Originally Posted by
Carbonfiberboy
Why did you slow down? You should have let it rip and seen what happened. Anyway you passed the test and sure enough, yes you have enough leg strength. That's not your limiter. If 165 is your top of Z4, next time try for 168 in your freely chosen cadence and see how long you can hold it. Should be at least 4-5 minutes. Well-trained cyclists can hold about that level for 8-10 minutes. Don't just slam it up there like you did this time. Find an effort level that puts your HR up there in 3-5 minutes, holding the same speed and cadence if the gradient is even. It should be interesting to see what your freely chosen cadence would be, IOW what cadence allows you to hold that HR with the least suffering. See how many of those you can do. Recovery is the time to coast back to the bottom. Or do them on the trainer, same routine. Some people find they can ride harder on the road, others not. I much prefer my intervals on the road.
Again, do not keep your HR down! Instead, get it up and keep it up. Huffing and puffing is the norm. That's what you want. And you bet your sweet bippies it hurts. It's supposed to hurt. If it didn't hurt, you wouldn't need to do it. Ride easy on the trainer for 45 minutes the next day.
Sadly 165 is my Z4 limit and my cardiologist said I should be careful and try to not push beyond that. Looking back at a few rides my last tough ride had me in Zone 4 for about 30 min of a 2 hour ride I don't recall the length of time I was in that zone at once, but I can recall it being at least 5 minutes of the 10 min tough climb.
I slowed down because once my HR got to 160 I didn't have much left and still had a lot of riding to do. The only good thing about riding those big hills is passing up the little electric cars as I hit 45-50mph on the way down!! The kids face in the back as I went by them was priceless!!