Commuting - What's considered a steep hill?

how steep is steep? or how long of a climb is long? I read in the touring forum about sharp inclines or long climbs and such, and just wondering what you all consider steep.

Last night I climbed a hill for 2 miles, 500 feet of elevation gain. It didn't seem that bad to me. I rode it to test out the new bike's gearing for climbing, and it did rather well. I didn't have to stop for a rest or anything!

nice ride!

This article may answer your question:

http://www.lancearmstrong.com/hill.html

For me, steep is neither long or vertical, it's not the physical measure of the hill,
it's the thought process it forces me into.
If I have to psych myself up, and feel an accomplishment when I've reached the crown, then it's steep.

It's a good hill, I guess I probably wouldn't call it steep or long, but it's as good as I've got around here.

500' in 2 miles ~ 4.7% grade?

I commute across relatively flat San Jose, so this question is interesting to me.

I recently gave hill-climbing a try: I rode up the nearest hill I could think of, which was Sierra Rd (east from Piedmont) in San Jose. That was murder! It feels a whole lot steeper on a bike than on a car.

I asked a competitive cyclist how a human could possibly sustain climbs like that, and basically they said "you get used to it". Like many things, I suppose, it just takes practice.

My take-away from the whole experience was that, despite commuting all Summer, I'll be mostly useless on steep hills unless I specifically start practicing on them.

Stayin' low,

JAB

I agree that you adapt to hill climbing... Knoxville is very hilly and some of the hills that were kicking my butt a month ago aren't so bad now. Once your legs get used to pushing harder to climb, it's not so bad. That's not to say you'll get to the point of just cruising up hills without any strain, but you'll be able to deal with the strain better.

Hills are hills...I ALWAYS notice hills...some I can get up easier than others, steep? those are the ones I can't even begin to ride up....

I recently gave hill-climbing a try: I rode up the nearest hill I could think of, which was Sierra Rd (east from Piedmont) in San Jose. That was murder! It feels a whole lot steeper on a bike than on a car.

JAB

Hrm...I'll have to check that one out. I don't have a topo map of that area but from the map on maps.yahoo.com it looks like it's got lots of winds and stuff. Usually indicitave of climbing.

The road I took was bernal rd. Up to Santa Teresa park and to IBM. From a map on parkhere.org I counted approx 500' of elevation gain.

With the bigger gears on my new bike I noticed that my quads were burning a little more, but I found that when I needed a break (a leg break, the lungs were fine :) ) I'd just slow down to about 4mph for a bit and that would suffice. I get more of a feeling of accomplishment when I rest in the saddle instead of stopping and standing for a bit.

Hrm...I'll have to check that one out. I don't have a topo map of that area...
I happened to pack a GPS unit along and marked what it said was the highest point, at UTM 10 0606097 4140936 (http://www.topozone.com/map.asp?z=10&e=0606097&n=4140936&datum=wgs84&size=l).

If you go, be careful; there are many blind turns, and the occasional car. The road gets quite narrow across the top of the hill, and there is no guard rail. It's a beautiful view, though.

Anything over 10% is steep.

CHEERS.

Mark

how steep is steep?
A hill you can't climb? (I'm not sure I can climb 10%, since I'm not sure how steep that is.)

Some of the switchbacks on a local road route require standing to get enough torque, in the granny gear of a triple. Cars' bumpers scrape the road when making the turns. It's crazy. I'm not sure of the exact distance to the top of the ridge, but elevation gain is about 3000 ft.

I happened to pack a GPS unit along and marked what it said was the highest point, at UTM 10 0606097 4140936 (http://www.topozone.com/map.asp?z=10&e=0606097&n=4140936&datum=wgs84&size=l).

If you go, be careful; there are many blind turns, and the occasional car. The road gets quite narrow across the top of the hill, and there is no guard rail. It's a beautiful view, though.I've done Sierra/Felter just once. I mainly ride on the Peninsula. Sierra Rd. gains about 1800 ft in 3.5 miles for an average grade of 9.75% According to Grant Peterson's "Roads to Ride" the first miles or so is an average of 10%. BigFloppyLlama would love it!

