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I have been looking around and I cannot find anywhere that sells a cassette with a 16 tooth top gear that is Shimano 11 speed compatible. Junior racing requires gear limits and I was hoping to find something similar in spec to Ultegra or Dura-Ace. Please can someone advise?

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  • I'm not sure what the question is here. Can you clarify?
    – jimchristie
    Sep 15, 2014 at 18:19

2 Answers 2

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https://www.velonews.com/2015/10/news/technical-faq-junior-gear-options_388340 - Junior racing requires a maximum rollout, which is often ,incorrectly, interpreted as a 15 or 16 small cog on cassette. A smaller chainring does a better job in most cases. Its probably a 'thing' about size from a sport drenched too much testosterone.

A 34/11 is nearly the same as a 50/16 (I'll let the author do the math for whats legal with his wheel and tire size.) Compact or even MTB cranksets can do this easily. Drop the large chain ring making it 1x (You probably have closer gear spacing than an adult running 52/36 on a typical road cassette), select a chain ring that gives you the maximum rollout you are allowed on the 11, and cassette that meets your low gear requirements. I'm not up in the play with road/drop bars setup and maximum cluster sizes, but the Gravel bikes will almost certain have gear that's got you covered, certainly 11-36 if needed and maybe even 11-40.

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  • 34/11 with a compact crankset sans outer chainring might be a nasty enough cross-chain on some bikes to induce skipping or ghost shifting. Aug 7, 2018 at 10:25
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It sounds like you want a 11 speed cassette which is Shimano compatible and has smallest cog with 16 teeth.

Miche makes some, and seem to be the only people who do.

However, Leonard Zinn notes that he was able to swap Campy, SRAM and Shimano wheels without problems on 11 speed (so if you had a Campy 11 speed wheel, it would seem to work).

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  • Reading up junior gearing it seems that the ratio is limited. couldn't you use a conventional cassette and just use a smaller chainring to limit the gearing
    – Kibbee
    Sep 15, 2014 at 19:07
  • That would give you lower gearing, but I don't know if its a faux pas or not allowed or something. In any case, an easier thing would be to move down from Ultegra/Dura Ace level to a lower speed system.
    – Batman
    Sep 15, 2014 at 19:53
  • Says you can block gears using the limit screw, but then I guess what's the point of 11sp? As it's about the "roll-out" or gear inches, I guess compact chainsets are order of the day.
    – adey_888
    Sep 16, 2014 at 2:03
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    Yeah, the post says that. =)
    – Batman
    Sep 16, 2014 at 12:25
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    The gear limits in the USA are defined such that you can get closest to the limit with a 52/14 (given normal tire size). With an 11t cassette, you can use at most a 40t chainring. Using the biggest chainring you can gives narrower gaps in the top gears which is optimal for racing. Since the OP is asking for 16t, my guess is they are racing where the limits are stricter than the USA. Oct 15, 2014 at 21:10

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