Originally Posted by
Branko D
It's rare.
...
That's about it. The other 30 or 40 guys I personally know who race either in triathlon or road, can't. A couple of the bigger guys probably could do it and can put put some high numbers in 20-30 minutes, but I don't think I’ve seen them go at it for a full hour and in terms of power to weight (or power to drag even at their height) they're not that special. While a hour at sweetspot is fun, even, you have to really want to hurt yourself to ride at threshold for a full hour.
I think it's a lot less rare than people think. I know plenty of guys who can do 300W for an hour and plenty of them are in their 40's and 50's. The local young hot shot p/1/2 guys here in NorCal would be north of 350W. (for guys who are say 60-70ish kg)
Here is a good example.
Mt. Hamilton out of San Jose. Part of the annual Mt. Hamilton RR. It's 18 miles of climbing but has two short descents that will lower your average power. Still, tons of guys over 300 watts for this climb. Not to mention that they still have more than 40 tough miles to the finish.
Personally, I looked through my Strava and found where I averaged
300W for 2:30 at age 56.