"Steep" depends on conditioning, gearing, and finally, grade. Most of us in hilly territory get used to highway-grade hills of 6% of so. Hills of 8%-10% can feel steep if your conditioning or gearing are not quite right, particularly if the hills drag on a bit. 12% and over feels pretty steep for almost everyone, I bet. I had a long hill climb this summer on my fixed gear with short pitches of 12%, and a nasty one of 14%. That felt steep...

If my speed falls to 6 mph or below, I consider that steep. That happens somewhere around a 9 or 10% grade, depending on how I'm feeling at the time.
Tom

On a recent touring holiday in the Alpes, I considered steep to start at 12%, a tough climb at around 15% and killer steep at about 18%. In the UK Ive done one over 20%, up and down. The down was even more difficult than the up.

Depends on how far I have ridden. If I'm 60 or 70 miles into a ride, a freeway overpass looks like mount Everest.

I live at the top of a common driveway that's 1/3 - 1/2 mile long. According to my neighbor, it's a 10% grade (Now I'm thinking that I want to measure it). At least, it's steep enough that it will never be declared a public road that the town will take over maintenance on.

I can make it up, but I'm not sure I could imagine doing it for a longer distance at this point.

Any thing I have to use my granny gear for...

Check out these topology maps. Just enter the city etc and scroll along your route.
The street info is a bit dated but elevations seldom change.

Topographical Maps - http://www.topozone.com

A hill where the state posts a sign: "Warning, steep hill, dismount and walk bicycle."

Part of my daily commute. Short, but mean.

BTW. Of course not. I do granny it, though :p

A hill where the state posts a sign: "Warning, steep hill, dismount and walk bicycle."

Part of my daily commute. Short, but mean.

BTW. Of course not. I do granny it, though :p
No shame there...whatever gets you there! ;)

A hill where the state posts a sign: "Warning, steep hill, dismount and walk bicycle."

Part of my daily commute. Short, but mean.

BTW. Of course not. I do granny it, though :p

Crap, i was in my granny all the way up that hill that wasn't even 5%!

I need to build my leg strenght more. My quads have grown in the last couple months, but not much....it's mostly flat around here.

My definition of steep ...

Bopple Hill in New York's Finger Lakes region ... rises 750 ft in 0.8 miles. 22% grade in places. I've done it twice and it sucked both times.

-mark

Any hill where you have to stop to rest or get off and walk.

Here's a TOPO map.

-mark

http://www.sellin.com/Fargo/_images/image16.gif
http://www.sporksports.com/photos/sanfran/DCP_2762.jpg
http://www.orienteeringbc.ca/gvoc/Pictures/Interval_training_pictures/Steep_hill.JPG
http://www.orienteeringbc.ca/gvoc/Pictures/Interval_training_pictures/Top_of_hill.JPG
http://wiv.tu-graz.ac.at/skol/nz-photos/0408-2002-12-steepest_street_dunedin.jpeg
http://mikespub.net/pictures/New-Zealand/Dunedin1.jpg
http://www.edogawa-u.ac.jp/~takata/otago99/023Challenge.jpg

If a jeep can climb it, so can you...if you ride dead slow on a 20x34.

Steepest climb I can recall doing is Moab Rim. Something like 900 ft. in a little under a mile. It's pretty brutal.

On my commute I have one climb that's around a mile, and not all that steep, but it feels pretty steep on my fixie, probably wouldn't be so bad on a geared bike. There's another pretty steep hill next to my work that I climbed once after work just to see if I could do it on the fixie. That one climbs about 350 ft. in half a mile, and is steep enough it'd be plenty challenging even on a geared bike.

If you follow the X-Games at all it's the hill they ran the land-luge down a few years back. Little Mountain Drive in San Bernardino.

-Trevor

Here's a TOPO map.

-mark
Ho man! that's steep :eek:

I don't have a topographic map of the hill behind my workplace, but it is long enough (about 1 mile) and steep enough that I am glad I do not have to climb it every day. I do go up it on a regular basis on my days off, when it doesn't matter how sweaty I get.

There's a bike race up Mount Washington NH every year. Average grade 12% with stretches up to 18%. There's an article about it at outsidemag.com . I've not ridden it, but ride up steep flippin hills every day. There's stairways for sidewalks all over my part of town.

The Cabot Trail in Cape Breton has grades of 12% or more. I heard that Cape Smokey is the steepest road in North America. Theres' a few rides listed at CrazyGuyOnABike.

