@dpollitt looks nice - its a CX bike to me. With the disks on 700C wheels you can swap to 650B with disks and get large volume tyres with a similar rolling circumference.

Shame there's so many spacers under the stem - always looks naff to me but I'd probably have to do the same.

36/52 compact crank set not so usual for CX. Geometry on gravel bikes usually is also much more stable and less aggressive.

The Shimano option with 11-32 cassette is hopelessly over geared for a gravel bike.

But that's the case with all Shimano gravel bikes.

road.cc/content/feature/…

Article explains modification of an ultegra bike to have useful gear ratios for gravel ascends.

The easiest way of course would be get a a SRAM bike in the first place.

Apparently, I hit 45.9mph (73.9km/h) after a short section of 10% descent, which makes me wonder how fast other folks have been on their bikes.

(This is a poll, not a challenge. Stay safe, everyone. Bigger numbers probably make you less desirable to the opposite sex.)

@DavidRicherby I see a 79.2 km/h strava.com/activities/1719445881/analysis/6348/6587

@gschenk why is the shimano option over-geared? Do you mean too many low gears, or too many high gears?

@Criggie Yeah. I dind't even have the fastest time for today on that segment. :-)

(Though I had a very slow start ot it: I knew there was a car behind me, so I was waiting for it to pass me, but it was going a lot slower than I thought.)

Oh, and good luck with the house move!

Ehehehe :)

Yeah new house is fun - so much strange stuff. PO had photos and pictures hanging everywhere, so the walls are lined with hooks and nails.

They had fibre internet, but must have used it wirelessly cos there's no ethernet in the place. So I have patch cables running everywhere.

But no literal skeletons in the closets?

And did you check the cellar? Dun-dun-duuuuuuuun.

Garage is chock-full of boxes - so car is out on the driveway. No cellar here, though there is a "pounding stand" in one of the sheds.

looks like the stand for a drill press

or maybe had an anvil on it in the past.

@Criggie "Over-geared" normally means all the gears are too high. I don't think Shimano do any cassettes with dinner plates on them.

Ooooh, shiny.

Well, probably old and rusty and very hard to get rid of. ;-)

Oh yeah - previous owner once removed... his surname was "Posthumous"

I mean.... that's the weirdest surname I have ever seen

and I remember Thai kids with 40-50 character surnames.

There are quite a few people called D'Eath in the UK. Yes, with the apostrophe; usually pronounced dee-ath.

I think I've heard of Posthumouses. Vague memory that, before surnames became fixed and hereditary, it denoted somebody who was born after their father had died.

Anyway - overgeared - I have sub 1:1 on both road bikes, and that's awesome as long as I can keep the front wheel on the ground. Then again sometimes you just need 11 tooth on the back - I'd rather carry around a small cog and not use it much than a big one and not use it much.

Hehe. My lowest is, er, 34-28 or something.

Does mean I start to grind out if the road gets up to about 10%.

Granny gear on the hybrid was about 1:1 -- can't remember if it was slightly above or slightly below.

On lose surfaces it often is difficult to get out of the saddle without losing traction.

With no low gears any wee incline over 12% has the potential to stall you.

I don't have the form to go fast on hills. So I'd be list without my 40:36 ratio. I don't use 40:42 all that often since I like to carry my bike on the steep ascents. However, for long climbs I was glad to have it.

But 52:11, spinning out at about 70km/h. Who needs that on a gravel or adventure bike?

Oh dear.

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