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Getting my butt kicked on uphill climbs. What to improve?

Old 06-04-21, 01:01 PM
  #26  
Seattle Forrest
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Lifting weights is great for you, everybody should do it, road cyclists are really terrible about this. It's debatable whether lifting helps you move the bike forward or not, but it helps you get the best quality of life, avoid injury, and age well. Don't stop doing it.

Climbing speed is purely down to power to weight ratio. Power is torque vector and cadence, you make it work your heart and lungs not your legs (for any appreciable amount of time).
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Old 06-04-21, 01:02 PM
  #27  
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Originally Posted by spelger
how much does height factor when climbing? honest question. i don't see height as an issue, it is not like there is much aero drag when climbing at 8-12mph (for me more like 6-8) up the grades in the route posted.
​​​​​​The guy that asked about that was getting at the idea that 150 pounds on a 3 foot tall guy would be portly and leave room for weight loss.
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Old 06-04-21, 01:03 PM
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Originally Posted by Rdmonster69
I must be training right then !! LOL .... I'm in a similar situation as far as cardio ability. Good part is I don't ride with other people so I go at my own pace. I hit the gym as much as I ride but I love that almost as much as the bike so I wont sacrifice one for the other. I'm in for a good 7-8 hours a week on the bike. I don't find other cyclists passing me often on the bike paths where I generally ride but most of the fast guys are probably somewhere else. When I was down this winter with a serious injury I lost a lot of mass from my injured leg. Doesn't seem to be holding me back much tho. FWIW I am 6'2" and 187 pounds and according to my app and cycling computer I average about 13.5 mph and that is pretty much regardless of how far I go, what the wind is like, roads vs bike paths.

Not sure why that is.
I ride mainly solo as well and started cycling as a way to supplement my strength training. I don't really want to sacrifice my gym time either and I've actually altered my weight training to focusing more on high rep/lower weight sets, just to reduce potential injury. My squats though have greatly benefited from cycling and I'm actually improving strength-wise because of the bike. Overall I feel like I'm getting a better workout balance with gym and cycling combined. There's just some days when I don't want to be stuck in one place and riding my bike helps clear my mind. Where I live, I'm surrounded by hills so I have no other choice but to improve in this area.
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Old 06-04-21, 02:32 PM
  #29  
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Originally Posted by terrymorse
Maybe not several years. Even just several weeks of focused training ought to produce marked improvements.

About 20 years ago, I was a fairly new rider and thought I was a decent climber. Then I joined the local Hills R Us recreational club ride. On big climbs, gray-haired guys in their 60s were leaving me in the dust!

I took that as inspiration and began some serious hill training. Several weeks later, I was they guy off the front.

It's amazing how quickly serious hill training can raise your climbing ability.
You might be lucky. Performance response in individuals to training stimulus follows a normal curve - some people may see no or almost no improvement.

Saying that, I made by far the most progress in the first two months of serious training. In fact, even though this is just my 2nd season training seriously, I am currently below my best results from last season.
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Old 06-04-21, 02:57 PM
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Originally Posted by ZHVelo
You might be lucky. Performance response in individuals to training stimulus follows a normal curve - some people may see no or almost no improvement.
Maybe I got lucky with the genetic lottery and can ramp up my fitness quickly.

But to paraphrase an old saying: "the harder I train, the luckier I get".
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Old 06-04-21, 03:52 PM
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If you are riding with others that are good cyclist already and have the correct type bike for the job, then you are severely disadvantaged and are probably just running out of glycogen (energy) trying to keep up with them.

In time you'll learn how to pace yourself, but not if you are trying to keep up with otherwise half decent cyclists. Once you figure out what pace will let you ride all day, and for how long you can go all out then slow back to that all day pace, then you'll be able to work on getting faster to keep up with others.

Mostly it's time and mileage behind you at that point. But there are methods that will help you get to that ability quicker.
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Old 06-04-21, 04:37 PM
  #32  
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Originally Posted by Iride01
... and are probably just running out of glycogen (energy) trying to keep up with them.
Fatigue is always multifactorial. Don't make the complex overly simple (and it's highly unlikely glycogen depletion is a factor on a ~15 minute climb). On the other hand, the principles of training are pretty straightforward - progressive overload, specificity, individuality.
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Old 06-04-21, 04:55 PM
  #33  
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Originally Posted by asgelle
Fatigue is always multifactorial. Don't make the complex overly simple (and it's highly unlikely glycogen depletion is a factor on a ~15 minute climb). On the other hand, the principles of training are pretty straightforward - progressive overload, specificity, individuality.
I didn't know the OP was only doing a 15 minute ride. I was more imagining that they are riding with a group on a 1 or 2 hour ride. And the other group members are capable of doing that ride solo at a 18 mph average.

