Chapters: 1:51 The two big issues 4:07 Why I did it 8:44 Numbers (To help you decide)

From a guy who works 90% with people who speak other languages, your english is pretty good lol

That level of organization in your videos is superb👌

Excellent video 👍👍 Your explanation made me realize that I actually don’t care at all whether I ride 1x, 2x, or fixed - as long as I’m outside and the bike is under me then all is well 🤗😜 So thanks!!

Probably the best reason I can think of switching to 1x is not having a front derailleur.

I am 61 , I dont ride fast once above 20mph I'm rolling. I have just converted my bike to 1 X . I'm using 28 chainring and 11-42. It suits me and I like the simplicity. The big jumps arent a problem as they are in the low gears , by the time I am using those I just spin and chill and sometimes almost die :-)

I had my 1x gravel bike on the roof rack of my car yesterday and someone drove up next to me and yelled “HOW DO YOU LIKE 1x!??!”. I rubbed my chin thoughtfully and said “Still getting used to the huge gaps”

Great video as usual! You should do a Q&A, love watching your witty talking videoes ;)

very helpful video and explanation! thanks a lot! i'm going to switch from 2x to 1x and now my knowledge is much more complete. great job!

Your English is not sketchy man it’s great

Your english is great and much better than my Swedish or Japanese!!!. Dont be that hard on yourself!!!

Well done. Thanks for putting all the work into this!

I ride a Giant TCX 1x 46t chainring and 10-42 cassette. Working great on both gravel and road, plus occasionally a bit of singletrack. I love the simplicity and the gaps don't bother me. Thank you @ridesofjapan for making this video!

This is a great video, really helped be select the drivetrain on my new bike. I think I'll be going for a 1x11 with a 40 tooth chainring and a 11-42 cassette.

What a great video, loved the colours the contrast with the dark backgrounds, and when a large table comes up, the highlighting. This takes quite a bit of effort. And when analyzing a number of combined factors it does take a few efforts to get it right. Thank you for not giving up, and thanks for such a great and humorous video. I find that when i feel gears are not working after a few rides, the calc or a spreadsheet will highlight the problem and the solution. I was using a 2x 11-34 on my gravel (34/50 chainrings). For commuting the 34 front ring giving me a 1:1 crank to rear wheel rotation perfect for the steepest and luckily shortest climb. A gravel race I did had over 3000' of climbing over 72km, and i found my other 11-42 cassette was allowing me to spin longer and quicker than others. The last hill i had to walk because of fitness. When i kept this on for commuting the next week i found 2nd gear (37) to be real nice. Alas after i broke my rear mech i stepped my racing cassette down to an 11-36. I also find the % numbers to give a better referential comparison, as we are creatures of comparison. I did not realize the changes you pointed out in the smaller cogs, but what i do notice, is my frustration is in the lower range - when i change my gears not for speed, but for climbing. It seems the downhills are for resting, for me. What i did notice is a 5 tooth gap is unsmooth when you are really grinding up a hill and are forced to shift. Momentum can slow when shifting, especially if the chain takes a few extra teeth to get up to next bigger cog and then you might tip over. Do you have any links about 1x setups/conversions? I have another 10 speed 2x coming, less expensive mtb, that i will probably upgrade to an 11 speed 1x. I am curious what i need to do. If I put on a single 1x chainring will it still work on a 10s cog? Will a chainring/crank setup stating it's 11s, really only work with 11s, or can i use that on a 10s? Just looking at more combinations, and yes more picky numbers. Thanks again.

I'm feelin a Mr. Rogers groove, just being neighborly and trying to make the world a better place. Thanks for another great video with pertinent content. "Please, won't you be my neighbor"

if only id seen this before I bought. keep putting out the great content

Yes and appreciate your work!

I'm building up a cross/gravel bike this spring/summer step by step and your videos are a biiiig help, thank you! Greetings from Berlin.

A delicate topic to address and you have succeeded in being a good politician.

Thanks! Great explanation. Finally some hard facts to help decide this question.

Excellent presentation. Great job!

Very informative. 👍🏻 Hope you’re feeling better soon. 😷

I tried one by four years ago, and I loved everything about it, simplicity, clean look,i was able to use all the gears, and few months ago tried double crankset again and for some reason could never find the right gear,so I went back to one by. I use mostly 44 NW chainring and 11-36 cassette

Great video explaining the details and your reasoning for a 1x setup. We are pretty flat around here, and one of my bikes even sports a 1x9 setup with an 11-36 cassette and 48t chainring.

