There is no doubt that there are times when for me climbing is absolutely horrible - when not feeling great, or on steep climbs where I’ve run out of gears and it’s properly hard, or if it’s really hot - but in general I enjoy climbing.
And we need to stop mocking people for needing low gearing. “Your low is a 34x34?” *Snicker* Yeah it is, do we have a problem? Then again, hot take, some roadies have always been dicks..
Where I live in VT 1 mile = 100 ft of elevation on gravel. As I get older I’m playing with set ups. Found a crux on TPC with eagle drive train. 44 chainring with 10-52 rear has been great. My other bikes are gathering dust
Thank you for using the word parallax. I often use that word to describe some of the spaces I ride through where it appears like there are multiple layers to the scenery, moving on different axes and at different speeds. It is one of my favorite occurrences to experience on a ride. I usually get blank stares when I point out the parallax effect to my riding partners. I suspect that if one was not into computer games in the MS-DOS or Windows 3.1/95 era, when ‘parallax scrolling’ was a a big back-of-the-box bullet-point feature buzzword, one would be pretty unlikely to encounter the phrase anywhere else, as far as I know.
Today I went up and over a mountain pass five times (you can climb this pass from three different directions, so not quite as repetitious as it sounds!) in the George Washington National Forest, and experienced that same Parking Lot Relief Speed Boost Effect you described every time!
This used to be a thing, but I haven’t experienced it in a long time. Now it seems most people I ride with and sell bikes/bike stuff to, when I ask them what gearing they want on their new bike or new cassette, they’ll take the lowest gear option I present. With most modern bikes having 12-13 speeds, there’s really no reason not to --the gaps are very slim even on a 10-36.
Strangely enough, I remember a time where I almost lost a friend over something like this. This was ‘back in the 11-speed days’ (Disclaimer: Some days I’m still in the 11-speed days…or even the 7-speed days). We were discussing a new bike build or rebuild or something (I don’t quite remember) and we got to the cassette and I mentioned an 11-28. She said, “No, 11-25, I need speed.” When I pointed out that the 11-28 provides the same high gear while also providing a lower low for steep climbing, she became genuinely offended that I propose the idea of a lower low gear, said “I don’t think this is going to work,” and didn’t take my calls for months afterward.
Nowadays, I point out to people that even if the area where they are riding is primarily flat, running a 10-33 or something like that instead of a 10-28 will allow them to stay in the big ring over the little kickers that still exist here and there, rather than having to bother shifting back and forth betwixt the two front chainrings every time the road does happen to rise for a half a minute here and there.
Do you live anywhere nearby? Send me a message if you do and want to ride together sometime.
Ha, my low gear is a 30x34 on my gravel bike and a 32x34 on the road and I love it.
I don’t mind climbing. In fact, I moved to Asheville , NC because I was soon to retire and wanted to ride more, and do more hills. When I retired, I bought a new bike and ordered 52/36 x 11-32. TBH, it was smaller gearing than I needed most of the time, but as I sometimes say, I know of no cyclist who climbs and thinks “Oh… I don’t really need this smaller gear.” If I don’t need it, I don’t use it.
Then last April, I did a cycling trip in Mallorca. My rental bike was 52/36 x 11-30. I was NOT happy, and had to decide early on that almost climb was going to be a strength workout because I just couldn’t turn over the gears on the steeper hills. Sa Calobra was misery! But it made me realized that I very rarely used my hardest gearing and home, and only spun out on descents. So I changed out my front gearing for a compact 50/34 and in the rear I have 11-36. My younger self would have laughed at such gearing, but the old man inside me is much happier.
Climbing can be enjoyable provided: 1) you have appropriate gearing, or 2) you’re a masochist.
Circa 1980 the standard road racing low gear here in Sydney varied between 42x18 and 44x17, with 42x21 only for wimps or tourists; standing was mandatory. Things have changed pretty dramatically, with even people like Tadej on 38x34…
I don’t deny for a second that wide ratio cassettes are a good thing. That said, I don’t enjoy climbing at all on modern bikes with modern gearing.
When I used to ride retro bikes, or when I ride my fixie on inappropriate terrain, climbing is a full-body, all-encompassing struggle - particularly on a noodly retro bike as a larger rider. Balancing keeping the bike moving with keeping enough matches left unburnt; pushing hard, but trying to maintain some souplesse to get the most out of the flexy bike; it’s pure physical and mental effort to reach the top, with no need to think about gear choice or cadence or heart rate zones. The choice is between seated and standing, and that’s it. At the top, you really feel like you’ve earned something. If you’re having a bad day, you just have to get on with it. And I love it.