That'll drain the energy out of the best of noobs whether it's entirely glycogen or not. And the OP did claim to be tired for days afterwards.

But in no way was I asserting that glycogen depletion was the entire reason for their problem. Perhaps I should have just said running out of energy.
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Old 06-04-21, 04:58 PM
  #34  
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Originally Posted by Iride01
Perhaps I should have just said running out of energy.
or better yet the technically correct terminology, became fatigued. There are other causes of fatigue beside reduced energy stores.
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Old 06-04-21, 05:01 PM
  #35  
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Originally Posted by asgelle
or better yet the technically correct terminology, became fatigued. There are other causes of fatigue beside reduced energy stores.
I didn't think we'd gotten to the point we were having a technical conversation. I'm just using colloquial terms. If I'm tired and fatigued I'm going to say I'm out of energy. <grin>
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Old 06-04-21, 05:06 PM
  #36  
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Originally Posted by Iride01
I didn't think we'd gotten to the point we were having a technical conversation. I'm just using colloquial terms. If I'm tired and fatigued I'm going to say I'm out of energy. <grin>
And then someone reading it is mislead into thinking the answer is to eat more when her problem might, in reality, be lack of lactate clearance. Just as when people hear someone say the other riders were stronger than me and think the solution is to add strength in the weight room.
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Old 06-04-21, 05:38 PM
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Originally Posted by asgelle
And then someone reading it is mislead into thinking the answer is to eat more when her problem might, in reality, be lack of lactate clearance. Just as when people hear someone say the other riders were stronger than me and think the solution is to add strength in the weight room.
Well if that's all the OP got from what I said, then my apologies to the OP.

My opening sentence in the my first post here will be misconstrued if you are saying I suggesting they need to eat more. I do tend to believe that being overly tired for days after long rides will have inadaquate carb intake as part of the issue. No where did I say that was the only issue you are making it out to be.

Besides, most of us are here to help the OP with suggestions. Where are your suggestions for the OP? I might have learned something if you'd addressed their question.
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Old 06-04-21, 05:42 PM
  #38  
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Originally Posted by Iride01
Where are your suggestions for the OP? I might have learned something if you'd addressed their question.
My suggestion would be to recognize that while there is some valuable information to be found from anonymous posters in a discussion group, unless one is already knowledgeable, it's difficult to separate the right from the wrong. One is much better off searching for reliable sources with a proven track record.

To that end, https://www.amazon.com/Cyclists-Trai...s%2C203&sr=8-2 https://www.amazon.com/Training-Raci...e%2C204&sr=8-2 or even https://www.amazon.com/Bicycle-Road-...2850395&sr=8-2

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Old 06-07-21, 05:53 PM
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As has been mentioned before, you need more time riding and less time in the gym. If you want to become a better runner, run more. If you want to better biker, bike more. If you want to be a better runner or bicyclist on the hills, run and bike more on the hills. It's pretty simple really and you can probably do it! There's no magic nutrition advice or supplement to use. You just need more training that is specific to what you want to accomplish.
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Old 06-09-21, 07:10 PM
  #40  
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Question for the OP: So what goes wrong with you when they ride away from you? Are you panting so hard you think you'll pass out? Or do your legs seem to simply go away or not feel as strong as they did at the start of the hill? Does you cadence drop? If monitor cadence, what is your cadence on this climb and can you hold it all the way up? Or even if you don't know your numbers, does it seem like your cadence is dropping? I see that this is a 621' climb. Most club climbers can do about 2500'/hour, so that would be about a 15' climb. That's a good length for a really hard effort.

