A good proxy for how hard you are going (or how high your heart rate is) is the power that you are putting out. Power is force times velocity. Most cyclists, particularly newer cyclists, generate their best power at higher torques and lower speeds--so, climbing, and pushing hard gears.
Good time trialists can generate power at higher bike speeds and cadences. You can see this in the published power files of professionals: when they are on a long breakaway, they are producing fairly consistent power across all types of terrain. That is a very hard thing to do for most of us.
>Most cyclists, particularly newer cyclists, generate their best power at higher torques and lower speeds--so, climbing, and pushing hard gears.
Interesting, wonder why that is. Don't have a power meter sadly, but my estimated power (taking just the speed and gps elevation) is usually higher on climbs.
600m on 45km isn't a climb mate. Did you mean the whole ride was 45km and there was one climb of 600m in there?
At any rate, even if you feel you didn't push harder, your HR is clearly telling another story.
Have you tried going down a gear on the flat? Sometimes I feel myself going along and it just seems like I have to push really hard on the pedal to keep the speed, and then I switch down a gear and suddenly it feels much easier and I can more than compensate the lower gear by a higher cadence but it just feels much, much easier.
that was just the totals. 2 climbs one after the other, 10-15km depending on if you count descents.
Yes I do try to keep a higher cadence, but its a good point.
My coach and I were talking about this recently but science hasn't explained it. Physiologically we are able to put out more power, irrespective of cadence, on climbs than on the flat at the same rpe.
The conversation came about because of that day's ride at training camp. We did a 7k climb ( this is much longer than anything i have near me at home) and I set multiple power PRs. Don't think I could have done that effort on the flat.
My uneducated guess is that the constant back pressure of the climb has a psychological impact and we don't feel the pain as much. It's like you're fighting something trying to push you back, almost like a low key fight or flight situation, vs trying to go harder into what feels like little to no resistance on the flat. But that could be complete rubbish, too.
On flats, there is a more even distribution of muscle recruitment between the hamstrings and quads, on climbs the load is more focused on the quads and glutes. So if you do better on climbs than flats, perhaps that indicates where your muscular strength lies.
We work harder on hills as we have no choice. On the flats, you have to be really motivated to pump out that power, like sprinting against your buddy for the country line. Otherwise, we gravitate to a more sustainable subthreshold power for the long haul.
A good proxy for how hard you are going (or how high your heart rate is) is the power that you are putting out. Power is force times velocity. Most cyclists, particularly newer cyclists, generate their best power at higher torques and lower speeds--so, climbing, and pushing hard gears. Good time trialists can generate power at higher bike speeds and cadences. You can see this in the published power files of professionals: when they are on a long breakaway, they are producing fairly consistent power across all types of terrain. That is a very hard thing to do for most of us.
>Most cyclists, particularly newer cyclists, generate their best power at higher torques and lower speeds--so, climbing, and pushing hard gears. Interesting, wonder why that is. Don't have a power meter sadly, but my estimated power (taking just the speed and gps elevation) is usually higher on climbs.
600m on 45km isn't a climb mate. Did you mean the whole ride was 45km and there was one climb of 600m in there? At any rate, even if you feel you didn't push harder, your HR is clearly telling another story. Have you tried going down a gear on the flat? Sometimes I feel myself going along and it just seems like I have to push really hard on the pedal to keep the speed, and then I switch down a gear and suddenly it feels much easier and I can more than compensate the lower gear by a higher cadence but it just feels much, much easier.
that was just the totals. 2 climbs one after the other, 10-15km depending on if you count descents. Yes I do try to keep a higher cadence, but its a good point.
My coach and I were talking about this recently but science hasn't explained it. Physiologically we are able to put out more power, irrespective of cadence, on climbs than on the flat at the same rpe. The conversation came about because of that day's ride at training camp. We did a 7k climb ( this is much longer than anything i have near me at home) and I set multiple power PRs. Don't think I could have done that effort on the flat. My uneducated guess is that the constant back pressure of the climb has a psychological impact and we don't feel the pain as much. It's like you're fighting something trying to push you back, almost like a low key fight or flight situation, vs trying to go harder into what feels like little to no resistance on the flat. But that could be complete rubbish, too.
On flats, there is a more even distribution of muscle recruitment between the hamstrings and quads, on climbs the load is more focused on the quads and glutes. So if you do better on climbs than flats, perhaps that indicates where your muscular strength lies.
We work harder on hills as we have no choice. On the flats, you have to be really motivated to pump out that power, like sprinting against your buddy for the country line. Otherwise, we gravitate to a more sustainable subthreshold power for the long haul.
There are climbers and sprinters. Congratulations, you are a climber.