What makes a cyclist good at climbing?

[singlespeedscott]

When the wheels start falling off their low back, heart, energy levels, they want someone else to pick them up and glue them together.

What's lower back got to do with diet?

a question you need to ask your orthopedic surgeon, GP, and physio/chiropractor.

My lower back is stuffed from falling of trampolines, school boy rugby, hapkido and moving 205l drums around by hand at work, not from excess weight.

[Chris249]

most riders' idea of improving power to weight begins and ends with smashing hills more....then riding home for pizza and beer, or pinot noir, baguettes, and cheese.

If serious with their training and improving power to weight, they will not be partaking in the foods and drinks listed above!

Thank god I'm not serious! I prefer Anquetil's approach;

"“To prepare for a race there is nothing better than a good pheasant*, some champagne and a woman.”


* some nice low-fat vegetarian food will do for me, but I like his other ideas.

[CKinnard]

My lower back is stuffed from falling of trampolines, school boy rugby, hapkido and moving 205l drums around by hand at work, not from excess weight.

One doesn't need to carry excess weight to suffer compromised nutrient and oxygen delivery to lumbar discs, or Modic type 1 and 2 changes, though carrying excess weight certainly helps.

To reiterate, 98% of the population doesn't follow the Australian Dietary Guidelines in relation to vegetable intake.

Most are deluded into thinking chocolate, starch, alcohol, frozen meals, and takeaway are as rich in anti-inflammatory and anti-oxidant properties as fibrous carbohydrates.

And even more are deluded into believing childhood posture and core strength don't impact disc longevity.
Pre 1970, posture was proactively enforced in Queensland State primary schools, as was physical culture and good manual handling technique.

In the meantime Scott, good luck with your 2015 weight loss goals.

[DaveQB]

and here's the radical part that people won't face because its a serious lifestyle change and that is keep saturated fats - particularly animal fats to a minimum and increase complex carbs and that's fruit and veg. oh no, give up the chops and bacon. ???? yep!

fat has twice the calories as carbs and remembering that carbs are our muscle fuel source for cycling.

but cancellara eats pig .... yes however that's on 20 hours a week training.

normal people are lucky if they can manage 10 hours.

try building your nutrition around veg, fruit and lean meat and watch your personal results increase.

No problem for me as I am vegan. I was 93-95kg before going vegan (and before cycling).
Although being vegan doesn't guarantee a good diet (there are unhealthy and fat vegans around), I do like my processed sugar

I've been doing this for 4 years now from 86kgs to 80kgs and with a big cardio engine (rest 42) no amount of training was going to overcome the lard, so now at 80kg, I can do a 10 hour 3 peaks with commuter training only.

Good on you mate, well done on the change! 3 peaks is impressive.

[DaveQB]

Most are deluded into thinking chocolate, starch, alcohol, frozen meals, and takeaway are as rich in anti-inflammatory and anti-oxidant properties as fibrous carbohydrates.

Too right. My wife and I are constantly amazed that the MacDonald's queue at any food court is a few magnitudes longer than any other eatery.

[DaveQB]

[*]Gearing - does your cadence differ on climbs compared to the flats? Fatiguing quicker due to sub-optimal cadence?

The easiest gearing I get down to is 36-28 (I am pretty sure my small ring is 36, not 34...) and I find on steep gradients, 10%+ I am stuck at 60rpm or less. From what I have looked into, I can't get any easier gearing on my bike

[queequeg]

[*]Gearing - does your cadence differ on climbs compared to the flats? Fatiguing quicker due to sub-optimal cadence?

The easiest gearing I get down to is 36-28 (I am pretty sure my small ring is 36, not 34...) and I find on steep gradients, 10%+ I am stuck at 60rpm or less. From what I have looked into, I can't get any easier gearing on my bike

Depends on your running gear. Same issue for me at the moment on my new bike, I can get to 36/28. If I want to go lower I need to change the Rear Derailleur to a Medium/Long Cage. That will get me to a max of 32 at the rear and also allow me to drop the 36 ring down to a 34. I don't think I would need to do that as 36/32 is pretty low already, and only gives me one extra low gear from a 28 anyway.