IME cadence is everything when it comes to holding high power. Say I'm trying to do a set of 8' intervals on the flat, like I did today. Well, there isn't any "flat," at least not on the roads around here. It looks pretty flat, but there are always little rises and drops. So I'm holding my power at some cadence and I come to a bit of rising pavement. My cadence starts to drop because if it didn't, my power would go up too high for the range in which I'm working. If this keeps up and my cadence continues to drop, pretty soon my power will drop too, because power is a function of both pedal force and cadence. As cadence drops, pedal force increases and as that happens the legs begin to tire and pedal force drops off and power follows suit. The cure is to down-shift and get the cadence back up into my power range. Same thing going downhill: as pedal force drops, cadence increases to hold power but at some point I can't push hard enough at that cadence and power drops, so I up-shift.

The point of all that jabber is that everyone has a certain cadence range which develops maximum sustainable power and this cadence range varies with the slope due to a technical factor called crank inertial load. In general, one does better reducing cadence slightly as slope increases. Now then, that 46 X 30 low gear of yours. I haven't seen anyone in a group ride using a gear that big since it was the fashion back in the late 60s and early 70s. Your cadence is way too low. My guess would be that your low gear should be closer to a 34 X 28 or 34 X 30. You should be spinning at an 80-85 cadence. You simply can't develop enough power with those big gears, plus they wear out your legs.

You have a lot of nasty little stops on that climb, plus it gets steep near the top. There are quite a few 13% kickers and one 19%. With your current gearing, pedaling at 80 cadence produces about 10 mph. To do 10 mph up a 13% grade requires almost 500 watts. My guess is that this might be more than your sustainable power. So you'll slow down and the pedal pressure will tire your legs. If you could have geared down and kept the cadence about the same while holding the same power all the way up. your legs would do better. You'd breathe harder and have better legs.

This is just my guess, maybe about some other person who's not you.

Re the strength training: everything you do that exhausts you will make you stronger. True, more cycling will be more efficient at getting better at cycling. However, more activity is better than less, meaning that if you like to do a thing, you'll be more likely to do it, and doing it is the important thing. I've been strength training to help with my cycling for 20 years or so. I've found that twice a week yields progress if I go to approximate failure on the second day and once a week maintains strength and muscle size. During the high season (now) I cut back to once a week. On the bike, a good strengthening drill is to do say six 1' max efforts up a suitable hill with 5' easy pedaling between efforts. Alternate sitting and standing. The best way to get better at climbing that hill is to do repeats on it, say 3. The best way to build endurance is to do a 4 hour ride once a week in hilly terrain, that's at your limit, IOW you can hardly get off the bike at the finish, say 60 miles and 3000'-4000'. On all other rides, just ride moderate.
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Old 06-10-21, 12:46 PM
  #41  
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Originally Posted by Carbonfiberboy
Question for the OP: So what goes wrong with you when they ride away from you? Are you panting so hard you think you'll pass out? Or do your legs seem to simply go away or not feel as strong as they did at the start of the hill? Does you cadence drop? If monitor cadence, what is your cadence on this climb and can you hold it all the way up? Or even if you don't know your numbers, does it seem like your cadence is dropping? I see that this is a 621' climb. Most club climbers can do about 2500'/hour, so that would be about a 15' climb. That's a good length for a really hard effort.

IME cadence is everything when it comes to holding high power. Say I'm trying to do a set of 8' intervals on the flat, like I did today. Well, there isn't any "flat," at least not on the roads around here. It looks pretty flat, but there are always little rises and drops. So I'm holding my power at some cadence and I come to a bit of rising pavement. My cadence starts to drop because if it didn't, my power would go up too high for the range in which I'm working. If this keeps up and my cadence continues to drop, pretty soon my power will drop too, because power is a function of both pedal force and cadence. As cadence drops, pedal force increases and as that happens the legs begin to tire and pedal force drops off and power follows suit. The cure is to down-shift and get the cadence back up into my power range. Same thing going downhill: as pedal force drops, cadence increases to hold power but at some point I can't push hard enough at that cadence and power drops, so I up-shift.

The point of all that jabber is that everyone has a certain cadence range which develops maximum sustainable power and this cadence range varies with the slope due to a technical factor called crank inertial load. In general, one does better reducing cadence slightly as slope increases. Now then, that 46 X 30 low gear of yours. I haven't seen anyone in a group ride using a gear that big since it was the fashion back in the late 60s and early 70s. Your cadence is way too low. My guess would be that your low gear should be closer to a 34 X 28 or 34 X 30. You should be spinning at an 80-85 cadence. You simply can't develop enough power with those big gears, plus they wear out your legs. On the flats I feel like I have good leg power, but it's hills that seem to get me.

