Bike Forums - hill climbing technique?

There seems to be 2 rivers of thought concerning how a novice cyclist should approach a series of small rolling hills:

1-Gear down to maintain cadence when the cadence naturally falls as the load increases;
2-Accept a lower cadence approach and "power" up the hills.

This second recommendation is scoffed at from those who think that it is too "macho" and that the proponents are all Lance wannabees.

The first group base their advice on the merits of "spinning" over powering your way up the hill. I have been reading a book called "Swim, Bike, Run" by Town, Kearney with a forward by Scott Tinley. In it the authors attempt to debunk the idea of what most of us think normally happens during high cadence efforts.
Instead of the effort being divided over a 360 degree cycle, they maintain that almost all the torque is applied from 11 o'clock to 7 o'clock. In other words we all pedal in a "piston-like" fashion, and that spinning as we know it is really a more efficient way to get the pedal to 11 o'clock to begin the piston stroke again rather than aiding in power production. Maybe they mean that your legs from 7 o'clock to 11 o'clock really become a liability rather than an asset, and to get them to where they become an asset again is the skill in involved in spinning.

They also write about the differing muscle groups used in the 360 degree crank rotation. The quadriceps cut in at 11 o'clock, and then are aided by the glutial muscles ( the bum group), which apply force 'till about 4 o'clock and then pass off to the hamstrings to apply power until 7. Other muscles then take over to return the crank to 11. The muscles of the legs just don't pay rent until close to midnight-just like some tenants I know.

In seated hill climbing they recommend targeting the gluteal muscles (the hip extensors) by keeping the upper body low and parallel to the top tube. They also recommend short-duration standing, as others have mentioned, as a way to use body weight to aide the quads and the hip extensors and to stretch out muscles used while seating-also, I think, to shake down pooled blood in the rear end.

Last year, I approached my ride in the local area which is quite hilly, by selecting one gear that would get me to the top of the hills without over taxing my knees, and using that one gear for the full ride. I reasoned that I would be getting a good resistance workout and then have the downside of the hill to regroup while I coasted. I then worked on various techniques to get to the top. I would speed towards the bottom of the hill to gain momentum, and then try to maintain maximum cadence without shifting, and then when that started to become too difficult I would slide my rear as far back on the saddle as I could to use the hip muscles more, and finally stand for a short duration to take me over the top. The single-speed idea will in time tell you whether you are building any strengh out of the strategy. Over time, I found my strength increasing, and satisfaction in that getting to the top was much easier in that one gear than before.

What I think is missed in the "gear-down" approach to hills is that you are not moving the load to other groups by incorporating different tecniques. You are simply dividing the load of the hill into more increments that are easier to handle; but by not altering style, the work is falling on the same group of muscles that are used during normal flat-land cycling. For me, I can't imagine anything more boring than cycling in the flat open prairie. The hills provide an opportunity to do something else, and figuring out how to master them, while appreciating them is the art. I mentioned in my earlier post that the lower cadence approach to hill climbing in isolation, is an attempt to level the hills mechanically by the applicatin of gears. Since then I have come across quite a few testamonials by single-speeders and "fixies" who claim to have little difficulty in matching geared riders in ascending hills, dispite what would seem to be the obvious advantages of lower gears in the hills used by the geared riders. (The "fixies" may run out of luck matching the geared cyclists on the downside of hills, and sometimes on the flats however.)

The single-speed and fixed-gear people have influenced me to think again about how gear-reliant we should be. If we focus too much on shifting down as we see the hill loom ahead, we tend not to speed up and use momentum as much, and instead put our trust in the derailleur to cut up the hill into easily digestible chunks. This long post is merely to offer the idea that there may be a better way, and that there is more than one way to skin a cat.