Thank you, that was very informative, and helpful in our decision making process.

The knowledge was special. Thanks so much.

Super helpful for anyone considering ditching a ring or those already on 1x who're thinking about changing things up (me)

very good and informative video! Thank you! I have the same cog and cassette :) 42 / 11-40 and I'm absolutely happy with them! removing the front derailleur and my 54t big plate I had 350 gr weight reduction! :)

another great video. Your content is always great no matter if it's talking or not talking, or talking with a frog in your throat (get better soon!). I do this sort of thing in Excel but I may give the site a check, thanks. The thing that occurred to me is that someone needs to make a continually variable transmission for bikes! No more cadence jumps, just pedal faster or slower. Well, it's a dream, maybe...

I have combined my GRX 1x with an 11-46 XT cassette in the back. I used the Wolftooth goat Link to manage „smooth“ shifting. I like it a lot on my Gravelbike.

No worries about the top speed here ... I'm 74 and grabbing the brake lever on the downhills .... Di2 with 36t on the crank and 11t-36t Cassette ... loving it !!

Your english is excellent, and your organization is spot on. Thanks!

8:25"The only time I really go hard is when I'm climbing". 🤣🤣

That video was great. Congratulation from Spain

Really great video. Thank you!

Wanted the same 11-40 cassette and XT mech; however, wanted a very low climbing gear, and a reasonable road gear. So, picked the 28/38 (cough) double chainset. I have both shifters as a gravel bike, so no problem there.

I had the same 2x setup with 50/34 chainrings and a 11-32 cassette. Switched to 1x with a 38t wolf tooth chain ring and kept the 11-32 cassette. I hardly ever use the 11t cog. On steeper downhills I just coast, saving my energy instead of fighting the wind resistance .

Great video!!! As someone whose just an enthusiast/amateur rider and not pro or former pro, you can get caught up in all the hype. I wasn’t sure whether to go 2x or 1x for my new bike. And then I thought about it a bit differently not long ago: I live in the flat flat flat Midwest USA and we don’t have climbs or anything. And for riding in a fun event where there are climbs, I can just swap the cassette. I got two wheel sets, one for gravel one for road. On the road I have a more compact setup since it’s so flat, and the gravel wheels run a wider range. Being that I’m an athletic rider at 100kg, and I’m not a pro bike mechanic, having less thing to go wrong and less parts to have to adjust is great. And last fall I finally switched my XC MTB to an Eagle 1x, and I realized how much I love not having the huge jump caused by the front gear change. It’s great. :) Maybe not for everyone, but I love it.

Just bought a 1x. Cervelo Aspero. Sram Apex 10x42T w 40T chainring. Thanks for the tips.

Nice honest comparison

Great video man

Love this topic, which is really two: what are the pros and cons of 1x and how to choose your gear ratio. We have been working on a automated calculator for finding the best gear ratio which will give you a recommended setup from a few basic variables....but I have been distracted. You have just encouraged me to dust it off again. Cheers from UK

Brilliant. I run a 11-46t rotor cassette with smaller jumps on the the bigger gears and decent climbing gears paired with 44 ring in the front and sram AXS red derailleur

I also live in Japan, ride 1x FSA Omega 42t crank and GRX clutched rear mech. I definitely won’t go back to 2x! 1x narrow-wide chainring gives that instant moment transfer to the wheels, like on fixed/track setup. My cassette is 11-36 XT, and I feel quite comfortable on japanese mountain terrain.

I tried 1x for 2 years to give it a chance. Never could ride without gear hunting, and spinning out. I tried it a year and a half too long. Where I ride with tons of hills and headwinds. You're totally right in the beginning, if you're concerned about the gaps and your cadence, you're not gonna dig 1x and compromises you can't get around without 2x. And now, GRX gearing with 48/31 and 11-30/32 or 34 ,... game over , reverse slam dunk for the win for all-road/gravel riding.

Great video man 😁

Great information as always! Yeah, for my road bike I am using 11-30 & a 50/34 works great...I am now living in Spain and I thought that the crazy hills here would assassinate me with that combo, but after a year of training with those chain rings and cassette I find it to be doable. My legs have pretty good watts potential. But heck, for a gravel bike I would SURELY try a 1- X Watch for those earthquakes out there! Lately the whole land mass of the earth is rather active! :0

Flawless video! I think with a 1x system you have to just accept that your speed or cadence may not be optimized in some situations. I put a Wolf Tooth Components 34T front chain ring on my old, 26" mountain bike, removed the front derailleur and shifter, and installed an 11-34 nine-speed cassette on the rear. I am using this bike as a commuter, with a rack and rear pannier bags. The gears are low enough to climb up the hills in the Metro Denver area, and still give me a top speed of 23.14 mph at 100 cadence. I certainly can't keep this bike at 20+ mph on the flats, so more gears just doesn't matter!

