TheKillerPenguin

when it starts doing that, press reload and the page should load fine.

GuitarWizard

I did...it sucks. Had to log out and log back in again.

Wow, you're in a pretty hilly area of NY....

The_Convert

I had an impromptu race with a friend of mine today and only managed 4,200 ft/hr over the course of 10 min :/

5k must be nutty.

NomadVW 

Hmm... I'm gonna have to try this sometime this week if I can work it in. All my climbs are longer than 10 minutes, but best I've done is 3700 ft/hr at 28 min 51 sec. Doing that same climb in 20 minutes would be insane.

The_Convert

Yea, the entire climb took just under an hour and was 3,800 ft gain.

The 4,200 was the best I had for a section of any length.

tc83

i'm going to throw this out there, but does anyone actually do 5000 ft in an hour, or do people just do 1/8th of that and discuss how they could theoretically do 5000 ft in an hour?

The_Convert

I don't think anybody has said they could/will do it besides penguin.

I would say though that you actually have to do it for a full hour to have really done 5,000 ft/ hour.

Otherwise, where is the line? Why can't you just attack a small hill for a minute and hit it?

marcelinyc

PP hill here I come! 24 mph for .3 miles of 6%(?)grade at 175lbs. How many watts is that ?
I voted no. Will you try again in mid season?

'nother

It's like someone saying they can go 35 miles per hour. That doesn't mean they can travel 35 miles in one hour; it just means they can sustain that rate for some period of time.

Even for 1/8 of an hour, sustaining 5000 feet of climb per hour is pretty challenging. I can do it for about 1/64 of an hour

TheKillerPenguin

I never claimed I'd do it for a full hour. my goal is to do it for about 11 minutes. Its not terribly long, but its not stupid short either.

What about someone who avgs 28mph over a 10mi tt? Did they not avg 28mph because they didn't do it for an hour?

Cypress

Aside from the naysayers....

I say you can. When is this happening?

TheKillerPenguin

Well, it was supposed to happen yesterday, but I couldn't even crack 4000ft/hr then

I suppose I'll try again in a month, and then at random times during build. I'm definitely gonna break that barrier by the end of March.

Cypress

Nice. As soon as the passes clear around here, I'll see what i can pull off.

(I'm no climber)

geneman

You suck!



Is this what you do on your rest weeks?

-mark

The_Convert

I suppose you can relate it to speed in that way, but really who cares who can do 35 mph for 6.5 minutes? There has to be some valid benchmark...40k TT etc.

'nother

I believe he gave a benchmark: "940ft, 2.6mi, 6.8% grade. For 5000ft/hr, I'll have to go 13.8mph for about 11:15". Why don't you give that a whirl and let us all know how 'valid' that benchmark is.

Edit: would it help anyone with this concept if he had said "83 vertical feet per minute" instead?

The_Convert

I said a valid benchmark... aka something I actually COULD repeat. Where am I going to find a hill similar to such exacting specs???

'nother

Obviously, you cannot, unless you go to that climb.

But, the nice thing about using vertical feet per hour is that it's a pretty good indicator of one's climbing ability, even when the variables change (within reason -- obviously the extremes will always be goofy but that's the case on speed, wattage, and most other measurements of ability).

Edit: Really, you have to qualify any of these measurements. No one (okay, well, maybe *one*) goes around saying they can crank it up to 400W. You have to specify how long. 400W for one second is a lot different than 400W for 30 minutes. But once you know the qualifier, within reason, you can compare abilities pretty well. Same for rate of climb. So, if you wanted to compare to Penguin's climb, find a climb that takes you around 11 minutes to do...just get in the rough area of 11 minutes, doesn't need to be 100% exact to be valid. Discover the elevation change, and divide it by your time and you will see how you stack up.

The_Convert

I think I essentially agree with you.

But how about we start with this-
From Arnie Baker, "standards of excellence" by category (how fast the winners go), 30-minute max. effort on a 6% grade:

Cat 5: 3300 ft/hr
Cat 4: 3800
Cat 3: 4100
Cat 2: 4400
Cat 1: 4700
US Pro: 5000
Euro Pro: 5500

So it seems as if Baker has set the time at 30 minutes. Seeing as he's seemingly gone through the trouble of calculating averages, that is probably the benchmark we should be talking about.

Basically, what I was getting at earlier was-

Say penguin DOES do 5,000 ft/ hr for his 10 minute climb. What would that really prove? Wouldn't it just prove the obvious that higher climbing rates are possible when the time decreases??

Basically he would still be in line with his category, but corresponding to a different (non-existant) chart for 10 minute climbing instead of 30 min.

NomadVW 

I don't think anyone was trying to "prove" anything. Penguin wanted to do the climb in a time frame that would end up being roughly 5000 ft/min. If I told you I wanted to do Zentisuboyama in 27 minutes, that means nothing to you. If I tell you I want to do my local hill climb race at 4000 ft/min for a half hour you have a reference point.

The rest of us just hopped on his thread.

'nother

Thank you, someone gets it.

The_Convert

Well I would suggest just going by time then, especially as those online calculators are rough estimates at best.

*edit- Your example makes little sense anyways. Do you hear pro riders talking about their training in ft / min??? They use power or time. Simply knowing the rough idea of the climb is enough to have an idea about how fast it is, or in bikeforums case, isn't.

hiromian

Find out your wattage on any given climb:

Watts =(Combined weight rider + bike and in KG X 9.8 to get Newtons X elevation gain in Meters )devide by time in seconds.

Watts per kg = Watts Devided by rider weight.

The_Convert

It would be so sweet to ride in a vacuum wouldnt it!

TheKillerPenguin

Except for the whole not breathing thing I agree

Unfortunately, there aren't any climbs much longer than 10-15 minutes around here. Even the longest climbs in the catskills are 20 minutes tops. So what I do is find a climb that takes around 10 minutes or a little more and estimate my power for the climb using analyticcycling.

Then I take a look at this chart, see where my 10min p/w ratio measures up to the 5min ratios and assume I'm slightly more powerful at 5min than at 10min.


So for example, if I did do that climb at 5000ft/hr, then my roughly 10min p/w ratio would be 5.28w/kg, and if I held that for 5min that'd make me roughly a midpack cat2. Since I would have held that p/w ratio slightly longer than double the 5 min time, it'd be safe to say I'd measure up with good cat2's powerwise.

It's accurate enough for free, and has correlated with what I've found when riding with others. Truly scientific as well