I started cycling earlier this year on my hybrid (Trek 7.4 FX) and the first goal I worked on was to maintain a cadence of 80 rpm. Spinning the pedals at any rpm above 70 was a big effort at first. I then switched to clipless pedals, which increased my average rpm by 10, then shortened my cranks which increased my average by another 10-15. My current comfortable cadence is 90-100 which I can maintain for 2.5-3 hours.

This means that I'm spinning very low gears, and though my average speed has improved it's still quite low--21 kph in flat terrain with no cars and few obstacles.

I want to go faster, but I'm torn on which to work on first--smooth spinning in circles or power to push a bigger gear? I don't know if it's because I worked on cadence exclusively but I feel like my legs are lacking in power. More often than not, shifting to a bigger gear has a negative effect on my speed. It also tires me out fast. So to accelerate I have learned to increase cadence, or even shift down so I can spin more instead. The lack of power also holds me back when climbing hills, or anything even slightly elevated for that matter. The increased resistance from the pedals tires me out very, very fast and I slow to a crawl to catch my breath and ease the muscles on my legs on the crest of the hill.

I feel my pedaling is still very uneven which is why I would like to work on spinning technique, but would learning to push a bigger gear reap better rewards in the short term? Which should I work on first?

You may have been premature with the shorter cranks. It probably is wise and wait until you develop a good base of training time.

However since you lack power, it's good to start working on it. Try some intervals of a minute or two pushing a bigger gear at a cadence of 75 or do. Then relax and recover with an easy gear spinning. For several of these and gradually increase the duration over a period of weeks.

A cadence of 90-100 is good for efficieny but not speed until you learn to combine both through lots of riding. Most people are faster at a cadence of 75-85 but they can't usually keep this up for long durations.

Experiment and see what works for you. Dont try and force some number on your own training

+1 to doing some intervals to build power. If you want to ride faster over a few hour ride, then pushing a bigger gear at a good cadence is less stressful than mashing for hours. But you have to build up that ability to do it.

Whats your goal? win races or Tour to see the country side.. I'm the Touring sort. on a hybrid I'd think you chose a bike to get places (other than a race podium).

Adapting to my 3 speed hub ... cadence too fast? shift up or slow down speed till it feels right

too low? down shift or bump the pace up a bit.. this is with just 3 speeds, in town .. my middle gear 57~61 ish..

My experience is that longer cranks make it easier to push a bigger gear, and they spin just as easily as shorter cranks... until you get to ridiculous rpm territory.

Push a bigger gear. Based on some of your other posts, I think you're just a little pain averse. I'm not judging, here, just saying that at some point, if you want to get faster and stronger, you're going to have to do the kind of work that raises your heartrate, makes you sweat, and gets your legs sore. Doing so will build stamina and make you more comfortable with cycling.

I concur with the suggestions above. You may want to search the net for programs like "Training for a century in x weeks" to see what percentages of different types of exertion may be best.

You need to be sure to fit in rest days, and to spend appropriate amounts of time in various types of training. I have never followed any of these plans, but I will be looking for one, because I want to do a century this year, and it will take some focused work to get there.

Even if you don't follow a plan, you will get the scope of what you should do (something like ride for x minutes at comfortable pace except for three intervals of heavy exertion for y minutes with z minutes of rest in between). If I don't do something specific, I tend to either over-do it, or not do enough.

Now to go search out a training plan for myself.

When asked if it was better technique to mash a big gear or spin a small gear, Eddy Merckx thought for a moment and said 'Its better to spin a big gear.'

Intervals.

At all but the shortest durations leg strength isn't the limit. You run out of aerobic capacity when you reach your maximum heart rate, and slower efforts under an hour are limited by lactate clearance.

Power is the product of speed and force, with those limits existing regardless of whether you make that power pedaling harder slower or easier faster although cadence can limit maximum sprinting power, influence perceived effort, and affect fatigue.

To increase it you need to force adaptations by stressing the limiting systems.

I like 3x10 minutes with 5 minutes rest starting at 110% of one-hour power - that has a big impact on everything from 5 minutes on for me.

2x20 minutes at 95-100% is a classic threshold workout.

Once a week following a rest day will do wonders.

Be sure to have easy days, weeks (typically 1 out of 4), and months as needed.

Many people don't pace themselves well on hills and limit themselves to a sustainable power output. 10% more effort is the difference between making it an hour and running out of steam in 10 minutes. 5% drops you from 60 minutes to 20, or 20 to 10.

A given power can feel very different on flat ground where you're free to choose your cadence and have high inertial load versus on a hill with low inertial load and insufficient gearing to allow you to pedal as fast as you want. A heart rate monitor can help there.

Thank you so much for the advice, everyone! Intervals and pushing a big gear than I am usually comfortable with it is..

Hahaha, you hit the nail on the head-- I am extremely pain averse! In fact I feel like I'm getting more and more pain averse the older I get. Maybe I should get those sufferfest videos.

If those are for spinning on a trainer, then no. Ride real roads.

