Effects of altitude on cycling
 

Just back from a trip to the Sierra Navada range in Southern Spain. I borrowed a mountain bike and rode the mule tracks up around Mulhacen ,and eventually up the mountain itself ,walking the last 500ft to the summint 11,432 ft. I seemed to be out of breath most of the time, it seemed to take about 20 mins for me to get any sort of regular breathing going. Normally I live at 400ft above sea level in the north of Scotland,so I suppose I don't have great altitude aclimatisation,but I am begining to wonder if there could be an issue with my lung capacity.
Im sure quite a few of you chaps accross the pond live at high altitude,maybe Denver,or at least regularly cycle high mountain routes,whats your experience . Below a pic of the old bike I borrowed at 9,000 ft?http://bikeforums.net/attachment.php...hmentid=221867

Yes, altitude can remarkably affect performance. Your experience is the norm.

"As you climb above sea level, atmospheric (barometric) pressure drops with a parallel decrease in the amount of oxygen available at the blood/air interface in the lung alveolus. Hypoxia (a low blood oxygen level) results and limits the maximum amount of oxygen that can be delivered to the muscle cels to support aerobic physical work. Although the heart rate (and cardiac output) increase to deliver more blood (with less oxygen per ml) to the muscle cell, complete compensation does not occur and the maximal aerobic ability (VO2 max.) is reduced by approximately 1% for every 100 meters (~ 300 feet) above 4500 feet. This change can be measured in the performance of highly trained athletes at altitudes as low as 1500 feet above sea level." Read more . . .

It affects people differently. I regularly cycle up to 8000 feet on the road and sometimes 9K on the mtb and have ridden as high as 10k this past June.
It doesn't hit me as a dramatic thing, but I do feel it up around 9 or 10k. I lived at 6k for a few years so that may have helped.
Several weeks ago I took a friend on a ride up to 9k and I thought he wasn't going to make it. He was hyperventilating and threw up twice.

Once acclimated, you won't really notice it while cycling, though performance will be diminished overall. VO2 max is greatly effected by age and altitude.

Since I live at 9,000ft, am 64 years old, and often ride at over 11,000 ft, that combination has a big effect on performance. However, better riders than me up from the lowlands suffer a lot up here.

I do at times feel the altitude when Nordic skiing due to it's greater stress on the system. When I drop down to under 6,000ft while cycling in the Denver area, I feel like superman ... albeit an old one :D

Cheers, Tom

Loveland Pass at 12,000ft in early June
http://www.yostwerks.com/LoveG.jpg

Snowshoeing at over 12,000ft last October ... A nice transitional workout between cycling and skiing seasons.
http://www.yostwerks.com/SnowshoeHoosierOct10B.jpg

Uphill skiing (skating) at 10,000ft. This is the one that really sticks it to you ! Though technique plays a big part in this.
http://www.yostwerks.com/FriscoBlack4.jpg

I've been living in the lowlands for the past 7 years and this summer went to CO for a couple of weeks riding 500+ miles in the mountains with many days well above 7,500' and climbing passes to nearly 12,000' (Loveland pass 11,990 :-). At the start of a ride I started breathing heavy sooner, and it slowed me down a mile or two per hour on avg, but other than that I didn't notice any effect. It really surprised me as I was expecting the altitude to have a greater effect.

I've been living at altitude (4000') for about a dozen years now, and when I first moved hear from sea level, I was sucking wind bigtime on every ride. Now, when I go to lower elevations to ride, I just fly along, and hardly have to breathe. So yeah, there's something to that altitude acclimatization thing.

SP
Bend, OR

Lowlander like you living at Sea level but ride the hills round here with a Max of 850ft. Few years ago I went to the Alps and initially at 3,000ft- just walking was testing the Lungs but out with the bike and rode the hills and the steepest ones in the area for a week in preparation for Ventoux. May only have been 6,000ft but without that week of aclimatisation I doubt I would have got to the first Cafe-Only 400ft above the village at the bottom.

Maybe Lance trains at Leadville CO to develop his lung capacity - ya think?

I live near sea level. A few years ago I went to Colorado to race the Mt Evans hillclimb. It goes from 7000' to 14,000'.
I definitely felt it past 10k'. At about 11k' I tried to eat a bit of clif bar. Just stopping breathing for a couple seconds to swallow put me behind so much that I got tunnel vision. It took a long time to catch up and I decided to go hungry rather than do it again.

I finished in 2:26, about halfway down in the open 45+ but first weenie Californian. (I was still a cat 5 and if I'd known I could have raced in the 35+ cat 4s, as Colorado does not have cat 5, and I'd have finished in the top third there).

The view from the top was awesome but it felt distinctly unhealthy being up there. I could tell that my brain was not running on all cylinders. So I did not stay long. I descended very cautiously until I felt closer to normal.

At about 11k' I tried to eat a bit of clif bar. Just stopping breathing for a couple seconds to swallow put me behind so much that I got tunnel vision. It took a long time to catch up and I decided to go hungry rather than do it again.