Great video my friend!

A good explanation. I tried 1x with a 42 with an 11-42 cassette but I did notice the gaps. Where I live there is a lot of flat road between gravel sections and those flat sections always showed up the missing cog for a comfortable travelling cadence. I now have the Praxis Alba 48/32 with Shimano RX long cage derailleur and 11-34 cassette. I love it for both gravel and road rides (two wheelsets) and if I run out of higher gears on downhills then it’s the gear god’s way of telling me to coast.

Great video! Clear and camera/editing is superb. よろしくお願いします。

Great video!

Your English is pretty much perfect. Reminds me of time I spent in Sweden though. Gaps bother me on rare occasions when I am forced to climb.

This was well done intro. If a cyclist has a narrow cadence preference, they can really enhance their rides if they get the correct gears. However, I also know roadies that only ride the big ring down hill. They might not feel the difference and then have all the advantages of the 1x. I bought the absolute black oval 30/46 chain-rings for my front and 11-34 in back with the ultegra rear derailleur that has the clutch. Brand new bike. I may post a follow up here if I learn anything interesting as I put more miles on this new bike. Can't wait to climb a steep gnarly hill with the 30/34 combo.

Get well!

I never noticed the gaps before but after a winter of 2x I really notice them now especially on road. Still good off-road though👍

Fantastic video. I live in very flat area and I am looking to convert a bike to SRAM AXS eTap, but something in the back of my head said go 1X, since I do not have to worry about hills. We only have bridges and wind, and there are days where I use the small ring to battle the wind when it kicks up, but since I run mechanical and a 12-25 cassette with a 50/34 , I have a lot of single tooth shifts to find the best gearing to fight the wind. I never knew about the BikeCalc, that will help me in my decision. Kudo's sir.

The bikecalc website was invaluable when setting up my 2x and 1x for gravel. My 1x is 42 × 10-42 (Rival)and my 2x is 46/33 × 11-32 or 11-34(Ultegra). I can ride both and adapt to the cadence changes easily with my only problem being switching from the Shimano to the Sram shifting action...but after a few miles it's second nature again. Love your videos...Keep up the great production and content.

Cool video as usual. With a nod to those who don't care what they ride, so long as they are riding, I am running a Rotor 1x13 on a 3T Exploro. I am using a 44T chainring and a 10/46 cassette. I have set the gearing for gravel riding primarily. I am on Rotor's carbon road rims using 25mm Contis on the road and 35mm G-Ones on the gravely days. Tubes in both cases. I have been riding on the road with groups and doing a few road races. I have done a couple of good gravel rides and a couple of gravel races. With respect to the range issue. The 44 against the 10 works fine for road and gravel. Its slightly less gearing then my 2 x 11 (52T) speed road set up. I could run a bigger CR for road work and the Rotor system is quite a simple change over but for now I'll stick with what I have. At the other end the 46T is plenty for what i am doing. One of those gravel rides had about 3500 meters of climbing and a lot of it was steepish (15%). The 44/46 combo worked well. The gear spacing issue. This is interesting. I am finding the spacing to be spot on. No big jumps between gears. The 46T does not feel like a bail out and the 39T (next one down) is a nice climbing gear. The steps through the guts of the cassette feel even. I didn't feel like I was searching for the right cadence when riding in a road bunch. So, 1x13, the way of the future?

Great video, very helpful for many riders. Switched to 1x a few months ago (with an 11-42 cassette) and finding the right cadence and gears at the moment. Did a race in the French Alps with lots of climbing, people looked at me and thought I was crazy doing a race with this setup, until I passed them in ascending and descending (only minor spinning out, coasting aero went fine!) Might go to different chainring (44t) or cassette (11-36 for the smaller gap and 12t). Thanks again, very informative!

Great points on gearing being very personal to the rider. For a period of time, I was just using my 1x gravel bike for road and I found it to be way less enjoyable than having a dedicated road bike with gears and road geometry.

I changed from x1 38 - 11-40 to the new grx 48/31 and 34-11 for better speed on the flat

Thank you for this info. I live where the hills have hills and I do mostly transport and touring, have a child who has decided that due to hills, seeing cars hit bicyclists, while also having a heavy Norco kids' bike, has deemed that she hates riding her bike, and this info hopefully helps me inform how I can make her love bikes again as we upgrade her bike and maybe mine.

