More power or spinning?

tozi1

I have found that For steepish hills -10/11% I can'tsustain high power low revs- kills my legs,so I spin up in a ridiculously low granny gear,my ride buddy made me think the other day when he said he was trying to avoid lower gearing as he wanted more power,so I wondered if I should be persevering with a lower,and harder cadence,or does more power come with more miles anyway?

StillGoing

Whatever suits you best, but, a low gear and high cadence will take stress off of your legs/knees relying more on your cardiovascular system to get you over the top. Weight ratios are important for hills; inevitably the heavier you are, the more you need to fight gravity trying to stop you getting up hills. Plenty of riders advocate staying seated, pick a low gear, spin the cranks and conserve your energy. Better to reach the top with energy to spare than be shattered and struggling to make it through the rest of the ride.

chrisaonabike

Time yourself up the hill in the granny gear. Go as fast as you can. Then (not on the same day) time yourself up in the higher gear.

Whichever is faster, is when you're developing more power. Simples.

A high gear, as an end in itself, is stupid. Obviously in a lower gear you have the option to not work so hard, but unless you're bouncing in the saddle (in which case you should certainly change up), you can still go as hard as you like.

It's about going as fast as you can, this developing power lark, not the sensation of pushing painfully on the pedals.

rolf_f

Depends on your gearing and the terrain. If you live in a hilly part of the country, you may find that at times you simply don't have a choice - the gearing will effectively be high because gradient is so steep. If that scenario is possible then it is worth spending some time in higher gears on climbs because that will help you deal with the steeper ones when they arrive.

I expect your friend meant that he wanted to use the high gearing to improve his muscle strength. My simplistic interpretation of cadence is that with high cadence you use your heart to drive you and with low cadence you use your muscles. The latter don't last as long hence spinning is generally better for endurance. But if you spin all the time, you aren't working your muscles so much and if you aren't training them then they won't develop.

napoleond

Do whatever you find most comfortable to get up the hill. Don't do what anyone else does for the sake of it.
If you were to ride up the hill at the same speed you will be putting out the same power at 60rpm in a high gear as you would 95rpm in a low gear.

imposter2.0

tozi1 wrote:

my ride buddy made me think the other day when he said he was trying to avoid lower gearing as he wanted more power,so I wondered if I should be persevering with a lower,and harder cadence,or does more power come with more miles anyway?

Doesn't sound like your 'ride buddy' understands much about power - it is not dependent on cadence.

chrisaonabike

I'd qualify this a little...

NapoleonD wrote:

Do whatever you find most comfortable to get up the hill.

with....

Do whatever you find most comfortable to get up the hill at the speed you want.

Obviously, low gear, low speed will be the most comfortable, as in, least effort. I think some people advocate training in the higher gears because it forces you to work hard enough to avoid the problem where the pedals are turning so slowly that you fall off.

My take on this comes from being Captain Slow - my endurance, such that it is, is far better up hills in the saddle, in a very low gear - over time that gear gets easier, I go faster, and eventually it becomes natural to change up. My preference is to get faster first, then find that a higher gear still allows me a reasonable cadence.

tozi1

All great advice,thanks.although I live in lincolnshire,the wolds area I ride in has some quite nasty hills.I think,as several folk said,I'll do the granny thing to keep me going,and try a bit of harder ,low cadence stuff on the flat when it's not life or death!
To be honest,I was starting to dread the hills so much it was spoiling the ride,and ruining the motivation,better to get to the top with a tiny bit to spare.

akc42

The question should really be more "torque or spinning to achieve maximum power". Power is the amount of work achieved, and if your legs are going faster, it doesn't need as much pressure (torque) to achieve the same amount of work.

I have been experimenting with spinning quite a bit recently. Up until then, I have been trying to get in the highest gear possible where I could still turn the pedals whilst seated. Then I decided to try spinning. What I found was, that the limiting factor for speed was no longer what my leg muscles could do (and in particular how long they lasted before starting to get really tired), but now my breathing and what I could sustain in my overall stamina was more of a factor. The other thing was my times dropped on all hills and I had a period where I was getting new PBs each week.

Its not just hills that spinning becomes useful. I have been practising deliberately dropping down a gear when running on the relative flat, so that my legs turn the pedals faster, and quite frequently I find I am going faster than I was in the higher gear. Again it is not the leg muscles that are now getting tired of the constant pushing, but what my overall fitness level can sustain.

I am also getting stronger. I few months ago, a 6-7% gradient would be me pushing the lowest gear I had (34-28 with a compact chainring) and struggling, but now that gradient is me spinning in the lowest gear, and it now takes a 9-10% gradient to find I am at the pushing as hard as I can in that low gear and still seated.

ben@31

Spinning at a high cadence will mean your leg muscles are not working as hard and you won't tire out as quick. You can spin away all day but you couldn't mash down on the pedals in a high gear all day. I like to cycle at a set cadence 90+rpm all the time and change gear on different gradients to keep the cadence the same. On a flat straight, I still spin at 90rpm but just in a higher gear, if I'm coming to an incline I'll drop down some gears to maintain the same cadence.

An certain ex pro-cyclist used to cycle with a cadence over 100rpm.

tozi1

Thanks everyone,that's a real help.Also I don't feel quite so pathetic now I know I'm in good company!