You have a lot of nasty little stops on that climb, plus it gets steep near the top. There are quite a few 13% kickers and one 19%. With your current gearing, pedaling at 80 cadence produces about 10 mph. To do 10 mph up a 13% grade requires almost 500 watts. My guess is that this might be more than your sustainable power. So you'll slow down and the pedal pressure will tire your legs. If you could have geared down and kept the cadence about the same while holding the same power all the way up. your legs would do better. You'd breathe harder and have better legs.

This is just my guess, maybe about some other person who's not you.

Re the strength training: everything you do that exhausts you will make you stronger. True, more cycling will be more efficient at getting better at cycling. However, more activity is better than less, meaning that if you like to do a thing, you'll be more likely to do it, and doing it is the important thing. I've been strength training to help with my cycling for 20 years or so. I've found that twice a week yields progress if I go to approximate failure on the second day and once a week maintains strength and muscle size. During the high season (now) I cut back to once a week. On the bike, a good strengthening drill is to do say six 1' max efforts up a suitable hill with 5' easy pedaling between efforts. Alternate sitting and standing. The best way to get better at climbing that hill is to do repeats on it, say 3. The best way to build endurance is to do a 4 hour ride once a week in hilly terrain, that's at your limit, IOW you can hardly get off the bike at the finish, say 60 miles and 3000'-4000'. On all other rides, just ride moderate.
I'm beginning to think my pacing is off and I need to work on improving my stamina through the last segment of my hill climbs. The other day I was at a half way point on a hill climb while taking a break and there was another cyclist at the same halfway point who went ahead of me. In fact he probably had a good 6-7 minute lead and I was not expecting to see him again. When I finally continued to the climb, I caught up to him fairly fast and almost felt like he was just going too slow, but fast enough where i would exert too much energy trying to pass him. Anyways, I was able to keep pace with him for almost the entire climb until we reached the last and steepest part of the segment. It's there I felt I was starting to gas out and had to switch to a lower gear just to keep moving. He eventually widen the gap and I probably was a good 2 minutes behind by the time I reached the summit. When I use to do group jogs, hills were also my weak spot despite being able to power through with fast runners on the less hilly segments.

Right now I can't really do anything about my front gearing, since this bike also serves as my uphill gravel bike riding up single track trails and hard pack dirt fire roads. With these roads I'm mainly riding at 30:37/42t, but I'm able to hold steady with the majority of MTB'ers. I don't want put blame entirely on my bike though, since I know I can still improve physically (at least for my age). I'm not planning to race nor do I want to lose muscle mass just to be some amazing cyclist, but I definitely want to improve my stamina and endrance a bit more.

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Old 06-10-21, 01:55 PM
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The bike really is to blame though for a part of your issues though. Lugging that extra 6 or 7 pounds of bike up a hill is bad enough. But with gearing that maybe isn't adequate for the speeds you are riding the level parts of your ride and down the other sides of any hill on the route is going to leave you with less energy for that particular climb if keeping up with others in a group is desired. You might need some higher ratio gearing.

For me, just riding that slow up a hill will have me overheat from lack of cooling airflow. Or at least what I'm imagining to be less than 10 mph climbing. If you are faster on the climb then good. It's better than I expected.

The other part is that you still just need to find that pace that allows you to ride all day and at the same time rest between efforts. And by pace I don't really mean cadence or minutes per mile as one might think. It's the muscle you put into pedaling. At any cadence I ride, there is a certain amount of muscle I can use that lets me pedal forever. (yes that's a fisherman's tale or exaggeration) Pedal harder than that and you are now on the timer for how long you can maintain that effort.

And that is where riding more and riding solo will let you find out what that is for you. When riding with others, competition and trying to keep up will only wear you out and make figuring it out harder.

