Average speed depending on fitness?

otherself

I've just got back into road cycling after a 12 month layoff. Fat (34 years old, 195lbs @ 5ft10) and unfit, I can manage 12.2mph with two big 1/2 mile hills on a light carbon road bike (7.6kg all up) after 7 days since I started. I'm having to take a break on the top of the hills due to leg pain / lactic acid build up.

What would be a good speed to aim for a fit person? I would assume it would break down into something like this:

Unfit / novice: 9 - 13mph

Fit person: 14 - 18mph

Very fit person / experienced club rider: 19 - 22mph

Elite Athlete / Professional: 23 - 31mph

Obviously age will play a part but i just read about an 80 year old man who did 25 miles in under 1 hour!

???

Alex_Simmons/RST

If you want to use speed as a measure of fitness, then confine it to your speed up a steep climb.

bahzob

It only really makes sense to use speed as a measure of your own personal progress.

Then ,if you have a circuit that you repeat, will become faster as you become fitter. This can be a valuable motivational tool to spur your training.

However even then it won't be a simple correlation. Weather, traffic and other factors will all have an effect. And there will be a massive difference if you were to ride it with other riders some of whom were better than you.

And ofc it the duration of the ride will have an impact.

All that being said the categories you list will not be too far off the mark, if they represent averages over a solo 2+ hour circular ride in OK conditions without a massive amount of climbing.

Ringo 68

How about using a computer and then comparing your times/speed with others who have ridden the same route on Strava.

I was pleasantly surprised to see that I was not too bad on the hills that I ride, certainly nowhere near the fastest but by no means the slowest either.

It does give you something to aim for as well when hitting certain segments of your ride.

teulk

You don't say how long your route is, obviously if its quite short and your doing two big hills then that is going to have a dramatic effect on your average speed. I'm 43, 203ibs and 5ft 8 so by your definition i am fat but fall into your fit category. i have a 40mile route with a 1.4mile hill average 5%. To me its quite hard work, there are a few other hills but they are quite short in comparison. I manage to average about 15 - 15.5 mph round that route. I have a flatish 23mile route that i cant average 18mph on. I used to get hung up on average times but then i found that i didn't enjoy riding constantly going out head down arse up trying to beat my previous time. Just go and ride and you will find that you will get faster naturally. I get more satisfaction from being able to ride 60 - 100mile rides than i do from averaging 18mph over 23miles.

Team4Luke

well done for getting back into it. Don't worry about speed, means nothing unless your training and racing which your not, you can be very fit and end up with a slower speed because it's a windy day !
Just steadily increase your distance when you feel you can, add an extra hill now and again or move onto a hillier route, look at your overall fitness and diet see what you can improve there too.
Keep at it and improvements will come.