Maelochs

One thing I can add---whether or not high cadence works best for non-riders is of no concern to me because I am not a non-rider.

I have worked at improving my pedaling technique, which helps no matter what cadence I use---and anyone who works to improve pedaling technique has to be Not a novice rider--you have to practice by riding.

For experienced riders ... we know form watching pros that each uses different techniques. As far as I can recall, people talked about Jan Ulrich grinding huge gears up mountains while Lance Armstrong and his chemical friends rode extremely high cadence. I have heard similar remarks made by commentators about many other riders--Chris Froome was known for spinning small gears, for instance.

I find that it takes different muscles to do an up-and-down mash versus a controlled spin. I also find on different days different techniques in different amounts work better.

Studies like this one as I said above, prove only what the study set out to prove---but don't directly correspond to any real-world situations.

Is it "science"? Yup. Is it useful? If "useful" includes cranking up a lot of folks on cycling fora .......

wolfchild

Optimal cadence is an illusion for me but my drop bars are definitely real.

genejockey 

Lemme check......

.....It's an old bottle of Finish Line.

genejockey 

GRINDING, and SPINNING......hmmmmmmm. Seems like we need one word for that.. I know!
GRINNING!!!!

Maelochs

This is probably the most accurate take. Some senior who worked part time as an assistant to some professor decided to turn his term paper into a "published paper" and got some friends to sign on. "If I were a real scientist, how would I create an experiment? What do you guys think? Pass me the bong. Hey, Joe, you still have that old bicycle?"

genejockey 

Nah. A couple of post docs had an idea over a beer or two. That's 3 (2 post docs + lab head). They had 2 grad students conduct the experiment. That's 2 more. And there was a piece of equipment in another lab they had to borrow, so they had to put that lab head on the paper, too. There's your 6 authors.

There was a lab tech responsible for the equipment, who had to show the grad students how to use it, and then fix it after they inevitably broke it - because that's what grad students do - and tell them how to plug it in, how to adjust the sensors, how to download the data, how to analyze the data, and what it meant. But they didn't put the lab tech on the paper because "you don't need publications".

indyfabz

NFS is the best lube. And I never wave. Seriously.

ofajen

Sigh. How soon we forget.

Otto

livedarklions

Alas, we don't forget. Just pointing out that the premise of that "debate" was even sillier than this one.

livedarklions

And I'm just going to add that what you said is true no matter what group is used.

63rickert

Time for my Lon Haldeman story. This happened in a little race that was only 30 or so miles from chez Haldeman. Lon was spectating, not racing. I was in a little chase group of four, we were well matched, all in 52 or 53x16 and cruising along at 26-27mph. Lon appears from nowhere and starts chatting with us. He did most of the chat because he could at 27. He was riding a fixed gear. When he announced he was going to go chat with next group up the road I asked him what gear he was in. “42 by 16” he answered. And because he was Lon and was not about to give anyone unfair advantage from utilizing his draft he took off like a rocket. Definitely above 30mph and more likely something like 35.

If you are going to talk about spinning, talk about spinning. And as stated upthread, Lon was not human.

njkayaker

The other part of this is the media over-interpreting and hyping a very minor study.

ofajen

I’m getting to know 42 by 16 pretty well, and that is some foot speed. Going 30 mph on say 700x25 means 145 rpm. Going 35 mph means 169 rpm.

Otto

Tony Marley

It is the only way to get up a mountain on a recumbent.

tomato coupe

Has anyone read the paper yet?

genejockey 

Just the abstract. It's behind a paywall.