Originally Posted by
Donegal
Cadence is personal...
...Most neophytes do pedal too slowly, but everyone must respond to their bodies...
...The moral of the story is that we are all different...
Very true. I try to stay away from the idea of a prescribed cadence being the answer for everyone. When I first started riding a lot as an adult, I bought a cadence reading computer to see how I was doing compared to the advice I read in magazines to spin 80 to 90 rpm. I was shocked to see that I was usually mashing along at 50 to 60. Gradually I progressed to being able to spin at 90 rpm comfortably, but most of the time I felt better around 80. But at times I found it helpful to speed up to 90 or 100 rpm. I tend to stay somewhere between 70 and 90 rpm now.
What I came to focus more on was making sure I was in a gear I could "stay on top of". This meant that I should never let my rpm get so low that I could not accelerate. This was especially important on hills, but even on flats, I found that I was most effective if I was able to increase my speed if I tried. I find that to be a better way to gauge my pedaling than knowing my cadence number.