Round big chainring + oval small chainring = muscle adaptation issues?

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Sacke
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Joined: Fri Sep 26, 2008 2:33 pm
Location: South of France

by Sacke

I put a 36 tooth Q-ring on my Rotor cranks today, but kept the 52 NoQ round chainring as the big chainring.

The question is simple... Is there a muscle adaptation for oval chainrings vs round chainrings, that would cause any issues or negative performance drawbacks?

Would it be better to either stick to having to one or the other, or are there others that have one round + one oval chainring on the same bike?

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MichaelB
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Joined: Tue Apr 22, 2008 4:31 am

by MichaelB

About to do the same. In the Doval thread, it seems that many do the oval inner to help with climbing issues, but don't want to go the whole hog.

Thos that have done it this way seem to be happy.

Standby to standby

DeeHubbs
Posts: 107
Joined: Tue Mar 31, 2015 11:05 pm

by DeeHubbs

I am in the same boat. On my Dura Ace 9000 cranks I have 34T Absolute Black chain ring (39g) on the inner ind and a standard Dura Ace 50T on the outer.
I like the oval for climbing and don't really feel the difference when I switch over to the big ring. I feel the climbing oval has improved my pedal stroke, anomy stroke now feels smoother when I'm struggling up the climbs.

BugsBunny7788
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Joined: Fri Jul 10, 2015 6:48 am

by BugsBunny7788

Interesting. I might follow your lead with Q inner and non Q outer chain ring.


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Sacke
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Joined: Fri Sep 26, 2008 2:33 pm
Location: South of France

by Sacke

I rode to work today pushing gears a little bit more than usual, and noticed something that may or may not be significant.

After having pushed big gears on a descending false flat, and finished off by sprinting between two roundabouts, switching into the small oval ring actually felt like it gave the legs some relief that a round ring doesn't. In that first minute after going almost full gas, the feeling of pedalling easier than expected was quite nice.

Similarly, after having started off the ride with a false flat and some headwind in the small chainring, switching over to the big one with a slightly tired legs felt like pedalling squares in the first minute, but with a bit more power than I would expected.

Having both, based on my extremely limited experience so far (30km in total), the muscles are activated slightly differently, and that can be felt after harder efforts in either chainring. It does feel like it's a positive difference, creating variation in the perceived effort muscle wise.

Marin
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Joined: Wed Jan 22, 2014 11:48 am
Location: Vienna Austria

by Marin

I switch between 2 bikes, one with round and one with oval (Rotor) rings.

I have no problems switching, but I find that spinning a high cadence doesn't feel good to me on oval ring. I'll probably also experiment with a small oval / large round setup since I have 2 sets of Dovals sitting in a drawer.

CycloTron
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Joined: Fri Jul 28, 2017 12:34 am

by CycloTron

Marin wrote:I switch between 2 bikes, one with round and one with oval (Rotor) rings.

I have no problems switching, but I find that spinning a high cadence doesn't feel good to me on oval ring. I'll probably also experiment with a small oval / large round setup since I have 2 sets of Dovals sitting in a drawer.


If you have Rotor Q rings, try changing the OCP downwards (i.e. if, on 3, go to 2 etc.) IIRC, to solve this issue.

CycloTron
Posts: 30
Joined: Fri Jul 28, 2017 12:34 am

by CycloTron

Sacke wrote:I put a 36 tooth Q-ring on my Rotor cranks today, but kept the 52 NoQ round chainring as the big chainring.

The question is simple... Is there a muscle adaptation for oval chainrings vs round chainrings, that would cause any issues or negative performance drawbacks?

Would it be better to either stick to having to one or the other, or are there others that have one round + one oval chainring on the same bike?


I find that the Q rings are ideal for spinning at high cadence when climbing, so it suits what you're doing in terms of using it on the small ring for going uphill. Just make sure you dial in the OCP to get optimum results.

by Weenie


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Marin
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Joined: Wed Jan 22, 2014 11:48 am
Location: Vienna Austria

by Marin

CycloTron wrote:If you have Rotor Q rings, try changing the OCP downwards (i.e. if, on 3, go to 2 etc.) IIRC, to solve this issue.


I'm back to round rings actually.

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