Jim Kukula

Here is a fun way to look at the climbing on a route. I download the data from mapmyride and then in excel I compute the distance and grade for each little segment and then sort those pairs of values and make a scatter plot. Anyway you can see from this that about 1 km of this ride was above 9% grade - and half of that was above 12%.

Here was a brutal ride from a couple years ago, 70 miles with maybe 5 miles above 10%:

Null66

Hey,

I "did" my first 200k this spring, and on a DT too, loaded, over loaded per people who know better and for what I actually used and for contingencies that did not happen... "Did" meaning made the mileage, but not the time. Took a few weeks of mostly indoor riding to get ready to to get ready. Here's a log of people trying to help.

https://www.bikeforums.net/clydesdale...00k-april.html

You too can "do" 200k this year, making the timings another matter, but even if it takes you all weekend you still DID IT! Regardless, if you make the time or not, even just the structure trying to get ready for it will vastly improve your riding and health...

First numb feet:
can be bad shoes, or trying to mash... feet can only take so much pressure so many times... What's your cadence?

Learn to drink and eat on the go...

Learn how you respond to various distances...

Steamer

Hmmm.

My own personal power data from a couple 200Ks, a 12 hr race, and a bazzillion training rides suggests that my ultramarathon limit is at around 60% of FTP. And that's if I am highly motivated. More realistically, it's closer to 50%. That ultramarathon limit is reached somewhere around 6 to 8 hours, or longer.

For a 160 lb rider, who is essentially new to the sport, to have an FTP of 280W is pretty unrealistic.

hamster

Re-read the starting post in the thread. The person is complaining about being unable to go faster than 10.1 mph even during 2-3 hour rides. My power data has me at 87% FTP for 1h50 and 71% FTP for 3 hours (and I can probably do better than the second number).

Further, the calculation assumes that he's pedaling all the way downhill at constant power. Let's make the model more realistic. Suppose that he goes up hills at 145 W, on flats at 100 W, and coasts downhills after getting up to terminal velocity. That only drops his average speed to 12.7 while dropping his average power to 104 W.

Finally note that my route profile has 70 ft/mile of climbing, which would be pretty hilly even by upstate NY standards.

Steamer

Consider how flat the CP curve is in the region beyond hours. That only distorts things by a small amount, perhaps 10%. At least that's what my data shows, anyways. It's possible your FTP could be underestimated. That's not a rare problem.

I mentioned the ultramarathon limit mostly because that's the number I have been most interested in, and have the best handle on, and would be the limit of interest to a person completing a 200K, as was referenced by the OP as being his goal.

Aside from that, do you know the CdA and Crr used in that calculator? As you alluded to, therein may lie at least part of the OP's speed problem.

The rest of the discrepancy between your calculation and the OP's report speeds probably lies in his weight (bike plus rider plus crapola/baggage).

hamster

If anything, my FTP is overestimated. Here are the numbers from 2013: 216 W @ 0:30, 201 W @ 1:00, 193 W @ 1:50 (4300' hill climb), 158 W @ 3:00, 154 W @ 4:00 (6000' hill climb), estimated FTP 220 W.

My last two ultras were a double century with 52'/mile of climbing at average speed 14.4 mph, average moving speed 15.5 mph and average power 115 W, and ... let's call it a 200k (unsupported) with 69'/mile of climbing, with average speed 12.7 mph, average moving speed 14.2 mph and average power 110 W.

CdA and Crr used by the calculator are displayed at the bottom. At our settings, it was using CdA 5.26 ft2 and Crr 0.0033. And yes, that's precisely my point.