I watch your videos mainly for the sarcasm 😆

Great video, well thought out, well put together, and I'm glad you scrapped your other iterations of this video for this one. Well done! Using gear calculators are really really good to figure out what size chainring you need for the setup to work. Once you understand how to use it, it can take the guess work out of it, you just go buy the chainring you need. Even today, I still see value in a 2X setup but still currently only using 1X. Surprisingly, the biggest innovations for 1X is what made 2X better: the rear derailleur clutch. Riding off road, the biggest reason to run 1X is to simplify the drivetrain, but also to make the drivetrain perform more reliably. The combination of a narrow-wide chainring (which cannot be shifted) and a clutch on the rear derailleur is the most reliable setup. However, 2X systems also benefit by the derailleur clutch by maintaining chain tension. Chain tension was/is the reason for most chain drops. The clutch does a really good job at minimizing chain drops even while using regular chainrings! Now I will say that I don't believe gravel and road benefit as much by 1X as mountain, but it also depends on the grades you typically ride. If you're rarely dealing with more than 10% grade, you're probably never going to use the small ring in your chainset. So removing the weight can be beneficial. However, since brakes are integrated w/ shifters for road/gravel, the weight savings are negligible. On mountain, you can remove everything including the shifter which actually compensates for the bigger cassette. The other use case where the gear calculators are really good is figuring out the gear ratios you want to run in single speed or fixed gear. Since you only have one gear, you need it to be the right gear for the majority of your riding. The great thing (outlined in this video) is that you can look at a bunch of different ratios at the same time!

Thanks!

Been on 1x for 2 years now, love the simplicity of it. Sram Force1 Easton EC90SL cranks with 48 chain ring and 11-42 in the back on a steel bike. There are a few 18% climbs in my area and some 25% but the elevation gain is never more than 150m at a time so I still have the gearing with the 42 at the back and better speed with the 48 up front. it came with 44 chain ring but i was maxing out on group rides and needed more top speed.

Also a one by 11 crit bike for the flats is amazing, 52 up front with an 11-28 cassette

I went from a 1x12 to a 2x10 set up on my gravel bike. 30-42 in the front and 11-336 on the back currently. I have not had any issues so far with it (3 months). My speed in flat is excellent, and when I get extreme climbs I have the gearing, unlike before where I had to give up on speed or climbing. So it's up to what you decide to ride on!

Great vid as always. I use both - a 2x for my road and 1x for gravel (duh). Definitely insightful to look at the actual gaps in numbers on the climbing end. I always thought the 2x was way more granular but apparently not by much at all! For me, the additional reason I prefer a 1x on my gravel bike is that there’s less to worry about (both on the trail and cleaning...).

Great video! And your English is excellent, BTW.

Well done. I have a Haanjo Exp with a 2x, 48/32 crank and Deore M-6000 11-42 cog. I'm in WA state and can't imagine just a 1:1 ratio. Some gravel out here requires an MTB trail approach and some of the roads around I-90 are quite steep.

"a very strong typhoon in my back" 😂😂😂😂

Great video

If you are not trying to win races, 1X is very viable, is simpler and lighter. Ezpz. I enjoy my cycling but i'm no tryhard, 1X is all good for me. The "bigger gaps" crap never bothered me. If you are trying to beat KOMs in your area, trying to win competitions, or are overly sensitive to ratio gaps or whatever, then go 2X.

My mountain bike has a 1x12 and i've found it to be amazing due to the simplicity and surprisingly large gear range. So I just pulled the trigger on a Norco Search XR S Rival gravel bike with 1x11, which has a 40t chainring and 10-42t cassette. Until now i've been using an old steel road bike for commuting with a 2x8 and 12-25t cassette, so I think the gaps will be relatively comparable. I'll find out on Monday!

On the subject of spacing, this is a non-issue if you are coming from lower level 2x groupsets. An 11-46 11s cassette has virtually the same spacing, or even slightly tighter spacing, as an 11-32 8s cassette. Going to 1x11 from 2x8 or 2x9 gives effectively the same spacing, same range, a better climbing gear and a simplified/cheaper drivetrain...

I’m still riding 3x6 uniglide on my old Ritchey. Does what I need it to do, which is make me grin ear to ear! 🤗

Great vid...main takeaway for me is the net gear ratios from a 1x or 2x setup including the rear cassette. I know a lot of folks don't drill down on the numbers, but once you do, and know how the current bike (and self) perform on flats and climbs (which takes some experimentation), it should be clear which direction to go. It would not make much sense to simply modify to 1x or 2x without this understanding.

