my comfort cadence is 81rpm but I did repeated short climb interval with 55-60rpm recently, it was fun. I would do more low cadence training more often.
Track cyclist here - enjoying these GTN videos for variety! For me, I've spent around 5 years training to put out power at higher cadence. For crits I tend to be about 95rpm (1 hour, 50km), Scratch Race (20 minutes, 15km) around 105-110rpm, with attacks and final sprint between 120-140rpm. Rev outs on rollers usually 160-180rpm, but again took years to hit these numbers.
Hill repeats are my favorite training session. Start low cadence than gradually spin up. Turn around, power down the hill as a reward, than go up again. So fun!
@gtn it depends on the day and what my coach wants me to do. I'm surrounded by hills. It's more about the percent of angle than distance. I could do a 2 -5% grade for 25 miles or more x 5, a 7% grade, like dinosaur Ridge, for 3x10, or the 13% grade near my house for until I can't do it anymore. I'm training for hill climb and century ride completions along with USAT events and four ironman next year. Hill climbs makes me stronger.
this is interesting because i climbed the alpe d'huez twice yesterday - albeit the first ride was at at around 00-20 and the 2nd ride was from around 19-45 in the evening. the first ride was primarily in the small ring (apart from the first km which is fairly flat) whilst the 2nd evening ride was entirely in the large ring (bar a minute or so around 6km in to the ride). now the first climb was just over an hour and 5 mins whilst the 2nd with the lower cadence was just over 59 mins. my cadence averaged 58rpm for 75% of the 2nd climb and dropped to below 30 rpm for almost 3 mins. This was on Rouvy though - so the low cadence wasnt an issue. I find it easier to push through with a high torque though. According to strava i have climbed just over 40,000m this year and i would say that at least 35000m of that has been below 65rpm
After one year riding high cadences in 2019 (on the flat average of 95), I switched back to low cadences; on the flat, I felt losing speed, and uphill, I even felt losing power. Low cadence seems to be best for me; as a hardgainer, I couldn't build up muscles with the leg press in the gym. Now, I use a Compex 4.0 for gaining more power, after only two sessions I could ride uphill faster then after 1.5 years doing legpress, I suppose due to a cartilage damage I could not put on enough weight to get the muscles grow. Especially when I go uphill a short, steep climb on the big ring, I can descend much faster than after going uphill on the small ring. Maybe pros use a higher cadence, but for example Bert Grabsch rode a really low cadence, but he nevertheless became World champion in the Time trial championships 2008. I am more like a turbo diesel who uses big gears. I know by my own experiences that by riding with low cadences, you are respectively your speed is easily underestimated, and until other riders that try to catch up with you realise that only your cadence is low, but you go fast, it is already too late, and they wasted their energy.
Hi, nice video. I prefer cadence between 88-95 . This week I biked one workout in Zwift with cadence intervals, find it under “Recovery “ Cadence Pyramid. You should hold the same watt but in different cadence from 60-100 . It was difficult but I made it. As Heather said that it’s really work for the brain to both be in right (black numbers) watt and in the same time in right cadence. It was a nice workout both as recovery, which can be a bit boring, but also bring in different cadence in your experience. // Marie-Louise
I do find I prefer a slightly lower cadence, about 5-10rpm less than my normal cadence (85-90rpm), when on the aerobars. I'm not sure how common that is.
Ok.. this (of course) is another great GTN vid… BUT…. Wait a minute 🤔…. Something looks different? Did I miss a very important announcement about one of our favorite presenters?
Not sure if this is a coaches corner question, but if you’re basing Zone 2 on HR or RPE, would a lower cadence be beneficial, since it’s less taxing? Cheers
your average cadence is probably so stable, 'cos you are athletes. I heard that single gear bikes are excellent to learn having a stable, constant cadence ,which is beneficial on races and so on. As an amateur, when I started I had an "all over the place" cadence, that got me so tired. Over time, I seem to ride slower, but my times say otherwise, I got faster. 😮 Nowadays, I go at my own pace, but after much cycling my cadence got more stable without me noticing, nor tyring, it was just natural. Also, due to stress I suffered from a couple of episodes of tachycardia and I prefer to ride at an average or low cadence. Sometimes I can pedal at a high cadence, but that's very rare, I prefer to avoid it.
Good idea, but horrible execution. We don't have the power or speed numbers. What if during your last interval, you didn't chose the right gear. What if you were very tired after your first 2 intervals.