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Old 06-12-21, 10:30 PM
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Just ride frequently and for longer. There are places that two years ago were small ring/biggest cog and a struggle for me to get up that are now big ring and 2nd/3rd biggest without thinking (more a function of I don't really need to drop to the small ring nearly as often as I used to.) I still get PRs on my regular climbs and sometimes I don't, but I still tackle them on a pretty regular basis. Learn to spin up hills, Don't forget to stand, mix things up so you aren't just punishing yourself on the climbs. I almost exclusively ride solo so pulling off to stop for a break isn't out of the picture either. Maybe I need to drink or eat during a climb and it's a good excuse for a break. Keep fueled (eat) stay hydrated (Drink!) and keep turning cranks. Also a bike fitting never hurts because bad mechanics due to position aren't going to help you go up faster.
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Old 09-14-21, 08:40 PM
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Originally Posted by jonathanf2
One thing I notice on my long bike rides, is that my body needs a day or two for recovery. I'm not as durable as when I was in my 20s, but I don't feel that old yet. My gym workouts are a bit different since I can allocate different muscle groups per day minimizing fatigue. I tend to ride 2-3 days a week @ 2 hours per ride, with my gym time taking up about 3-4 days a week at 1 hour per session. Depending on which I do more, either gym or or bike time is reduced and I try and have 1 rest day per week.

I've also reduced weight due to my cycling, originally clocking in at 155 lbs. Now fully hydrated I'm at 150 lbs. and can drop 5-10 lbs. in water weight depending on my cycling sessions.
If your priority is to become a better climber and have better endurance, you will need to flip your training days. You should be on the bike 3-4 (or better yet, 5) and lift 2-3. If you want to have a strong body, but not necessarily an ideal one for cycling, then keep your current training regime. If you want to be a good climber, then you must devote more time on the bike doing 2-3 days of all out hard climbs and the remaining on recovery rides. As my coach told me, to win in the mountains, your must train in the mountains. In my day, I was always first or second hitting the summits.

P.S. Don’t add too much muscle by doing weights other than those used specifically for cycling. The reason being, you don’t want to carry additional pounds when climbing.
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Old 09-15-21, 01:18 AM
  #45  
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Originally Posted by rsbob
If your priority is to become a better climber and have better endurance, you will need to flip your training days. You should be on the bike 3-4 (or better yet, 5) and lift 2-3. If you want to have a strong body, but not necessarily an ideal one for cycling, then keep your current training regime. If you want to be a good climber, then you must devote more time on the bike doing 2-3 days of all out hard climbs and the remaining on recovery rides. As my coach told me, to win in the mountains, your must train in the mountains. In my day, I was always first or second hitting the summits.

P.S. Don’t add too much muscle by doing weights other than those used specifically for cycling. The reason being, you don’t want to carry additional pounds when climbing.
I posted this back in June and I've been hill climbing every week since then, plus going on group rides with other hill climbers. My climbing and endurance has drastically improved. I still go to the gym, but I've switched my training regiment to focus more on low rep, heavy weights to keep mass down, but still build strength. I've also been focusing on cadence and working on climbing techniques while managing my energy based on the route.

So as others mentioned, just climbing on a regular basis has been a big help to improve.
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Old 09-15-21, 01:26 AM
  #46  
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Originally Posted by jonathanf2
I need to work on improving my stamina ... When I use to do group jogs, hills were also my weak spot despite being able to power through with fast runners on the less hilly segments.
Some suggestions to consider.

You might recall from your jogging/running the idea of Fartlek style training. "Speed play" means toying with your session with periodic sprints across your route. Say, with running, sprinting from one telephone pole to the next, every time you reach the fifth telephone pole. Or, on a ride, every 5mins sprint hard for 30-60sec, then recover. Irrespective of whether you're on a hill at the time, or dead flat, or whatever. Over time, that sort of approach can help train your body to cope with "curve balls" whenever they come. (Used to do distance running, myself, with plenty of hills, varied terrain, Fartlek-style training among the tools we used. Worked very well, as a boost to endurance. Helped with cycling, and swimming.)

For outright cardio improvement, at the gym you might consider tossing in the occasional hard 10min rowing session. At a very brisk cadence with moderate pull strength, a good rowing stroke across 10+ minutes can be one of the hardest cardio things you'll ever do. Used judiciously as part of your overall training, it can be a great boost to cardio stamina.

I suspect that adding the occasional strength workout that instead focuses on stamina instead of raw strength could help. Will still be the strength exercises for the muscles you're targeting, but instead would stress those muscles in a stamina way instead of a strength way.
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