I've been bitten by the Century Bug, and now have three under my belt. The last one was Florida's Horrible Hundred, with about 4,600 feet of elevation two weeks ago. I'm looking at organized century events for 2018, and I have my eye on the New York Grand Fondo. I'd want to do the century, but it has just over 7,600 feet of elevation. That's significantly more than the Horrible Hundred. The event is the third week in May, so I should have an adequate amount of time to train. I live in Florida, so I can ride year round. Unfortunately, the only real hills by me are short.


I'm assuming that going from 4,600 feet of elevation to 7,600 feet is significant. How would you train for this, considering I only have access to limited hills?

To oversimplify . . . I would make a point of riding HARD into the strongest winds you can find. And do it a lot.


It's not the same as climbing, but it can't hurt!

Not sure where you're getting the 7600ft metric.. it's marketed as 8500 ft, and strava returned about 8300 ft for when I rode it last year.
eg. https://gfny.com/overview/

There is something I think screwy with the RWGPS metrics if you're looking at that page. I actually referred to this in an older thread but didn't really get resolved: Strava vs. RideWithGPS

As for training.. If your goal is completion, and you're not aiming for a specific time goal, I found it easiest to really think of the ride as 2 back-2-back 50 mile rides. Have a bit to eat, and take 15 minutes or so break at the top of Bear mountain which is the halfway point. in the time leading up to the ride.. say a couple weeks beforehand, just try and complete an approx. 70-miler with at least 5500 ft of climbing, and you should be good.

Be able to ride more than 100 miles of your current terrain. Bring itsy-bitsy gears, ride steady on the climbs.

I'm no big century rider, completed a couple. But for comparison, I rode one here in western NC which is mountainous, and two months later one on the coast which is flat, I suspect rather similar to what you'd experience in Florida. Without getting into specifics I believe the flat ride is no easier than the other. While much energy is spent in climbing, you can at least reap the benefits of the elevation gain by resting during the downhill coasting. On the flat terrain, there is constant pedaling & little chance to coast any length of time for rest.

If you completed the "horrible hundred" a couple weeks ago without issue, I doubt you'd have much trouble with a few more thousand feet of climbing.

I realize none of this answers your training question.

There's a lot of truth to this -- I found myself on a 30-ish mile section of rail-trail and my average speed on that section was lower, and I worked a lot harder, than I would have in a similar-distance of regular road riding, because there was never any coasting, just constant pedaling.

Also, total feet of climbing doesn't tell the whole story -- how steep are those climbs? 8000 feet (or whatever) of climbing over 100 miles, if it comes at 2% grades, isn't going to be as tough as if it's in 10% grades, for example.

But bottom line, if you can do any century you can probably do it, just don't mind-screw yourself too much.

Climbs have always been my weak spot and we don't have any long, serious climbs in this part of Texas. It's been the toughest part to every metric century I've ridden the past couple of years (still aiming for the full 100 miles before the end of 2017).

So whenever I've tagged onto the back of a fast group for 50-60 mile rides I'm fine until we hit any hills, then I'm done. I can sprint to close the gap that opened on the hills a few times but after 10-20 miles of that I'm cooked.

So my method -- including this afternoon -- is to tackle one of the three nearby circuits with some roller coasters and hit the repeat button until I can't breathe or feel my legs anymore.

It's even better on days with strong north or south winds, depending on the direction of the climb. But headwind alone on a flat isn't quite the same, unless the headwind is at least 30 mph. On climbs other muscles are recruited just to stay upright and balanced, which makes them more exhausting than flat terrain with a headwind.

Hill intervals have helped, some. Climbs that I used to do slowly, I can now do half-fast (literally -- I'm middle of the pack on every Strava climbing segment, but up from dead last a couple of years ago). And the same climbs that I used to gas out on when I tried to climb fast, then needed to pull over and huff my inhaler and gasp for air for a few minutes, now I can finish and keep riding. I can recover while easing up on the effort for a few minutes, but no longer need to stop after sprinting uphill.

