Upper body strength

chuckcork

Doing a local event which involved 2no. Cat 1 climbs, it quickly became clear to me that on the really tough climbs that upper body strength is a must, having to stand up in my lowest gear and clamp on the bars with my arms going to jelly just about on one particular climb that had maybe half the other riders off their bikes and walking.

Later on I had the opposite, a steep winding decent that left my hands in pain as I was having to clamp the brakes that hard and for that long.

Any suggestions for building up the strength?

I'm not wanting to be "king of the mountain" but additional strength would be welcome.

cougie

You dont need a massive amount of upper body strength - look at the best climbers - they're like birds not built like swimmers.

I think the best exercise you can do would be to do more of those rides - your climbing will get better and you wont need to force the gears over quite so much. Its the same with the braking really - do it enough and your hands will get used to it.

virtuoso

Like Cougie said you don't need any upper-body strength to ride a bike, you're problem is that you are too tense, release the death grip!

Climbing a hill on a bike is much like making love to a beautiful women, remember that.

ride_whenever

virtuoso wrote:

Climbing a hill on a bike is much like making love to a beautiful women, remember that.

What spin until your lungs give out then mash your brains out?

virtuoso

ride_whenever wrote:

virtuoso wrote:

Climbing a hill on a bike is much like making love to a beautiful women, remember that.

What spin until your lungs give out then mash your brains out?

Ride it hard until you reach the peak, but keep all the tension in the lower body.

chuckcork

virtuoso wrote:

Like Cougie said you don't need any upper-body strength to ride a bike, you're problem is that you are too tense, release the death grip!

Climbing a hill on a bike is much like making love to a beautiful women, remember that.

I thought Swiss Tony sold cars? Sure glad my wife doesn't know about that aspect of cycling, she might wonder why I'm on the bike so much. :oops:

Anyway, I was barely able to move forward, 4-5kph only, using a 34T/25 combination. If I hadn't clamped hard on the bars I probably would have gone sideways with the force I was putting through the cranks.

cougie

Sounds like that hill was pretty darn extreme. If you built up your arm muscle - its dead weight to carry round 99% of the hills.

I'd say lower gears may help, or failing that - just go round the hill ? ;-)

I did the Cheshire Cat this year and that goes over a 25% climb. I did that on 39*23 - v slowly - and it wasnt my arms that ached - I thought my heart would pop though. I thought I'd left my climbing block on - and only realised after the event.

chuckcork

cougie wrote:

Sounds like that hill was pretty darn extreme. If you built up your arm muscle - its dead weight to carry round 99% of the hills.

I'd say lower gears may help, or failing that - just go round the hill ? ;-)

Wimp out when it gets tough? No chance!

Cougar

I believe in developing your upper body strength to help prevent back injury and support the large leg muscle groups. The extra weight (negligible) never did me any harm and I won quite a few hilly Time Trials beating much lighter (puny) riders.

The training material on this web site includes some excellent stuff on weight training from qualified coaches and some ideas re climbing technique from the likes of Cadel Evans who believes in developing core strength. I don't think I've read anything on here yet I've disagreed with. When it comes to this forum well that's a different matter entirely.

Developing upper body strength is great for overall fitness and health and if you need to lump someone then you can. At the end of the day do what you feel is right.

fuzzynavel

virtuoso wrote:

ride_whenever wrote:

virtuoso wrote:

Climbing a hill on a bike is much like making love to a beautiful women, remember that.

What spin until your lungs give out then mash your brains out?

Ride it hard until you reach the peak, but keep all the tension in the lower body.

Not quite.....you ride it hard until you are spent then climb off and walk home!

chuckcork

fuzzynavel wrote:

virtuoso wrote:

ride_whenever wrote:

virtuoso wrote:

Climbing a hill on a bike is much like making love to a beautiful women, remember that.

What spin until your lungs give out then mash your brains out?

Ride it hard until you reach the peak, but keep all the tension in the lower body.

Not quite.....you ride it hard until you are spent then climb off and walk home!

Or if you're married, fall asleep (with a smile)