Originally Posted by
Drew Eckhardt
Leg strength is only a limit for efforts well under a minute. After that your muscles run out of phosphocreatine.
Speed over anything taller than a highway overpass comes from your lactate system and aerobic fitness where the goal is maximizing the power (increase it with training) to weight ratio (decrease it with a calorie deficit) as suggested by gregf83.
Where your Clydestale status comes from middle-age-spread you can make much bigger gains by dropping weight.
I increased my power to weight ratio by 80% as in use the same cog but a 50 ring where I needed a 30. 28% increasing FTP from 180 to 220W, 49% dropping weight from 205 to 138.
I don't understand why leg strength is not relevent... I have a 17km avg 5.4% hill here, and often times i feel im not, cannot push down hard enough to get moving faster then 20km/h.
If my leg strength is stronger, that will mean i can push down the pedal harder, hence generate more watts, hence if i were to back down my wattage to be comparable to a lesser leg strength guy - it will be easier for me yes?