Originally Posted by Brian Ratliff
Actually, the whole cadance thing is only for cyclists who are traveling at speeds which, at 60 rpm, would put them above the anerobic threashold. For those cyclists where 60 rpm doesn't do this, say they are traveling 10-15 mph, it really doesn't matter what their cadence is. In fact, even most racers, when they are intentionally traveling slow, in the 10-15 mph range, will slow their cadence to improve their bike's handling characteristics. Force on the pedals stabilizes the bike, and if you are going slow and cranking at 80 rpm, there is extremely little force on the pedals.
This relates to what I was saying above about cadence.
I'd be a fool to ride at 100rpm while traveling at 10mph on flat windless day to the local park.
This said correct use of cadence is only one small piece of assessing compentence. It is subjective and I'd expect a trained tester would be able to note which cyclists could improve competence by using higher cadence and would look for general patterns, not a specific situation, especially one where higher cadences are not beneficial.
Al