StillGoing

There are times when I use the inner ring and a high gear with high cadence on the flat. I can stick with my ride buddies using their big ring and a low gear, but while their tiring their legs out, I'm just breathing a bit harder. It doesn't make your ride buddy a better rider just because he chooses to mash a bigger gear than you. Just feel smug when you power away from him as you reach the top of a hill whilst starting to engage him in a conversation.

ben@31

philthy3 wrote:

There are times when I use the inner ring and a high gear with high cadence on the flat. I can stick with my ride buddies using their big ring and a low gear, but while their tiring their legs out, I'm just breathing a bit harder. It doesn't make your ride buddy a better rider just because he chooses to mash a bigger gear than you. Just feel smug when you power away from him as you reach the top of a hill whilst starting to engage him in a conversation.

I'm pretty much the same. Today I did 47 km, with 90% of it using the inner ring and constantly working my way up and down the cassette. I had an average bike cadence of 99 rpm, average heart rate of 167 bpm ( I was very cardio fit but had a few weeks off with injury). Average speed of 27.3 kmh. When I was at my peak cardio fitness I could average a couple of kmh faster at this cadence.

simon_masterson

On the very toughest hills, holding 90(+) rpm the whole time isn't feasible with 'standard' road gearing for many amateurs.

In general, 2+2 doesn't equal 5 - if you want to go up x hill at x cadence in x time, you'll need to be using x gear. Climbing a gear or two higher than you might like and feeling the lactate burn is only one part of becoming a better climber (and 'grinding' up hills in really high gears can also be useful).

But you have a choice - you can just climb at whatever pace you find comfortable at the time. If you're not racing, who cares? If you're looking to compete with the hill climb specialists though, you're in for a world of pain!

napoleond

I'm a masher, always have been. My average cadence on tge road is usually 85-90rpm tops. The only time I don't is racing on the track where I'm doing 130rpm towards the end.
Never felt it an issue. It is what is.

Roberto di Velo

Simon Masterson wrote:

On the very toughest hills, holding 90(+) rpm the whole time isn't feasible with 'standard' road gearing for many amateurs.

I was about to say the same. Whilst I'd absolutely agree that a high cadence is the best and most efficient way to pedal most of the time, I find that when I hit the really steep stuff, I'll struggle to maintain 90+ rpm. I think the key to climbing is finding out what works for you; in my case, I find "grinding" at 70-80 rpm the best way to tackle really sharp climbs.

That said, I don't think there's anything wrong with having some lower gears to work with, if that's what you'd prefer.

StillGoing

A cadence of 70-80rpm up steep ramps is not grinding. The really steep ramps spinning is not going below around 60rpm.

http://cyclinguphill.com/cycle-uphill-techniques/

Nobody is suggesting continuing trying to spin at 90+rpm.

ai_1

Roberto di Velo wrote:

Simon Masterson wrote:

On the very toughest hills, holding 90(+) rpm the whole time isn't feasible with 'standard' road gearing for many amateurs.

I was about to say the same. Whilst I'd absolutely agree that a high cadence is the best and most efficient way to pedal most of the time, I find that when I hit the really steep stuff, I'll struggle to maintain 90+ rpm. I think the key to climbing is finding out what works for you; in my case, I find "grinding" at 70-80 rpm the best way to tackle really sharp climbs.

That said, I don't think there's anything wrong with having some lower gears to work with, if that's what you'd prefer.

philthy3 wrote:

A cadence of 70-80rpm up steep ramps is not grinding. The really steep ramps spinning is not going below around 60rpm.

http://cyclinguphill.com/cycle-uphill-techniques/

Nobody is suggesting continuing trying to spin at 90+rpm.

Glad to hear you all say this. I was reading through the thread, agreeing with the philosophy of keeping the cadence up when you wanted to but not agreeing it was necessarily feasible. Sometimes I wonder does everyone else fly up a 10% gradient or do they just live where 3% counts as a steep climb!!
I was out in the mountains yesterday and spent plenty time in 34/28 with my cadence down in the 60s. I'd love to have been spinning at 80-100rpm but I'm just not capable of that power output. The two toughest climbs yesterday were a 3km climb with an avergae of 9% and plenty sections at 12%-14% and a 6.5km climb with an average of abut 6.5% and some short ramps of 10% -11%. I spent much of both those climbs working hard in 34/28 and sometimes wishing for one more sprocket.

Roberto di Velo

philthy3 wrote:

A cadence of 70-80rpm up steep ramps is not grinding. The really steep ramps spinning is not going below around 60rpm.

http://cyclinguphill.com/cycle-uphill-techniques/

Nobody is suggesting continuing trying to spin at 90+rpm.

Thanks for the link.

In my mind, riding at a lower cadence is grinding! I've also met a number of people who've been under the misconception that you have to maintain the same high cadence even on the steep stuff, so I thought it was worth pointing out that you don't. Although you probably can, if you give yourself enough gears.

simon_masterson

philthy3 wrote:

Nobody is suggesting continuing trying to spin at 90+rpm.

The proponents of this theory - including the pro teams - would say that you should be. If we're talking about keeping cadence up when climbing rather than 'grinding', that's what we're talking about. That's the point - maintaining cadence may be preferable, but that doesn't mean it's practical.

IShaggy

ben@31 wrote:

An certain ex pro-cyclist used to cycle with a cadence over 100rpm.

EPO cadence!