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Old 07-07-12, 10:52 AM
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chasm54
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There is fast-twitch muscle and slow-twitch muscle. How much you have of each is largely genetically determined but can be influenced by training. Slow-twitch is largely responsible for endurance work.

If you do leg work in the gym it won't make you go further, but might make you go faster. Track sprinters do low-repetition squats with big weights. With that exception, cycling is primarily an aerobic exercise and leg strength is not the limiting factor. Look at the legs of some of the GC contenders in the Tour de France and I'll bet theirs are thinner than yours. That is because mostly you need no more strength than is needed to enable you to run upstairs. What you need is the aerobic fitness to keep running up stairs for a long time, and that has to do with your weight, and your aerobic capacity, not with the size of your muscles.

If you do lots of low-cadence training on a bike pushing very big gears, yes that will increase the weight you can push in the gym. Be careful of your knees, though.
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