Coming from a normal 2x bike, I tried 1x for the simplicity and had my Bokeh initially setup with SRAM Rival 1x (11-42 cassette paired with a 40T ring). The large gaps and resulting cadence changes also ended up being the dealbreaker for me until the shop owner recommended Shimano Di2 and I haven't looked back ever since. 2x Di2 with full synchro-shift is technically the best 1x config, with the only downside being cost. I now run a full Ultegra Di2 group with a 11-34 back and 50/34 ring for normal road use, and swap over to Absolute Black 46/30 subcompact rings when I do some bikepacking.

Great video. Did 50/34 with an 11/42 cassette does it all.

I like the video, I love 1x, my favorite gearing is 56 x 12-27. Great for rolling terrain and I just stand up a bit on the climbs :)

thank you! I'm on a 1x 46 t in front and 11-40 cassette, but have another plate with 42t in front, which is better on a long Brevets with big denivelations. Good Luck!

Great video. Next week I'll do my 1x conversion: 42t chainring and 11-36 casette, better climb ratio of my actual compact ratio 36 11-28. I bought a 105 r7000 50-34 crankset: this way I have a new (and lighter) crankset to test with a wolftooth chainring... if I don't like it I still have a lighter 2x crankset

I don't care about 1x2x3x as long as I'm moving forward, I'm enjoying the ride. 😊

I live in a hilly town. I found the high end gears to be a waste. I found that a 34T chainring /11-34T cassette worked. Interestingly, I am converting to a 32T chain ring as it affords me a smaller cassette of 11-32Twhile still giving identical ratios. I also think a friction thumb shifter keeps you far more in touch with your bike mechanics while eliminating the finicky adjustments of indexed shifting.

For anyone that is interested: When I went 1x, I hated that the new cassette was such an anker at over 400 grams (11 speed shimano XT). I did not want to switch to Sram since I already had the expensive GRX Di2 groupset. I decided to try a Frankenstein system with a GRX Di2 groupset shifting a Sram chain on a 265 gram 10-42 cassette. I was amazed that it shifts even better than the purebred shimano system I had before. I love it and it saves even more weight than 1x does in the first place.

I've seen a lot of videos about bikes and this one is a a favorite. I've been thinking about this a lot for my gravel bike and after this I'm convinced. The DK200 was won this year with a 1x, and if you can tour with it as well why not?

I run a 44 x11-36 (11 speed). 44x11 is plenty for speed, 44x36 is about the same as 34x28 so fine for climbing as well. The bottom is 11-12-13-15, I do notice I miss the 14 on the flats. Will probably change to 12-36, still plenty of speed possible with 44x12.

Good video. What size cranks do you ride on your 1by?

I was a mountain biker first - back in the mid 80s. I didn't start riding road until I started racing XC seriously in the late 90s. For training. I think because I still have that mountainbiker mentality - the gaps in 1x? Yeah.. they aren't an issue. Cadence is usually not the focus on an MTB - simply getting meaningful power down on variable terrain is. So you dont fret about getting that "perfect spin" because on an MTB... alot of the time when you DO find it, you have to change it up to accomodate terrain. I have a tendency to do the same on the road bike. Instead of gearing down to Crest a small rise, I just add power - and my cadence goes down, power goes up, but speed stays the same.

This is a very well explained video, thank you very much !! When i use my gravel bike (with a Sram Rival 42 x 10/42 groupset) on the road , i find the gap between the gears a bit annoying riding in a peloton when you're behind someone, it's a bit hard to have a good cadence. When i ride 1x alone or with few people withoot drafting it's perfect.

I'm a total beginner so this isn't particularly useful to me...I'll gain more from losing weight than messing with my bike (in progress), but it's really interesting to see what kind of customization is available depending on riding interest. So to that end, this video was really interesting!

I ride 1x7, works perfectly. You don't need that much gearing. I am not riding tour the france every weekend.

It would work for me. I would choose a 44t chainring with a 11-32 cassette. That is still 46 kph at 90rpm and the easiest gear is even a bit easier than what I have now on 2-by.

Good film! Yes, the rainy season has been long this year. I'm wondering whether using a 1x system would be preferable on my commute bike. 22 gears seems just a waste. Yes, on the flats tailing behind a dump truck I put some good speeds out but generally not much above 45kms (good day) by myself. Great info and I will ponder further!!!

Excellent 😂

very useful and funny

Just RIDE. Ride what you have, ride what you can afford. Just RIDE