[DaveQB]

[*]Gearing - does your cadence differ on climbs compared to the flats? Fatiguing quicker due to sub-optimal cadence?

The easiest gearing I get down to is 36-28 (I am pretty sure my small ring is 36, not 34...) and I find on steep gradients, 10%+ I am stuck at 60rpm or less. From what I have looked into, I can't get any easier gearing on my bike

Depends on your running gear. Same issue for me at the moment on my new bike, I can get to 36/28. If I want to go lower I need to change the Rear Derailleur to a Medium/Long Cage. That will get me to a max of 32 at the rear and also allow me to drop the 36 ring down to a 34. I don't think I would need to do that as 36/32 is pretty low already, and only gives me one extra low gear from a 28 anyway.

Yeah I was told something like that, that I'd need to change the rear derailleur. The bike came with SRAM Red groupset, so I suspect this wouldn't be a cheap project, so I haven't looked into it. Are you going to make the change and get onto a 32? How much might it set you back?

[queequeg]

Depends on your running gear. Same issue for me at the moment on my new bike, I can get to 36/28. If I want to go lower I need to change the Rear Derailleur to a Medium/Long Cage. That will get me to a max of 32 at the rear and also allow me to drop the 36 ring down to a 34. I don't think I would need to do that as 36/32 is pretty low already, and only gives me one extra low gear from a 28 anyway.

Yeah I was told something like that, that I'd need to change the rear derailleur. The bike came with SRAM Red groupset, so I suspect this wouldn't be a cheap project, so I haven't looked into it. Are you going to make the change and get onto a 32? How much might it set you back?

I am running Ultegra 6800 Mech, so a new RD for me is $69, plus a new cassette and chain, so to switch is about $200.

Can SRAM Red run up to a 32? I though the WiFli RDs were Apex/Rival/Force. I just bought a Rival 10sp RD for my commuter and that was $69 (to replace my Apex one).

[rogan]

Plenty of talk in this thread about diet. Weight is a very significant factor in climbing. The best way to get weight down, without losing muscle mass (ie. power), is not a high carb diet, but a low carb diet. A low carb diet, however, is no good for your CV system, cholesterol and gut. So you don't stay on it forever, you drop about 600 g to a kilo a week, get to your target weight and go back to a more normal, healthy diet.

That's my experience, but everyone has to work out what works for them. There are plenty of people out there who will tell what you should be doing. As someone riding a lot who presumably wants to get better at climbing (else why are you reading this thread?) you listen to them, rather than your own body, at your peril. Australian guidelines and so on are all very good, but are not necessarily designed with you specifically in mind. If you are riding more than 300+ km a week (burning 5000-8000 more calories a week than a sedentary identical twin of yourself, energy equivalent to a kilo of fat), in particular, their recommended portion sizes and intake will not work for you. Your muscles do burn carbs, but your body knows how to change fat to carbs, and to lose weight, you should develop that particular metabolic pathway. Everyone should develop that metabolic pathway...

Then there's the flip side, and I do this myself sometimes - because I'm burning so much energy, I can literally eat whatever rubbish I like. In the end I'm not a pro, I don't do this for a living, and I would like to enjoy my life overall. Eating is not a competition to see who can exclude the most foods from their intake. If you want to live like a Jain - that's your choice. But it's not mine. You can sneer at the bogans lined up at maccas if you like. But if I feel like a Big Mac, I will sometimes have one.

Does all of this have any meaningful impact on climbing ability, outside body weight? Not in my experience.

[Calvin27]

The easiest gearing I get down to is 36-28 (I am pretty sure my small ring is 36, not 34...) and I find on steep gradients, 10%+ I am stuck at 60rpm or less. From what I have looked into, I can't get any easier gearing on my bike

If you're pushing around 10 speed, all of the sram mtb stuff will work. So if you want to take a cheap option to see how it goes, a 10 speed X5 will work with the shifters. I've ran 34x28,30,32. I've found 28 good for everyday riding, 30 is better for climbing days about 2000m ascent averaging over 7-8% with nasty pinches. 32 is reserved for my eventual baw baw attempt.

