16%, stuff like https://goo.gl/maps/n1CLE7qEh5sbQjAg6
But the point is that I rode the same roads on a geared bike and still resulted in walking despite having a 30x29 gear choice.
In the end the slight inefficiency of a really low cadence pales into insignificance if you're simply unable to put in enough power to grind up a slope regardless of the gear. Going up something at 5kph takes the same amount of power input regardless of the gear you're riding, it might be very slightly easier to do it at 80rpm rather than 25rpm, but the difference is minor.
I always chose my fixed gear for the downhills. Too low and downhills were just awful, and that's being able to spin at 180-200rpm.