I'll never be fast, but I can finish now. That's an improvement.

The main thing thwarting my efforts at a full 100 mile century has been neck spasms, not the legs and lungs. I'll probably need to switch from a racing geometry to touring geometry frame to resolve that problem (C2 vertebrae injury from car wreck years ago, won't get any better than it is now). I could do it on my flat bar hybrid but it's much slower without the drop bars if there's any significant headwind, and the lack of hand positions makes the wrists ache after long rides.

Zwift and a Kickr.....I don't see many hills here either, but in the last 3 months I've seen some pretty good improvement.

There is such a thing as cumulative fatigue. Climbing can certainly cause you to exert above your comfort zone if you're not careful, and once your legs are cooked, you'll be in limp home mode for the day, regardless of 10 or 15 minute coasting sessions.

And there's ^ that ^. I rode a long ride this weekend, 59 miles out and back. (Up to the Blue Ridge Parkway and back) The last section to the turn around point is a 13 mile climb with about 2800 ft. of climbing, or about 215 ft./mile. Okay, that's a long climb but doable. The last 3 miles is about 1200 ft of that 2800 total! That's about 400 ft./mile. THAT will take the wind out of your sails, or at least, wind out of MY sail. (Went back the way I came so the downhill was a blast!)

There is a local century every Labor Day. They target every big climb around here with a total of over 10,000 feet of climbing. No way. I've climbed most of them, but not all in the same day! It attracts some well knowns apparently. Pretty much weeds out us weekend warrior types.

Like Canklecat, I'm not a strong climber and have learned if I want to go distance, to conserve energy on climbs. Drop it in granny gear and slowly winch my self up. There are some long rides I'd like to do around here that has me considering some change in gearing.

So look at the course, specifically the climbs, and plan for them. Energy wise that is.

Absolutely! See my post above. I'm not a strong climber but if I'm wanting to go the distance I have to pace myself and conserve as much energy as possible on the hills. Harder to hold back early in the ride when I'm fresh and strong but if I don't I'll pay for it later.

Improve power/weight ratio by either slimming down, do more watts or both.

Much longer than usual climbs
Here in SW Ohio, my biggest local climbs are 350 feet. For me, riding at my own pace (not keeping up with a group), I find that I settle into a maintainable pace on long climbs, since the top is so far away. As long as I can stay seated with a reasonable amount of pedal force, these are all doable, and I look forward to them.

Pacing
Pacing with a heart rate monitor, or even a power meter, is very useful to keep my efforts within a sustainable range as much as possible. I did the 77 mile Storming of Thunder Ridge ride, with 6800 feet, and finished with some reserves by the end. I was concerned about it's 12.5 mile, 3100 foot climb up the Blue Ridge Parkway (about 250 feet per mile), so I really worked on keeping a moderate pace. That was a fun ride.

Feet per mile
I check the feet per mile on the bigger, steeper climbs. (get the total gain, divide by the length of the climb.)
For me (with a 34 front, 32 rear lowest gear) :
250 ft/mile or below (0-5% grade) won't be much stress. keep the right pacing.
250 to 400 (5-8%) is a strong effort, and I wouldn't want an excessive amount of these.
400 or more ft/mile (over 8%) will "burn some matches" and affect my leg muscles.
And portions of climbs over 12-14% will really affect my muscles.

Long rides with lots of elevation gain
I've heard comments that somewhere around 100 to 200 feet of elevation gain is comparable to riding an extra mile on the flats.

I use the 200 foot rule. So a 50 mile ride with 7000 feet of climbing is kind of similar to a 50 + 7000/200 = 85 mile ride. That actually sounds pretty close. My local club rides, often in the range of 40 miles and 2000 feet, would be like 50 mile flat rides.

Your 100 miles and 8000 feet ride is something like 140 miles on the flats. So train to handle those longer flat rides.

These hilly rides have a lot slower average speeds. (Riders can't offset the slow climb speeds with fast downhill speeds.) So your time on the bike will increase, too.

