Noob questions about gears, gear ratios and general feel of climbing.

Hello

I’ve recently started to cycle again and I very much enjoy it. Bought a [Fuji Jari 2.1](https://fujibikes.eu/collections/all-bikes/products/2022-jari-2-1) which commes with a 46/30 crank set and an 11-34 (10 speed) casette.

For context: I live in a more or less flat region of Switzerland, but there are a lot of hills with smaller, but very, very steep climbs here. My fitnes is honestly not that great – didn’t do much sport since Covid hit basically and never was a huge sports guy.

Now I’m reading stuff online about very sporty gear ratios and casettes, but for me, on my last gravel tour (I didn’t plan that well), Even with a 30/34 setup (ratio of 0.88) it was a bit too steep to get up on one particular hill, so I had to push my bike for like 3 min or so.

Since I’m new to amateur biking, outside of being a kid with a bike, I wonder if this is “normal”, if my fitness will adjust or if it’d be sensible to have a bigger range casette long term. I was thinking about 11-36 or even something like 12-40/41 and maybe 12 speed or so. the gaps inbetween the shifts feel good enough for me personally, so I’d rather get more range than finer gaps.

I honestly don’t need to speed down a mountain at like 60Km/h, my 55 or so I’d get are plenty enough, but I want to be able to get up any hill I come across. And up until now, I’ve never used my 46/11 ring, as I don’t see much point sprinting faster when I’m already >55km/h (I don’t feel as secure and there’s an argument to be made for reaction time and being able to break etc.)

Can some of the more experienced people in here guide me a bit (I’m sorry but all of this is very, very new to me, so sorry if there are errors in my reasoning due to a lack of experience).

by N00bYugi