Bike Forums - Question about Grade

Bike Forums (https://www.bikeforums.net/forum.php)

- General Cycling Discussion (https://www.bikeforums.net/general-cycling-discussion/)

- - Question about Grade (https://www.bikeforums.net/general-cycling-discussion/1248957-question-about-grade.html)

Quote:

Originally Posted by Calsun (Post 22450763)

The keto diet is going to provide the best results and it is a healthy long term diet.
.

No it's not and no it isn't. And she's probably going to get very miserable very fast trying to climb on a new keto diet. You want her to quit cycling?

OP did not ask for diet advice, but that's truly awful.

https://www.frontiersin.org/articles...21.702802/full

Quote:

Originally Posted by GhostRider62 (Post 22450293)

Unless one has a team car at the top of l'Alpe d'Huez, one returns to the same spot on most ride. Net gain is always zero for mere mortals.

She is giving us a very hard set of numbers. 4100 feet in 13 miles is difficult. This is a simple way to look at caloric expenditures, only an attorney would need a calculator. Unless this route is a climb up and then descent, I would like to see those roads. Nonetheless, it does not matter WRT energy used. Why would you make a distinction that has no meaning.

26 miles with 4100 feet of ascent, irrespective of how distributed, will add a distance equivalent to 20-30 miles making this ride feel more like a 50-55 miler in more typical terrain. There are a few places I can think of where a Century could potentially have 16,000 of ascent, but not many.

Being new, they only allow 5 posts and you are not warned until you attempt a 6th post. They force you to wait 24 hrs so I couldn't edit my address until now.

Ok so I messed up. We are certainly not doing that well, no way so I did the math again.

We are gaining 1338 in elevation cycling up the hill the entire time. No break. it's 4.3 miles ALL l uphill. It's 4.3 miles uphill then 4.3 miles downhill. 8.6 miles total. Not that great. I've lost 3 lbs this week and we just started riding about 8 days ago. When I exercise, I just don't eat as much. It just ends up that way.

2.5 years ago we rode 13.5 miles up the hill the entire time, same route just riding longer.. Elevation gain was 1575 feet. If I remember, it took us about 1 hr 30 min. That 1 hr 30 min ride is perfect enough to feel good almost all the time, if that makes sense. To feel truly healthy. Anything shorter, not so much.

Thanks everyone for your input! Happy Sunday to you all

Quote:

Originally Posted by Korina (Post 22450761)

Just a reminder not to pay too much attention to the scale; you're replacing fat with muscle, which is much denser. You may not lose much weight, but pay attention to your clothes; when they start getting baggy, you know you're doing it right. I do love baggy underwear syndrome! :D

And yay you! :thumb: Go Monique go! :speedy:

LOL Thank you Korina. That is wise advice, I just threw out my scale. My clothes will surely tell the story just fine. It should be about health, not numbers

Quote:

Originally Posted by Calsun (Post 22450763)

That amount of exercise will not result in weight loss but you will improve your cardio and have stronger butt, torso, and legs muscles. Only cutting calories, especially carbs, will result in significant weight loss. The keto diet is going to provide the best results and it is a healthy long term diet.

It also takes a certain amount of time for the body to consume all the glucose and start to burn fat. A 4 hour ride will do far more in this area than 4 one-hour rides of the same total distance.

I would LOVE to do the KETO diet but my husband will not agree. I do not have the will-power to do it alone. My son is schizophrenic, he worked for APPLE for 10 yrs and it kept him sane. He has schizophrenia and planned to beat the disease with Strict KETO and hardcore exercise. He lost the battle with the disease when he broke his leg. Food is medicine, that's for sure

Quote:

Originally Posted by BlazingPedals (Post 22450661)

I plugged a generic route into RideWithGPS, from Sierra City to Sardine Lake. It came out to 1581 vertical feet in 6.1 miles, one-way. Lots of 4-6% grades, with one piece of 8%. A little over a mile of it was unpaved. Obviously Monique's ride is a bit different, but probably something close. Looks like a good effort.

Really? that's great. You are describing the ride perfectly. It is that ride so this is 100% accurate. This ride is what we need to work up to, which is very do-able for sure. We did it a few yrs ago so it will happen again. To go up further, you take a right and you are at the top of the hill. This is where the Downieville Downhill race begins. I was too tired by the time we made it up to consider riding the Downieville Downhill.

In our 20's-30's, we were in much better shape when we lived in Auburn right next to Stagecoach Trail. We never got bored riding down Stagecoach onto the Clementine Trail doing that loop within just a few hrs getting home by dinnertime. Those were the days

That 1338 feet in 4.3 miles is a 5.9% grade. That's a really nice grade to make a hard workout. It's steep enough to be a challenge, but not so steep that it needs lots of standing up or "mashing" a slow cadence. I assume it's steeper in some parts, and a bit of recovery in others. Hopefully the downhill is a nice reward! I don't like downhills that need lots of hard braking for hairpin turns or very steep grades.

Your climbs are a lot bigger than any of my local climbs. Here, it's often 300 feet (they can be anywhere from 2% to 18%!). But it was still very good training for my out of town mountain rides, at 1500 feet or even 3000 feet. A 3000 foot climb is actually easier than 10 repeats of a 300 foot climb. I have to just set a workable pace on the big climbs, instead of pushing to get to the top of the shorter ones.

Quote:

Originally Posted by rm -rf (Post 22452726)

You might consider moving, that's what we did. These hills are what we love. It makes sense the 3000 foot climb would be easier than 10 300 feet climbs. I don't last that long..hence shorter uphills are easier for me. I poop out on longer, more flat rides. It's really strange. I often wonder if it is boredom. There really aren't any rest areas uphill here when you are going from our house onto Gold Lake Road. There just is no flat spots, it sorta levels out a little for a bit but you are still pumping pretty hard. I know that is an opinion. These downhills do not need lots of breaks, I just go slow coasting the whole way home. We do ride very fast though...it is so nice to leave from your front door. I highly recommend everyone who cycles consider moving to certain areas so they can leave from the house. Once you have to put your bike on your car or in the truck, it's not much more work but psychologically for us, it just doesn't tend to happen very often

I did a 100 mile ride yesterday that had 5,900 feet of elevation gain. The route was mostly flat, except for 4x 1 mile climbs with 29% peak gradient and one of them averaging 25% for a quarter of a mile. If was f****** steep! While I would agree that several short punchy climbs can seem easier than a longer sustained lower gradient climb, once you go over 20% gradient I think it goes the other way. I was having to put out 500W just to keep moving forward on the steepest sections, so I was going well into the red. Impossible to pace like you can with a longer, shallow climb.

FWIW I prefer longer climbs with a steady 5-6% gradient that you can pace without going into the red. Anything over 10% soon becomes uncomfortable and anything over 20% is just painful!