Originally Posted by
NumbersGuy
Understood. I'm just trying to point out that it seems much of the commentary (here and elsewhere) around higher cadences being "better" or "the right way" tend to look at singular components of the process, and how, if extracted and evaluated in a vacuum with zero outside factors, they are irrefutable evidence that lower cadence is worse.
Unfortunately, scientific and other studies often have a confirmation bias and are designed around proving a hypothesis. They aren't always the most objective in their methods, often don't include a wide enough variety of test subjects, and focus on evaluating a very narrow set of results, ignoring other factors and results which they don't deem relevant to what they are trying to prove or disprove. Scientific "fact" also remains treated as such until enough new evidence is produced to disprove it and define the new "fact". Humans tend to like to define everything in terms they can relate to, and can struggle with things that are highly complex and can't be defined in one of the boxes we'd like them to go in. The old idea of the atom being protons, electrons and neutrons. We're now up to 18 predicted types of elementary particles, of which 16 are "prove" having been detected by experiments. Pluto is a planet, not a planet, both it and Eris are both dwarf planets. We come up with words and give them definitions most can grasp and then sometimes those definitions don't work any longer when new evidence is uncovered.
I'm happy to not stick everything into a defined box. I get on my bike and push the pedals at a comfortable rate. If it's getting harder than I want or I'm going uphill, I shift to a lower gear. If it's getting too easy or I want to go faster, I shift to a higher gear. I'm not competing or functioning without the ability to take in more fuel. I'd rather make sure I enjoy my riding rather than make sure I'm riding at an ideal cadence.
I agree. Personally I use a pretty wide range of cadence in different situations and decades of riding makes that a natural and subconscious choice. The only thing I often do when training is push my cadence envelope a little in either direction to gain flexibility. A lot of structured workouts call for specific cadence depending on the objective or say things like "ride at your normal cadence +5-10 rpm". In that way I've gradually increased my useful cadence range over the years in both directions. I'm fairly happy grinding down in the low 50s when required on a 20%+ slope, or spinning well above 100 rpm at high power. At threshold power on the flat I'm usually in the 85-90 rpm range, but I don't watch it live on my bike computer!