Check out the elevation range near the bottom of the page on this site:
http://www.freewheeling.ca/tours/cabot.htm

When I need you to help me climb that hill, that what steep is.
Corsaire

A couple of years ago I rode from Aspen, CO (7902 ft), up Hwy 82 to Independence Pass(just under 12000'), over 4000' elevation gain in thin air, 19 miles. Not excessively steep, just relentless and long. Took almost 3 hrs going up, no stops, about 45 minutes coming down. Wheeeee! Actually, I did pause just a few seconds to shoot an energy gel - not to rest but because I was going so slowly (~ 6 mph) I didn't think I could open the gel without losing my balance and falling over! I posted about it at the time in General Discussion. I'm not a lightweight and no climber so I got a special feeling of accomplishment. This is kind of an epic ride in the area. Former pro Alexei Grewal (who grew up in Aspen) wrote about doing this climb when he was about 12.

Steep is when you have to struggle to keep your front wheel on the pavement.

In South Jersey - a highway overpass or a thoroughfare bridge

As for the long climb. I do Palomar Mountain in Northern San Diego County, by way of the Nate Harrison Grade Road. Ten miles all up hill, though most of it is not to steep.

If it's a hill, I think it's steep. Sometimes just riding a 7 mile route up gradient to a friends house is a difficult ride even though no "hills" are involved.

http://www.sellin.com/Fargo/_images/image16.gif
http://www.sporksports.com/photos/sanfran/DCP_2762.jpg
http://www.orienteeringbc.ca/gvoc/Pictures/Interval_training_pictures/Steep_hill.JPG
http://www.orienteeringbc.ca/gvoc/Pictures/Interval_training_pictures/Top_of_hill.JPG
http://wiv.tu-graz.ac.at/skol/nz-photos/0408-2002-12-steepest_street_dunedin.jpeg
http://mikespub.net/pictures/New-Zealand/Dunedin1.jpg
http://www.edogawa-u.ac.jp/~takata/otago99/023Challenge.jpg

Those pics above look steep, but at that lenght is not that bad. Put tha steep road but on
4 miles that won't let up, then now we're talking...
Corsaire

Any hill that I can coast down at greater than 50mph.
Weeee....I love to coast and I refuse to use the brakes until I get to the bottom.
Enjoy

Anyone here ride up Ralston Ave in San Carlos, CA? I'm trying to use that as my hill training and its kicking my a s s. I have to stop multiple times on it going from El Camino to Highway 280, even in my easiest gear (36-27). Anyone who knows the hill can take a guess as to what % grade it is?

I guess I'm just trying to come to terms if it really is a difficult hill or I'm just that much of a wimp and need to train harder.

Bad ass hill. Balmberg in the swiss jura. rising 500 metres (yes we have the metric system, no clue how many ft.) steepest part 23% and never less then 15%. I didnt sit down for half an hour. But i was proud that day (and had a slight headache)

Any hill that I can coast down at greater than 50mph.
Weeee....I love to coast and I refuse to use the brakes until I get to the bottom.
Enjoy
You only 'coast down' hills without curves?

Steep is when you have to struggle to keep your front wheel on the pavement.

D'oh! I have that problem on the hill I mentioned above (Sacto area members, the river trail at the Hazel Ave. bridge, you probably know it). I thought that was because I'm such a bada$$ spinner!

http://www.sporksports.com/photos/sanfran/DCP_2762.jpg


Bill Cosby has an old stand up bit about Lombard Street, "They put in grooves and curves, then they plant flowers at the bottom where they buried the people who have killed themselves..."

Anyone here ride up Ralston Ave in San Carlos, CA? I'm trying to use that as my hill training and its kicking my a s s. I have to stop multiple times on it going from El Camino to Highway 280, even in my easiest gear (36-27). Anyone who knows the hill can take a guess as to what % grade it is?

I guess I'm just trying to come to terms if it really is a difficult hill or I'm just that much of a wimp and need to train harder.Well, I hate to tell you this but you're "a wimp and need to train harder." :-) It's only 6.4% and 1.4 miles from Alameda de las Pulgas up to Hallmark. From El Camino to Hallmark the average grade is only 4% for 2.8 miles. Crestview from Edgewood Rd. to the top is much harder.

Steep is anything you have to walk up.