The NYGF has a handful (9 or so) of short spiteful climbs of like 400' at up to 8%ish grades, and one sustained 1200' climb up bear mountain that's really about 5% average grade. If you have any reasonable fitness and 50/34 + 11-28 gearing you won't have a problem. So long as you pace yourself early, and on every climb.

How do you know what pace is pacing yourself? Basically, the key is to learn your FTP/FTPHR or LT/LTHR. Then don't exceed that on the climbs. IMMEDIATELY drop into your LT/mid zone 4 pace on any climb, and try to keep your HR in Z3 or below when not climbing. You may feel like you can go faster than this pace... but for the first couple big climbing rides, pace yourself, and then you can adjust your strategy on future rides based on what you learn about yourself on the first rides.

For training: Kickr + Zwift + Watopia to the radio tower. Note: Adjust Zwift difficulty to 100%!!!

Also, do Watopia Full Pretzel a couple times.

And do the Zwift FTP Builder 12 week program.

I got the 7,600 ft from the Ride With GPS map given on the NYGF website. It says 2341m which equals 7,680ft. I just remembered the 7,6XX. But now that I looked at the website again, I see it on the course page as 8,500 ft. Great! Another 1,000 feet of elevation!

Like Canklecat, I get dropped on the hills. I usually catch up before the next hill, but then I really get dropped for good by the second or third hill. I have made improvements over the last six months, and I hope to continue to improve. Two weeks before the Horrible Hundred, I did a solo 85 mile ride, climbing the same local causeway bridges 20 times. I did a lot of hills riding, every Thursday night, and (usually solo) endurance riding on Saturdays.


Oddly, I did the Horrible Hundred with two faster riders than I. I kept catching up to them during the first 30-35 miles. Then I was able to stay with them during the next 30-35. As a result of the endurance training I had done, I continued to cycle at about the same pace, and I pulled them for most of the last 30 miles. I even got an occasional, "Hey Bob! Slow down!" At the end of the ride, I felt like I could have done another 20 flat miles. But I'm not sure if I had any hills left in me.

Best advice I've gotten was from the fellow who started the local fast-ish B-group, after he'd watched so many people get dropped on A-group rides, get discouraged and not show up again. At 60, I'm among the oldest and expect to get dropped by the A-group, but thought I could hang with the B-group.

He was out for several weeks with an injury or recovering from surgery, so I'd ridden a few times with the B-group and was on the verge of not returning. But in his absence, on too many of their weekend 50-60 mile rides the A and B groups would combine, which defeated the purpose. The B riders would draft off the stronger A riders. I could hang on for awhile, but gaps opened on hills and I could close them only so many times before I was spent. And despite the no-drop policy, they dropped us slowpokes. (Fortunately I knew the long rural route so I didn't get lost.) So the advertised 15-16 mph average (which I can handle) was really 18-20 mph (which I can't handle for more than 10 miles or so).

I don't want stronger riders slowing their preferred climbing pace for me -- that can be exhausting in its own way. I realized that on slower casual group rides when I got stronger, but would hang back with the slowest folks to keep 'em company, because some were new and unfamiliar with the route. I discovered it was just as tiring to slow myself to around 7-8 mph to match their speed, as it was to maintain my own slightly faster pace. It was hard to find the right gear and cadence to ride slower than I preferred.

When the fellow returned he hung back with me on a couple of rides to chat and just advised me to go my own pace on hills and not try to match other folks. He'd climb at his own preferred pace, but lag a bit at the top to wait for me to catch up. So there was the challenge to not dawdle and keep him waiting too long, but without the pressure to worry about preventing a gap from opening. So I gradually found myself getting a bit stronger over time and not feeling so exhausted.

And after concentrating on intervals and hill repeats this summer I finally overdid it and was exhausted by September, so I cut way back. Now I'm doing the hard training rides only once a week, rather than 3-4 times a week.