Climbing on modern bikes is objectively better, but I find it a chore. I’m constantly changing gear, I can never settle into a pace. Winching your way up a climb in an easy gear is just soul destroying, dragging out the suffering, letting the mind wander to places it shouldn’t go. Standing and pushing on just feels pointless when you don’t have to. Occasionally I pretend I’m on an old bike and arbitrarily limit myself from using the easiest gears, and just push on through the pain - the feeling of speed is worth it. Climbing a tight, twisty road at full gas is so satisfying, feeling the bike surge and respond to every little effort in a way it never would on the flat. It’s just so easy to end up twiddling your way along in bottom gear, because that’s the easy option. The feeling as you finally winch your way to the top is merely one of mild relief that the moderately uncomfortable effort is over, rather than one of achievement. I hate it, and I just want it to be over, but don’t have the discipline to shift up a gear to make it happen.
I dislike riding in the flat for long periods.
Where I live it is hilly, there is one flatish course available. My weekly 100km ride is about 1300m climbing. The events I do are all climbing based from the Marmotte to tour du Mont Blanc.
On the MTB I’ve done Salzkammergut Trophy A course which is 210km and 7100m climbing.
On road the Tour du Mont Blanc is 330km and 8000+m climbing in a day.
I love climbing too. If there wasn’t any, riding would (eventually) be dull and painful.
I’m by no means a natural climber at 85kg, but I revel in the purity of the exercise contest. Sure some days I head for the flatter, rolling terrain to smash the big ring, but others all I want to do is loops of the Bath basin with its myriad of climbs and descents. Every once in a while I treat myself to a 25% monster to remember what real pain is, the kind no turbo erg death spiral can do justice to: rear wheel skittering through lack of grip, lungs blazing and sinews straining. Glorious.
I run a bottom of the range TCR with a cheeky 52/34 and 11-28. Great fun for powering up the brutish Cotswold climbs, frequently around 10% but short enough to bludgeon through. If I’m going over 100 miles I’ll usually treat myself to a 32 on the back. At 35 I don’t feel like I’ve lost the power to make this work like when I moved here over a decade ago, long may it last.
If riding is life, climbing is the spice.
I have to admit, I much prefer climbing to an extended duration on flat roads. I am small/light so find it harder when the larger lads get into their stride on flat roads. On the hills I can get my own back for a wee while.
I’ve been to Tenerife a few times to just spend a week in late winter/early spring and get some decent climbing miles when the weather at home is not so good.
Unfortunately my descending is terrible so the descent is not as enjoyable as it could be.
For me road riding is all about the climbing. Yes flying along on the flat in a group is fun, but going uphill is my zen place, whether it’s the calm serenity of a long mountain pass or the brutality of a UK Hill Climb race.
It’s all relative. If you live in an area where there is an abundance of variety and climbing is optional, then yeah, usually people find a taste for it, because they do it when they want. If you live in totally flat… it feels to foreign, or if it’s crazy steep, and you barely can find a recovery ride (like here), then you don’t love “climbing” as much, because it means a totally different thing.
It’s like spicy food… if your cuisine is all spicy all the time - that’s normal. Ask those people if they like ‘spicy’ and they’ll probably say " now and then" because most would find their spicy unedible. Climbing is similar.
I am what might be described as slow & untalented but I love climbing. I like feeling my legs burn and as someone else said the feeling of accomplishment after finishing a climb.
I live in a flat part of the UK so have to actively seek out hills on rides from my door, and all my vacations are riding trips to mountains or famously hilly areas (literally just got back from a week in the Ardennes).
It does mean I get to choose though, and I can appreciate that the lack of flat (or choice) will influence your opinion - a friend lives in Tenerife and their only flat recovery ride option is basically the highway that serves the industrial docks, and you’ll always see dozens of cyclists riding loops of it.
I love climbing! Alas, and live in Chicago, USA which is pan-flat. The grass is always greener, and all that. One of my favorite cycling memories was camping in Big Sur on a California San Francisco - Los Angeles tour — then waking up at the crack of dawn and climbing out of Big Sur with my overloaded, overgeared Soma ES. It was still fun.
totally loving it! I really enjoy it. not sure what else to say about it 
That sounds like total bliss!