Your mouth to God's ears.

I greatly prefer elevation to headwinds.

A headwind is a mountain with no soul.

(Overnight the winds here were 20+ sustained with 25+ gusts. That doesn't happen every day but it happens often enough that we ride in it because otherwise we'd never ride.)

For the same distance, is your average speed going to be higher or lower for a flat ride compared to a "very hilly" ride?

Unpaved roads have much higher rolling-resistance than a paved road. So, this is a poor comparison.

It's a significant difference.

How long did it take you to do the 4600 foot century? Was it hard for you or easy?

Agree with the advice to do intervals and especially learn what pacing works best for you.

Back in April a few of us did an impromptu local century route with 8,000 feet here locally. I was using my heart rate to pace myself, not letting it exceed mid 150s while climbing. I was done at 90 miles and 6,100', I had nothing left. Two weeks later I did another century with 11,500'. I used mid 140s HR as my max on the climbs and finished the ride feeling good! My fitness level didn't change much in two weeks, but pacing made all the difference.

IIRC 1.5 - 2mph faster on flat ride. Pretty much insignificant difference. For me, average speed on a century is a non-issue. A century with 7600' of climbing speed shoudn't even be considered IMO.

That's not actually insignificant (especially over 100 miles). Keep in mind that aerodynamic drag increases quickly with speed.

That you are faster on a flat ride suggests that this isn't true. If they took the same effort, you'd be equally fast.

Since there's a time limit, you have to consider time. (Yes, you could come in after the course closes but that should really be what you plan to do.)

Hills add time because you lose more time going up than you gain coming down. It takes you longer to go up than down.

They add to your total energy expenditure (1 mile w/ elevation gain costs more energy than 1 mile w/o). How much depends on how you pace yourself. If time isn't an issue you can level the hills (eg ride the same power going up as on flat ground) but this is slow, you spend more time riding at a constant output.

If you don't level the hills, then you're putting more energy out more quickly. Maybe you're burning matches, maybe you're producing big peak forces (mashing) that fatigue you more quickly.

I think hills add difficulty pretty much no matter how you define "difficulty."

But you don't need to do anything special to train for them. A watt is a watt, cycling is an aerobic endurance sport. Train to be able to ride long and hard-when-needed.

If 1.5-2mph isn't significant, you're not riding hard enough.

I was with you right up to that last paragraph.

You statement becomes true once you exceed a certain minimum level of fitness + equipment.

I consider this threshold to be where where your watts/kg is sufficient to climb in zone 3 for the duration of your longest climb at more or less the average of its average grade and max grade.

If your fitness and gearing are below that point, the you will suffer miserably just to go up the hill AT ALL, and the hill will destroy you for the rest of the ride, because the MINIMUM watts required to go up exceed your FITNESS. Below this threshold, it is impossible to pace yourself, because the mimumum pace (at say 50 cadence or 40 cadence standing) exceeds any pace you may set for yourself.

Once you cross that threshold of fitness (and gearing) then yeah, a watts a watt and its up to you to decide how fast you want to climb.

But below that threshold, climbing requires some minimum watts/kg for a given gearing, grade, and elevation gain and if you lack that fitness you will pay the price.

TLDR; you can't flatten hills if your watts/KG can't get you up the hills staying at your sustainable power level.

I'm just curious as to where in Florida you're able to ride 100 miles with that much elevation. I've lived and ridden in Florida. There ain't many hills (I had found one near Camp Blanding SW of Jacksonville). My brother lives in Jacksonville and logs his rides on Strava. In a 30-50 mile ride he's lucky to get 250 of elevation. The ride profiles are pancake flat.

Dan

I did the Horrible Hundred in 6hr, 36 min of pedaling with about 7.5 hours time elapsed. My Garmin said 7:50 time elapsed, but it started during the ride to the start line about 20 minutes before the ride started.


I wouldn't say the HH was easy, but I felt like I could have gone another 60- 90 minutes more on flats. I'm not sure if I had many hills left in me though.

It's very true that most of the Florida peninsula is flat. But there are significant hills in Clermont (just west of Orlando) where the Horrible Hundred is and up to Ocala and southern Gainesville. I did a "dry run" century that went from Gainesville, south to Ocala and back with about 3,300 ft of elevation. I'm sure these are not close to other parts of the country, but we do have some hills here.


Clermont is the winter training center for some sports due to the amount of hills present. I've heard that many triathletes train in Clermont during the winter months.

Just to add something that I don't think has been mentioned: flat centuries promote drafting. A cyclist can easily go faster than he could by himself by working with others. Add in big climbs, and any advantage from drafting disappears. You are on your own. So the miles become more difficult.
Alan

Actually, it's the other way around. Compared to riding at 15 mph, riding a century at 17 mph will gain you 47 minutes, but riding at 13 mph it will take you over an hour longer. In any event, 1-2 mph makes a significant difference if you're riding LONG enough, and I think most would agree that an hour longer or shorter is significant.