I'm also paying more attention to warmups. At age 60, it takes me much longer to warm up -- usually almost an hour. So I have to resist the urge to charge uphill before I'm warmed up. I have to ignore Strava on some climbing segments because, while I'd like to improve my time, those segments occur early in my workouts before I'm warmed up. So I gear way down, sit and spin. There are other equally challenging climbs later in my workout routes when I'm warmed up.

push a bigger gear on the flatitudes of florida than you normally would. upshift one or two gears. the speed doesn't matter as much as the muscle/tendon memory/familiarity and slowish power. keep it in the big ring. look to drop in average speed 1-3 mph. get used to grinding into the wind. it will help you in those last, hilly 20 miles.

Can you train yourself to pace yourself?

If you look at the course profile of the GFNY, you'll see that there is one long(ish) climb, and not much climbing to speak of for the first 1/3 of the course. Get too caught up in the enthusiasm of the start on that first 1/3 and you'll find yourself paying for it in the last 1/3, which is especially demoralizing, because the last 1/3 is mostly easy and you'll be thinking, "why am I having such a hard time on the flats here?" There are only a couple of "walls," and they are not too difficult if you approach them right. Both are preceded by short descents; HAMMER the downhill approaches, take the outside line on the corner at the top (NOT the apex), and you may well get up without mashing at all. Just be prepared to keep climbing. The biggest challenge on them may be avoiding they guys who coasted on their approach and lost track of what gear they were in (you never heard more grinding of gears and swearing on a ride - fortunately, those segments are closed to traffic, as is most of the course).

How old are you? In terms of pacing yourself, you may find it an advantage to be older. After the racing corrals, the start is organized mostly by age, oldest to the back. The first time I rode the GFNY, I started way at the back, mostly because I didn't get there early enough to find my corral. Consequently, I found myself passing a LOT of folks for the first few miles. Not because I was particularly fast, but because so many people ahead were really slow - it was very easy to draft when I felt like it, or make my way up whenever convenient or when faster riders came up from behind. The next year, being on the "sponsored" race team (albeit still a Cat 5), I started at the VERY front. That was a disaster. I thought I was kind of pacing myself for the first few miles, but really I was racing just to not get run over or completely embarrass myself. Consequently, by about mile 40 I started to develop these sort of borderline cramps that never went away, and the last 60 miles were a slog. My time improved significantly, but it wasn't as much fun.

It's much easier said than done, unless you actively monitor your heart rate and power I suppose, but pacing yourself, and knowing when and where to push and when to relax really is key.

+1. Start training with intervals with the objective of increasing your power during each interval. You don’t need hills to increase power. An indoor trainer or outdoors with a powermeter and some resolve is all you need.

Your power to weight ratio is too low to keep up. Thats why you get propped on the hills, but not on the flats. The only way to not get dropped on a hill is improving that particular ratio. As I said before more power, less weight or preferably both.

FIFY.

(ie FTP power, not 1m sprint power or 3m pull on the front power)

OP, you have recieved some solid advise. I would just add that sweetspot workouts will help you a lot with prepping for the kind of climbs you would face in New York. Sweetspot triaining is simply spending time at ~90% of your threshold power or heart rate. Spending 30-60 minutes doing this, punctuated by a few sprints or other high intensity jumps, 3 times per week will provide you with a lot of benefit for your training time.

Good luck!

Thanks for all the posts! To answer some questions/comments:
1. I'm 52 years-old and will be 53 by the NYGF. Fortunately, the little bit of maturity I have has allowed me to accept hat I'm not as fast as others in general. So I don't mind being passed by others (usually); I've learned to, "Ride Your Own Ride, Not Theirs!" I actively say this to myself out loud, especially during the early part of an organized ride.


2. Power to weight ratio: Yes it is WAY too low. I am a short Clyde, but now I'm a borderline Clyde. I've lost 25 pounds in six months. I hope to lose another 20 by the NYGF. I know this will help, but I also want to be stronger.


Please feel free to keep the comments coming!

If you lose 20 more pounds you'll float up those hills. Least that's what it'll feel like.