Go single speed/fixed gear and you get to work on both (or just pick a gear on your hybrid and don't shift). When I started "really" started getting into cycling I was exclusively a FG/SS rider that mashed on big gears for a daily commute (53x16;87 GI). This meant naturally built in intervals when city riding on the roads. At after a stop light I performed starts like a trackie, pumping the big gear with 80-90% max effort just to get to a comfortable cadence and nice cruising speed (80 RPM was about 20 MPH), but once free from inertia I encountered air resistance and I had to spin quickly to maintain speed to keep up with city traffic. Rinse and repeat at every stoplight.

I did this everyday working day for a year just to go to work and back home. If you're wondering why, it's because I'm not a morning person and I always leave a little late to get to work, thus forcing me to sprint at almost every possibility to avoid being late. Nowadays I'm strictly a road cyclist since I sold my first FG and am currently building two others that aren't in rideable condition yet, but geared bikes are easy mode comparatively now.

It takes time to build speed and strength. Have realistic expectations for your first year of cycling, and don't injure yourself trying to push too hard of a gear. That's what I did.

Just keep spinning those mid-range gears, and find a club with people who are just a little faster than you that you have to chase on group rides. The speed will come.

I'm all in favor of just riding at what seems like a comfortable cadence, and that isn't the same for everyone. If you're specifically training for something, that's different, but if you're just out riding for fun, no reason to do things somebody else's way.

People are shaped differently, and what works well for some won't for others. At slow cadences, you tend to be limited by leg muscle, or lack thereof, at high cadences, by heart/lung fitness. If you have legs like tree trunks anyway, it makes it easier to mash and harder to spin, if you have minimal leg muscle, it's the opposite. Lance seems to have popularized spinning, but then again, the doping tended to help out on the aerobic side which made that more feasible.

Thanks-you just made me realize I should take a step back and not be too hard on myself as I just started out. After my initial post, I went on my first group ride with my hubby's workmates who were very considerate of the weaker riders (me). They stopped to wait at intersections and always had someone riding behind to protect my back from traffic. During the first third of the ride I stayed on the big gear, thinking I would need it to keep up, but it wasn't going so well for me so I switched to the more familiar and comfortable middle gear for the rest of the ride--and it turned out that aside from the hills, I could keep up just fine! I had to change my pedaling technique mid-ride to try to keep up with the riders in front and increased my cruising speed to 26-28 kph, which I had previously never achieved before

So your advice of going with people a little faster than myself is spot-on!

Minimal leg muscle here, so I cope by spinning. Doesn't really help me much on hills, so I feel like I have to build muscle..! How?

Unless you live in Kansas, you should be able to find a ride with some elevation changes.

If you're not training to race, just do natural intervals based on the road, hammer up a hill as fast as you can, then rest, or spin up the hill then hammer down in your highest gear.

It really comes down to this: To ride faster, ride faster.

I don't do anything based on a stopwatch, but I have a 4 mile route around my neighborhood with about 500ft of elevation gain. I will ride 4 laps of that 1 day a week hitting the uphill parts as hard as I can. Another day is a 24 mile out and back that is hilly with 2 hard climbs and another day is just 30 miles of gentle hills that I ride at a moderate pace.

But ultimately, you want to be able to extend the length of time you can go at higher effort levels.

As you progress, you will be able to spin at the same cadence in a higher gear, but it takes a while, expect 6 months to a year of work to see serious improvement.

At all but the shortest (well under a minute) efforts leg strength isn't important. For minutes you're limited by how much oxygen you can get to your muscles, and after that lactic acid accumulation determines how hard you can go.

Bradley Wiggins was looking spindly on his way to win the 2012 Tour de France; and Marco Pantani was dimunitive when he won in 1998:



When you look at pedaling forces they're not that high. The blue circles are a 1.5 mile long 7% grade. Average forces don't exceed 275 Newtons which is 56 pounds. Pedaling forces are sinusoidal with a peak approximately 1.4 times the average magnitude making peak pedal pressure 80 pounds. The red curve is the 185W average for the effort. The cursor is centered at 75 RPM (everything left is proportionally slower) and 185W.

There is a difference between smooth and spinning (in a low gear). For a smooth pedal stroke - one that is less effort in the long haul, get yourself a set of old-school rollers. That's what we used for indoor training before the magnetic resistance contraptions. Getting 'good' on rollers without a front fork brace or support will improve your balance and smooth out your pedal stroke.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3WCUN7-nezQ

Good to hear! It's sort of like driving a manual car... if you floor it in too high of a gear, the car won't make any power and it'll make bad noises, but once you shift back to a reasonable gear, it'll get going.

What worked for me was to just keep finding hills and climbing them. Eventually I developed a taste for it, and started doing more climbing out of the saddle. That'll build muscle.

Continue to ride with a high cadence style if that works for you, but some power intervals are always useful. I used to do repeat climbs of the steepest hill I could find.

IME, it's always a contest between aerobic exhaustion and strength. when both are making me equally miserable, i figure i'm in the sweet spot.