Changing Optimum Cadence.

Old but not dead

I came back to competitive cycling 18 months ago and this year will be my third season since my come back. Last year I chose a tough Cyclosportive in the Pyrenees as my seasonal target hoping that if I could get fit for that I would also perform well in time trials afterwards. Despite performing very well in the sportive both in my age group and overall, and changing myself from one of the weakest climbers of my club to a strong climber I am still feeble in time trials.

I have performed a lot of turbo training over the last 6 months aimed at developing more power at TT conditions. It hasn’t worked. I had to consider that at 61 I am past it and should give up racing, or get smarter to find and target my weaknesses.

I have done a series of tests to map my performance. The test that was most revealing was a power/cadence graph. For general fitness I performed 2 series of 40 minute sessions over a number of weeks. Each session was performed at a fixed cadence. One series with a heart rate of 130 bpm, and the other at 150 bpm.

I expected a power curve starting at 50 rpm that increased with rpm to a peak at around 90 rpm. Thereafter the power would slowly drop towards 100 rpm then quickly drop after 100 rpm. However my results showed a peak at 80 rpm and this very quickly dropped to less than half power at 90 rpm. There is a marginal power increase above 90 rpm. But basically there is a massive power drop at the very cadence I have been using during my time trials. I have repeated some of these tests at critical rpms to verify the results and was surprised to get very repeatable results.

Based on the assumption that increasing the number of power strokes per minute will generally increase power I would like to increase my optimum cadence to 90 to 95 rpm. Does anyone have tried and tested means of achieving this as the last 6 months has shown that training at 90 to 100 rpm does not work for me.

Alex_Simmons/RST

Just checking on your methodology.

Forget about holding a HR. At which cadence can you sustain maximal power for the duration?
How are you controlling for daily fluctuations in performance?

You may find preferred cadence is different on different terrain and conditions.

If you really want to lift cadence, then the answer is pretty straightforward, ride the same power in one gear smaller more often.

But end of the day, the objective is to produce more power as that's what will make you faster. You can't isolate the cadence element from the pedal force element, as they are not independent variables.

So you may well end up pedaling at 80rpm in a bigger gear instead.

Old but not dead

Thanks for your reply Alex. I hope the weather is better for cycling in Australia than it is here.

After reading your reply it has triggered a few chains of thoughts. Normally when riding on club runs I am peddling at 90 to 100 rpm on the flat when at a easy easy pace and this drops down to about 88 rpm under load. However on long climbs I am fairly constant at 80 rpm.

I will do some turbo tests over the next few months to determine what my sustainable maximum power cadence is.

RChung

Old but not dead wrote:

After reading your reply it has triggered a few chains of thoughts. Normally when riding on club runs I am peddling at 90 to 100 rpm on the flat when at a easy easy pace and this drops down to about 88 rpm under load. However on long climbs I am fairly constant at 80 rpm.

I will do some turbo tests over the next few months to determine what my sustainable maximum power cadence is.

Just as you noticed that your cadence varies between the flat and climbs, you'll discover that your cadence will vary between the turbo trainer, a flat road, and a climb.