Congratulations and hope you didn't get too wet in the Howey-in-the-Hills section.

First suggestion is to join a group..... Florida Cycling Clubs for group bike rides and racing

TCCA would be a suggestion. Outstanding group. I tagged along with them at this year's Cross Florida ride,
https://spacecoastfreewheelers.com/charities/xfl. A great ride you should consider for April next year.

156 miles yesterday with only 371' of gain that included 2 bridges so pretty flat over here west of you in the Cape Haze Peninsula area. Can ride 100 miles in Rotunda West with less than 100' of gain.

I cut Horrible Hundred short this year and did Sugarloaf 4 times up the front with once up the rear. Had 200' more gain in 81 miles than the full 100 mile ride. Rode Six Gap in September, 11,000' in 103 miles and would recommend it for you....CycleNorthGeorgia.com Home of the Six Gap Century

I prepare by riding in 53/12 or 50/11 into the wind for hard short distances or 2 to 3 mile sections at 15mph to 17mph. Yesterday's ride I did a few of the long steady standing sections. When riding group rides the guys I ride with keep me constantly pedaling for our 40 mile rides, no resting like going down after a climb, that helps condition for climbing. My 67yo legs are a bit tired this morning but still planning on 100+ faster pace miler tomorrow. Last Saturday's ride was 127 miles but only 8 miles with the faster riders since I joined them after already riding 68 miles and their 24 to 28mph speeds are no good for my old body.

Ride smart and climbs will be a breeze. Lots easier than riding into invisible 20mph+ winds for endless miles.

FORGOT to mention 2018 Bike Sebring 12/24 Hour in February, https://www.bikesebring.org/ No major climbing but a great endurance challenge. I'm registered for the 24 Hour Non-Drafting 400 mile RAAM Qualifier

I'm not talking about time, I'm talking about effort.

Oh, yeah. And each extra 1 mph above 15 or so is harder than the last extra 1 mph.

If you are in that shape at the time of the NYGF, I'd say you'd be able to complete it but find it hard (assuming you pace yourself on hills).

Note that it's not just elevation gain; it's grade too.

IME, significantly higher average speed on flatter routes, even +100 miles. As someone else mentioned, it's basically impossible to make up time lost climbing while descending, unless we could magically get the hill to be longer on the way down than it was on the way up. But this is for someone +200lbs... for a 140lb guy, it might be very different.

From two rides in the same week:

70.3 miles, 1,378ft^, avg. HR 145bpm, 215W avg. power, TRIMP 357, avg. speed 19.0mph

46.2 miles, 5,059ft^, avg. HR 145bpm, 216W avg. power, TRIMP 343, avg. speed 13.2mph

I'm pretty sure this is the typical case. I'd risk even saying it's a general principle.

The following statement seems odd:

Also, beware of counting the accumulated ups and downs of a rolling ride. Many of those rollers are tackled with momentum for the first part, and a little burst up and over the rest, and your threshold power is no where near limiting your effort, and you aren't sustaining it long enough to burn matches / hurt your legs.

You can climb like 5-7 minutes well above threshold. If that gets you over the top and staying with a group you can benefit from on the descent and flats, then it's probably worth burning a match.

But much beyond that 5-7 minutes you'll pop, have to recover, and the rest of the climb will give back whatever time you made on that initial attack (and then some).

But worse, you'll have burned a match for no gain!!! This is the real killer of climbs longer than 5-7 minutes. If you don't pace yourself, you're burning matches for no gain.

Not sure what is odd. This thread started with the OP's concern about climbing and what it takes.
It has been turned into speed oriented somewhat. For me, a century is about endurance, not speed. I don't track watts of power, HR's, etc. I DO track my average MPH on my usual rides. My usual rides end by about 60 miles, a century just isn't in my usual repertoire of rides I pursue any longer. Been there, done that.
And so while I do track speed, it was/is never of any real interest while doing a century, my only concern was finishing. For me, at my age, weight, and fitness, after about 80-85 miles it's all mental anyway. The tank is empty.

And so whether or not time lost during a climb can be made up on the subsequent downhill, or whether a century is finished at 16mph average vs. 14.6mph is irrelevant to me. The energy saved or restored by the rest period of a downhill, means more to me long term. I WILL add I live in a mountainous region and I'm used to climbing, which again, was the major concern voiced by the OP and a real concern coming from a mostly flat-ish region.

Thus, for a flat century I personally didn't find it any easier to complete than one with elevation gains/losses.