He's right this time.

Jester? Beauford? Ladera Norte? Any others that fit the bill?

Nonsense. The most effective way to train for ANY cardio-based sport is by doing intervals of the type of effort you want to improve at. You can improve by doing intervals of distances far shorter than 1/2 mile. All that matters is that you get your heart rate to the desired level and repeat, adjusting (reducing) the inter-interval time as you progress.

Usually Far West. I've done alternating Far West/Ladera Norte repeats (just crank the corner at the bottom and keep on going). I used to do Beauford as well. I don't do repeats on Jester any more -- Jester is for blood: only single PR attempts -- I don't want to "know" how to go slower up Jester

You don't go to war with the hills you want. You go to war with the hills you have. Don't blame me for being able to keep a normal cadence at 14% in a 39-23

NOT speculative. Long, bitter, painful, EXPERIENCE.

Benefit from mine or find out the hard way. Your move. If you try the latter, let me know, I'll link you to a good site for bulk Ibuprofen supply.

Trust me on this, steep upgrades aren't great for race training. Nobody understands this better than me, I LIVE on a hill that's an upgradefest, I ride UP the stupid thing 300x annually.

Screw it, you guys do it YOUR way. That's MUCH more entertaining.

I think you need to go here for your information. Science seems to work better than opinoun.
https://www.cptips.com/climb.htm
This is one of the best Cycling sites you will find. The nutrition and medical info is spot on.

I hate you.

I daydream about a nice mellow 14% hill for the last .5 mile before my driveway. Sigh. That remains a wishful fantasy. The 15%+ Wall remains (two of them, 200yds, then about 100 yds). I don't call it Mt. Doom for nothing (these upgrades part of a mile long, 400 vertical foot slog). Try it with 109 miles in your legs. This is living proof that you can get used to just about anything.

When I first got back into cycling 2 years ago, there actually were days in the first two months where I'd call my lovely spouse for a sag wagon ride in our Volvo back to my driveway. I wasn't sure I could actually grind up those final upgrades carrying the 30 extra lbs I featured early on. Now I can manage it no matter how tired I am. It's never really that bad when you know you'll be in a hot shower within five minutes : ).

Again, this has no training value. But it makes an OK cycling anecdote.

Wouldn't these type of steep hills going on the 53/11 gear hurt one's knees? Where I live I find very steep hills but I try to go up the easiest gear possible because I have hurt my right knee in the past already doing 14-16% gradient hills with a lot of strength, especially now that I'm 45 I don't want to cause more damage to my good knee left.

Relax, i think the 53/11 up a 14% hill is a bit of a pipedream.

But from the tone of the OP, it looks like he needs to do a lot of strength work too, and there is nothing like short hard pushes to build strength. Yes, we know that's anaerobic but that's what you need for strength. He didn't mention race training, just about getting in shape to do a century.

And as for aerobic training, the grade is not raelly so important. What matters is the level of activity you are doing, how close to aerobic threshhold and for how long, and it is the power you put out, not the speed that determines that.

And if there is no decent hill around, apart from a short sharp brute, then that's what you have to work with. 14% slopes in the middle of a long 10% hill (maybe to 500 or 700m) are pretty much average climbs around here, so I'm spoilt for choice. But where the OP is from, maybe there is only Hangman's Bluff.

If you can ride up a 14% grade in a 53 x 11 report to the dope testing tent IMMEDIATELY.

Somebody riddle me this: If I'm going balls out on an interval, what does it matter if the resistance is air, gravity, or some widget attached to the rear wheel?

if you're planning on doing a century, more mileage would be better training than more or steeper hills. Strength is good to have, but you also need to be able to withstand 5-7 hours in the saddle, and a half mile hill climb, even at 25%, isn't going to give you that.

Repeats in the gear that allows you to keep the RPMs sufficiently high...

So Patentcad, now that you're able to ride up your mount Doom after 109 miles in your legs, what do you attribute it to? How did you attain the ability to do this? If you weren't forced to ride this hill, would you still be able to the way you do now? Obviously riding mount Doom has given you mucho training benefit...?

yep

I would say the hill would work just fine for a training stimulus. It doesn't matter AT ALL what kind of work you are forcing your body to perform, just so long as the load is there.

It all depends what you are trying to train, too. Personally, I would ride such as hill at slightly above LT to enhance anaerobic capacity, ie to adapt to clearing lactate quickly. Then, turn around back down, descend for a very short spinning rest, and repeat 20x. At the end, you'll be totally trashed, and maybe puking in the street on top of your rubbery legs. Amazing.

It is the same thing as why one would do repeats/speedwork in track, to get used to riding at/above threshold, and when exceeded, recovering from the effort quickly.

And making it up any 14% grade hill in 53x11 that is not a dinky little rise would be near impossible.

A longer hill is certainly better, though. My favorite is Blue Mounds State Park in WI, a ~1000 ft, 3.5 mile climb. It works!!!!

Waterrocket, if you can climb a 6-mile, 2000+ ft ascent with a 39/23 at normal cadence speed (90 rpm), you should start picking your pro-team of choice!

Cheers~

Too bad pcad doesn't do sound bites.

You got to work on your "training is for wussy."

I am a wussy in training. Maybe that helps.

It must be the aero bars.

What's the difference between a 1/2 mile of 14% and a mile of 7%, if you've got the gearing to get the cadence you want at the resistance you want?

The problem with super-steep grades, IMO, is that you may be tempted to not pace yourself well because you're trying to keep the speed up to keep from falling over.

Also, steep grades can make for problems with slipping when standing or wheelieing when seated - these distract from the goal of the workout. Not sure if you would have these problems on a 14% grade.


A final point is that internet posters are as guilty of "grade inflation" as today's most lax schools and colleges...

I think it's the way people are calculating grade. There may be an instanteous super steep section garmin's picks up or something. The 28%'s I hear about seem a stretch....

Here's a toporoute of Jester. The top is not flat as shown in the profile, bringing the average grade to a full 14%:
https://www.toporoute.com/cgi-bin/get...YYFGVGGWIJXPEJ