But yeah weight is king when climbing. You can make up some with power but when the guy nexct to you only needs to hold 80% of your power to keep up, you are stuffed if it goes for any length of distance.

[dalai47]

I find on steep gradients, 10%+ I am stuck at 60rpm or less.

Which may not be your optimal cadence (going on the cycling tips article linked above needing to produce the force for longer durations already) so such a low cadence amplifies the issue.

[singlespeedscott]

Anything above 60 rpm on a descent hill is optimum cadence. Very few climb like Chris Froome.

When I look at the Strava data for all the racing snakes On the hills around here, it shows that's shows that is their average for most climbs. It's there ability to push a bigger gear at that rpm is what makes them faster.

[cancan64]

Looking at cadences I thought I would have a look at the difference between todays easy Mt Gravatt repeats on the 11 spd carbon bike and Tuesdays repeats on the steel single speed .. times were the similar (11 spd 8:21, 8:41, 8:20 to SS 8:22; 8:32;skipped as running late) but avg cadence on the 11 speed was 77 compared to 41 on single speed.
The carbon bike is (AT) 2kg lighter, back pack would have similar weight, carbon bike is 36/46x11/28 (didnt use top couple of gears and didnt get out of breath) and single speed is 44x16 (used all gears and didnt push it but kept the momentum going)...Pity I didnt have the HR monitor on, would be interesting to see what difference that was... might not help with the thread

[singlespeedscott]

Nice Efforts cancan. It sort of shows it's more whats between the ears and your ability to suffer that makes you faster up the hills. Also it proves to me that the weight of the bike has little bearing on your performance.

[kb]

Anything above 60 rpm on a descent hill is optimum cadence. Very few climb like Chris Froome.

When I look at the Strava data for all the racing snakes On the hills around here, it shows that's shows that is their average for most climbs. It's there ability to push a bigger gear at that rpm is what makes them faster.

I think it varies Canty's 13min 1 in 20 was 90rpm
Edit: although, it's admittedly not a particularly long or hard hill.

[singlespeedscott]

The 1 in 20 is nothing like the hills I ride except maybe for the climb up to Mt Mee from the Dayboro side. Around here they are steep and undulating. Very hard to maintain any sort of rhythm.

[CKinnard]

Does all of this have any meaningful impact on climbing ability, outside body weight? Not in my experience.

It does impact climbing ability in the experience of Australia's top sports dietitians, and the dietitians that advise top pro teams.
It also impacts recovery. But thanks for sharing your experience.

[Strawburger]

1:20 is not really a climb for a climber in my opinion

[kb]

1:20 is not really a climb for a climber in my opinion

Yeah, he only averaged 88rpm for his 1:11:51 Hotham . Although most of the fast guys on Baw Baw do seem to be in the 70s.

[Alex Simmons/RST]

There is no substitute for training to increase your watts and then using those watts wisely over the course of a climb.

I find it fascinating and amazing how many watts those skinny pro riders can produce. I'd like to think I am stronger in a pure strength way (about a 170KG calculated 1RM squat) but I can not produce the power they do for any measurable amount of time. The science behind that eludes me.

Strength is the maximal force a muscle or group of muscles can generate at zero or near zero velocity. It's mostly a function of muscle mass and cross sectional area, fibre type and neural activation. It's a measure of force.

Power is the rate of energy transfer.

Sustainable power on a bike is the result of quite low forces (much, much lower than maximal), repeated often and frequently. The limiter in this case is the ongoing supply of energy in the form of ATP in the muscle cells doing the work. That is ultimately limited by the rate at which we can utilise oxygen. It's all about aerobic capacities.

Sustainable power output and strength are unrelated.

[Alex Simmons/RST]

Other potential though far smaller considerations may also be:

[*]Aerodynamics?
[*]Gearing - does your cadence differ on climbs compared to the flats? Fatiguing quicker due to sub-optimal cadence?

Aero does has some influence, but only marginally on climbs. Hence the chart I posted here:
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For that rider, reducing their CdA by 10% has a large impact on the flat, but a much smaller impact as the climb steepens since the energy demand you are reducing is a much smaller proportion of the total energy demand.

