Cadence advice
Comments
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sub55 wrote:cadence doesn't matter ,when you feel the need to change gear , press the button. End of.
^^ this.0 -
sub55 wrote:No mate, the statement i highlighted is completely utter tosh. The power required increases by the cube of the speed. Therefore the faster you go ,the power requirements and the calories burned increase expodencetially .
Thats not to say you wont have to refuel mid ride, but given a fixed distance or time ,you will always burn more calories the harder you ride.
How does that make it tosh? You are saying precisely the same thing that I was...Mr Will wrote:... (but you'll still burn more calories than doing it the slow way).
2010 Cannondale CAAD9 Tiagra0 -
I have run out of popcorn...seanoconn - gruagach craic!0
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pinarello001 wrote:I have run out of popcorn...
Lets try this then.
Ultimately Cycling performance is dictated by cardio vascular fitness. Not strength.
So why would a rider concentrate on incrasing their cadence , that in turn stresses their CV rather than push harder.
Peeps say thy spent time working on their cadence building it up to whatever and now they're a better more accomplished cyclist for it. May be , just may be their increased performance is because they got on a bike and did some training , which stimulated their cv system and they got a little fitter.constantly reavalueating the situation and altering the perceived parameters accordingly0 -
sub55 wrote:Personally i'm a firm believer in the fact it doesn't matter. Get your crank length right in relation to your leg length , cadence doesn't matter ,when you feel the need to change gear , press the button. End of.
I think that is right in theory but not in practice. It's also why the argument that you don't need cadence - just time yourself manually whilst riding - doesn't work. People think their cadence is faster than it is. I found that when I started recording cadence on my computer that every time I checked it, I had a good, high cadence. I reckoned I was well in the 80s. When I checked the average, it tended to be about 10 lower. I think that was because I tended to think about cadence, and therefore check it, when I was pedalling faster. By setting the computer to display both current and average cadence, I got a much better idea of what I was actually doing.
So probably, if it is more effective to spin faster, for most people they won't feel the need to change gear at the optimum time unless they are actually paying attention to cadence. Probably once you are naturally running at a higher cadence, you can then probably happily forget about it.Faster than a tent.......0 -
Well, I wouldn't sit doing around 9,000 RPM on the motorway in a car, in the same way I don't pedal at around 90 RPM on my bike.0
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CSDGC wrote:Well, I wouldn't sit doing around 9,000 RPM on the motorway in a car, in the same way I don't pedal at around 90 RPM on my bike.
A car won't get tired. As long as it has fuel and air it can run forever. A human on the other hand cannot go on forever no matter how much fuel you keep putting into it, it will tire eventually. But since you want to use a car as a comparison, would you drive up a steep hill in 3rd or 5th? You go up a hill in a car at a slow speed you pick a low gear and high revs try it in a high gear low revs and you stall.0 -
SmoggySteve wrote:CSDGC wrote:Well, I wouldn't sit doing around 9,000 RPM on the motorway in a car, in the same way I don't pedal at around 90 RPM on my bike.
A car won't get tired. As long as it has fuel and air it can run forever. A human on the other hand cannot go on forever no matter how much fuel you keep putting into it, it will tire eventually. But since you want to use a car as a comparison, would you drive up a steep hill in 3rd or 5th? You go up a hill in a car at a slow speed you pick a low gear and high revs try it in a high gear low revs and you stall.
My point is that when cruising, it seems more efficient in a car and on a bike to use less RPM. I tire quicker and use more energy at 90 RPM than I would at 60-70, like a car would use less fuel at 6-7,000 RPM compared to 9,000 RPM.
If you think about it purely from an energy point of view, to pedal quicker your legs need to generate more kinetic energy to move the pedals and cranks and chain faster, while moving the bike at x mph.
To move at x mph in a higher gear, you are using less energy moving the chain, cranks, etc. Not to mention the fact that more energy is lost as sound and heat energy when pedaling at a higher speed.
I guess people should really just pedal at whatever speed you are comfortable with. No amount of arguing can tell someone what they are comfortable with.0 -
If we use the pros for the yardstick for want of a better word, they were split traditionally between 'Rouleurs' and 'Grimpers'. The Grimpers had a higher pedalling cadence and were generally tour riders. This higher cadence did not lend itself to one day riding on cobbles and they were called 'Roulers' - rolling the gear. To roll the gear, you had to be physically stronger. Apart from Liege-Bastiogne-Liege (A Schleck) you rarely see a climber winning a classic and vice versa for the tours.
However, the modern riders' cadence - even over cobbles, put most of us to shame.
When I was with Eastbourne Rovers, the track boys out on a club run or TT would blow me away when the hammer went down or the Cafe sign 'sprint spot' was looming. Their cadence was tangibly lower. When it came to a decent length of climb, I turned the tables on them.seanoconn - gruagach craic!0 -
when cruising it makes sense to go for as low a cadence as is comfortable, but when you are climbing, the guys in the 'know' say higher cadence is more efficient.0