I can relate to that, although I didn't get tunnel vision, I felt like I would suffocate if I didn't breath constantly,and quite hard. The very rocky mule track kept on diverting my attention from controled steady (but fast ) breathing on the last 1500 ft.
Thanks for the reassuring comments, I have a bit of a nagging concern that my early working life , when I spent long periods engulfed in welding fumes,may have reduced my lung capacity. Nothing ever shows up on medicals,but the cycling around Sierra Navada,sure got me breathing hard.
Cheers
Lee

I live at 7,200 and ride to 9,200 (and hike well over that) regularly (when I'm not back east). After a little acclimation, it doesn't seem to bother me that much. And boy, do I sleep soundly for the first 3-4 days after returning to sea level.

I'm a flatlander. Several years back, I had business in Denver but wasn't sure when it would conclude. Turns out I finished on Friday but wasn't due to fly back until Monday so I rented a car to explore for the weekend. Ended up Friday night in Blackhawk (elev about 8500). A rain made me have to sprint about 30 yards to my car, thought I was going to expire. On Saturday, I happened on Mt. Evans, the highest automobile accessible road in the country at somewhere around 15,000 feet. My poor little 4 cyl rental was wheezing at full throttle in first gear on the insanely steep switchbacks as I neared the summit. I was in worst shape than the car, I parked and walked the final few hundred feet up a slight grade to an observation platform feeling like there was no air at all. As I walked down back to my car certain that human life wasn't possible at that altitude, two bicyclers arrived from the access road into the parking area. This was years before I started biking but I was impressed, still am.

A lady in Blackhawk who wintered in California said that, on return to altitude, it took her a couple of weeks to become acclimated.

http://www.brucew.com/images/bikefor...s-crop-960.jpg

I live at 453 feet. It's also dead flat around here. I trained on hills for four months prior to tackling Evans. There wasn't much I could do about the altitude, though. I knew I could climb 6% at 7mph, making the 14 miles a two-hour ride. I planned for three.

We started at Echo Lake (10,500 feet). I stopped to rest at every milepost, which gave me some nice photos to remember the ride by. I arrived at the top three hours and five minutes after starting, only five minutes longer than my plan.

The locals, of course, ride it non-stop. What impressed me most (other than that I'd made it) was that there are bike racks in the parking lot there. It's such a popular cycling destination they need bike racks. Amazing.

The bad thing about it was that Evans was the first mountain I ever climbed. The rest have been anti-climactic.

Seeing all the immpressive posts ,re. mountain passes and living up high,I am beginning to question the term highlander,as in Scotland,no one lives above 1000ft ( Tomintoul ). The next area to mine ,Grampian, is the highland region which although has Ben Nevis in it and a lot of very nice mountains in the west,notably the Cuillin on Sky. for the most part isn't high. Tomintoul is in Grampian,as is Cairngorm which due to its northern latitude 57 deg N. has artic flora and fauna on the summit.
I don't think I will ever acclimatise to high alltitude on my annual visit to family in the Alpajarra,area of Sierra Navada, but I certainly get used to cold wet and windy in Grampian.
Lee

Hats off to you, honestly! I live in Florida but there is a river drainage basin near here where you can get some semi-hills (100-150 feet climb at 4-5%) but nothing like that.

Barring Florida:innocent:- I reckon you can make a mountain out of a molehill. Plenty of local hills but the highest is only 850 ft above sea level and you start near sea level. BUT make that 850ft offroad and a mile long at 12 to15% with ruts- loose gravel- flints and slippery green chalk and I would rather climb Ventoux occasionally. And on the road we have a couple of baskets at 1 mile at 12% with a little section at 20-or the real basket of a 16% that I do only make certain I have the right gearing and I am fit.

Yep- I have climbed one of the famous Mountains that is recognised to be hard. Took me a long time though at an average of 5mph. I got there and without too much pain. In fact at one point I thought I was going downhill but that was because the slope had lessened to 5%

First mile of the climb and I had a problem but then got into a rhythm. Once that rhythm came I had the right balance between Cadence and speed---Or legs and lungs- Or effort- and That rhythm stayed with me to the top. OK- Steepest was at around 12% but 13 miles at 7.5% average takes it out of you. Or would do if I hadn't found that rhythm.

That's about all I can train on unless I get a ride out-of-town. I just did repeats until I was so bored I'd about fall asleep in the saddle.

next time take viagra before riding at altitude http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases...0624120556.htm

Effort at altitude will always leave you breathless.

A week ago yesterday, I summitted a mountain at 19,300 feet (not on a bike, of course!) and no matter how many deep breaths I drew, I couldn't get the oxygen my system desperately needed. I learned more about altitude than I ever wanted to know!

Pictures / blog here:
https://picasaweb.google.com/1103015...eat=directlink

A fascinating slide show. Thanks for sharing. I can only imagine.