If you have a PM, you will most likely discover you soft pedal a lot on the flats – on hills if you do you will fall over… So even general fitness could be an issue?

This is certainly true. Most people have little idea of how much they slacken off on the flat and slight declines. It takes more concentration to keep the power down on flatter terrain. So in that sense hills force people to ride at a level they actually can, and serve to become natural form of interval training.

[Alex Simmons/RST]

Saying climbing is dependent on power/weight ratio doesn't drill down to the physiological essentials.

If we're talking about climbs greater than 10 minutes long, then we're talking aerobic advantage, and the physiological advantage is better understood as cardiac output rate per kg bodyweight.
In other words what limits one's climbing ability is the maximum rate you can get adequate oxygen distributed around the body, but especially the working muscle.

And cardiac output is a function of maximum heart rate, stroke volume, and peripheral resistance in your arterial system.
The work rate required is primarily dependent on the weight of your body and equipment, and secondarily on your efficiency at turning metabolic energy into power at the pedals.

So, the things you can do to improve your climbing are:
- increase the size of your heart muscle so stroke volume increases (a training outcome...however studies show as stroke volume increases, HRmax decreases)
- decrease peripheral resistance to cardiac output via a low fat diet and improved blood pressure in order to get a more compliant arterial system and competitive bodyfat %. blood pressure can be normalized through good life balance, relaxation strategies, and keeping non cycling muscles relaxed.
- reduce lean tissue to the optimal level for total body and bike weight
- increase muscle capillarization (a training outcome)
- improve cycling efficiency so that the body consumes as little oxygen as possible not required for climbing.

Maximal heart rate cannot be improved by training, however stimulants like caffeine can increase it.
Stroke volume has genetic limitations on how much it can be increased; and increasing heart size comes with higher risk of cardiac arrhythmia with age.

You could also do anything that increases oxygen carrying capacity of the blood (increase red blood cell count via blood doping, take EPO, go live at a high altitude)

So basically improving your power to weight

Or what I said on page 1:

I repeat its the ratio of power to weight.

More fully, it's the power to weight ratio sustainable for the duration of the climb.

If the hill is more than a couple of minutes long to climb, then it's all about increasing your sustainable aerobic power, and reducing the amount of non power producing mass you are moving up hill.

What CKinnard is getting at is the means by which one improves their power to body mass ratio.

Things under the physiology hood like cardiac output, capillary density, mitochondrial enzyme activity and mitochondrial density, lower body fat levels, increasing gross efficiency, muscle fibre type conversion, lifting of VO2max and the fractional utilisation of VO2max at threshold are nice and all, but we can't easily train and measure progress with such things without frequent and sometimes invasive lab tests.

So using something like power (or a good proxy like speed up longish climbs) as your performance benchmark is much more practical, and besides power output is the ultimate integral expression of all those underlying physiological factors (and smart understanding of one's power output over a range of durations can be almost as informative as the underlying physiological factors - it's certainly more practical). Training can't isolate one physiological factor over another in any case (it's all on a continuum). We can however emphasise development of some factors over others with the nature of one's training.

There is no need to make it overly complicated.

Eat to get lean, train to improve power.
Good diet, smart training, adequate recovery combined with the right psychology are the keys here.

In the end, your sustainable power to weight ratio will dictate the speed you are capable of climbing at.

[CKinnard]

There is no need to make it overly complicated.

The devil's in the detail, as are lots of small and not so small gains....and realistic goals.
Though racing has never really been about informed realistic goals.

I won't elaborate on the latest physiological topic going around sports physiology circles now - autophagy.

[Alex Simmons/RST]

There is no need to make it overly complicated.

The devil's in the detail, as are lots of small and not so small gains....and realistic goals.
Though racing has never really been about informed realistic goals.

I won't elaborate on the latest physiological topic going around sports physiology circles now - autophagy.

Why not?

List some sound evidence based practical strategies for improving climbing performance based on the above that would be suitable for the audience here and which adds to the fundamentals already outlined.

There is no need for physiology lessons to improve performance. What is needed are evidence based, practical implementable actions, i.e. an understanding of what to apply, when and for how long.