Topic: Bicycle Terminology. Question.

[grcamna2]

It's all about the intent of the statement. We all understand that the rear sprockets control the level of effort required by rider to peddle. Smaller sprocket = less effort, Larger rear sprocket = more effort.

But the front sprockets should best be thought of as a "range" like 4 wheel drive cars. Moving the front creates a different torque curve, or so it's been explained to me. I'm not a racer, nor a hill climber, but I am quite familiar with bikes. But the vernacular of "up or down" has a different meaning in the context of which it's used.

Best to express these in terms of numerical gear positions, then confusion averted.

I agree it's better to express the gear I'm in as lets say "a 35 inch gear" which is a lower gear for hills,it would be a smaller front 'chainring' w/ a large rear 'sprocket.'  You can go to an even smaller 'inch' gear for climbing than that like 'a 24 inch' and the small front and large rear,your pedals would be spinning fast and your speed would be low but even though the pedals will have a high 'cadence'(rpm) you wouldn't feel much resistance and you will spin easily    I think it helps to make myself up a gear chart in the number of 'inches' for each gear and then shift(also choose the type and size of the rear gear cluster so you won't have many 'doubles' of 'inch/sizes') according to that chart w/ as close a number as I can to keep my pedals spinning at an optimum cadence/rpm for what I like...roughly 80-90 rpm's for me lately.

[underachiever]

Quit complicating things.

You can either shift up into an easier gear or downshift to an easier gear.

or

You can shift down into a harder gear or upshift to a harder gear.

Those are really your only choices.

Unless of course you're smart enough to ride a singlespeed in which case you only have 3 gears to worry about.

Sit. Stand. Walk. 

[grcamna2]

Yeah, it does help me when I simplify, you're right.