The Biking Thread

I've never hit 38mph without a significant decline...and maybe a tail wind :Wave:

But I ain't no racer and I have no idea what my cadence is either. I ride what is comfortable (except for that one climb last week...that wasn't comfortable :mad:)
 
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Tig said:
My fastest recorded cadence was 186 on the old fixed gear bike running a 39T × 15T gear. It was during a road sprint hitting 38 mph, and I almost threw up.
My happy cadence range is 85-110.

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Pedal to the metal.

No idea what my typical is but I like to "grind", probably in part because the squishy shoes and plastic pedals I've been riding waste even more energy at high rpm. Or so I would imagine.


Speaking of which, the Lakes aren't even close to fitting. I've tried 11s, 11.5s, and 12s. These were the narrowest even out of the 11s, some of which were just regular widths that happen to run wide. I guess I'll try Bont, but I can't afford any more return shipping after that. I seem to have sizing issues with pretty much everything. *spits* Might have to go super cheap, which is what I usually have to do with regular shoes. Cheap stuff is usually made to fit just about everybody.
 
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Danhedonia said:
Right. If you had a fixie, perhaps they would, but different gears means you can change resistance (effort), speed, etc. while keeping cadence fixed and vice versa.

There's a lot more refined outlooks than that, but shit, I'm old and fat and on the couch and that's all I'm good for today.
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Tig's numbers are RPMs. And 186 is fast no matter what the resistance is. Usually if you have a computer/meter you're looking back at your max and average RPMs and speed. Cadence is often a goal and finding what gear to use on a climb is determined by your cadence (what gear can you keep your target cadence in). Lance Armstrong really changed that for climbing, fast RPMs in lower gears. The great climbers before him used hard gearing and thought powering up the mountain was the fastest way. Lance proved all of that wrong. Also spinning low gears/fast cadence on flats in races before approaching climbs keeps the pressure off your legs and on your heart (which you can train and prep for), saving your legs for the climbs. Cadence is probably more closely watched in cycling than in running nowadays.
 
Looking at most of my flat road rides, my average cadence is in the low 90's, even though I spend most of my time in the mid-90's. I've always been a spinner, not a big gear grinder, AKA: a diesel. I had a nice road/track sprint and could ride short hills well, but not having diesel power kept my MTB and cyclocross results lowly.

I now say "had", because I'm struggling to ride at all now. I can barely get out of bed 4 days after Saturday's hour and ten minute ride. It kills me to not be taking advantage of the empty roads right now.
 
Tig said:
Looking at most of my flat road rides, my average cadence is in the low 90's, even though I spend most of my time in the mid-90's. I've always been a spinner, not a big gear grinder, AKA: a diesel. I had a nice road/track sprint and could ride short hills well, but not having diesel power kept my MTB and cyclocross results lowly.

I now say "had", because I'm struggling to ride at all now. I can barely get out of bed 4 days after Saturday's hour and ten minute ride. It kills me to not be taking advantage of the empty roads right now.
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Sorry to hear that about your riding. Something that clearly brings you so much joy also hurts so much.

PS, I never, ever, had that much rpm in me. I typically hang in the low to mid 90s, maybe drop some on steeper stuff if I am out of gear, maybe sometimes a little faster. But I seem to have trouble spinning really fast.
 
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Was watching GCN for some gravel biking tips, and ran across this with Ted King, who used to “domestique ” for Sagan. I thought it was a pretty cool video, and appreciated his insights, now as a gravel race competitor.




Also then watched this one, which was just fun, and reminded me somewhat of cycling culture around here.
 
On Saturday, we ventured to our local MTB trails. I’ve never ridden MTB-specific trails, so it was awesome. Well, other then breaking my rib after falling off a wooden feature a few feet high. At least that happened right at the start. :facepalm: But it was super cool. Rode intermediate trails for about 3 hours.
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Theodore said:
rib mojo :eek:

never been mtbing
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Thanks! it hurts so much...haha. Ugh. I started riding on mt bikes about when they were invented, around 91 or so. So I used to ride on all the stuff that these trails are designed to simulate, but they take shit to the next level. it's been about 25 years since I did this on a regular basis. super fun, but I did one stupid thing all day and paid for it. :)
 
Guitar Heel said:
Thanks! it hurts so much...haha. Ugh. I started riding on mt bikes about when they were invented, around 91 or so. So I used to ride on all the stuff that these trails are designed to simulate, but they take shit to the next level. it's been about 25 years since I did this on a regular basis. super fun, but I did one stupid thing all day and paid for it. :)
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Just watched this video of you and svl yesterday

 
Guitar Heel said:
Thanks! it hurts so much...haha. Ugh. I started riding on mt bikes about when they were invented, around 91 or so. So I used to ride on all the stuff that these trails are designed to simulate, but they take shit to the next level. it's been about 25 years since I did this on a regular basis. super fun, but I did one stupid thing all day and paid for it. :)
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That's all it takes. I stopped to see if a guy who crashed needed help the other day. I saw him ahead of me, looked down to check something on my bike looked up and he was on the ground. He said he caught the edge of the road, how I have no clue (it's a wide bike friendly shoulder on a well maintained road).
I have never done MTB but this place looks cool though likely I will never even consider going since I've never done MTB

 
And I see when I got home that Strava has decided that MY rides are no longer free for me to review anymore and I need to pay them $5 a month for the "Privilege" to do so. Time to start checking out other apps. I don't need to know my speed against others or HR/Cadence/Power but I do like to compare myself against me. If I can't do that I'm less interested in using Strava (also they removed the ability to create a ride which I often used to figure out how far/high a particular route might be before taking it).

Anyone use other apps and do you like them if so. I don't have a Garmin and my iphone is what I recorded with on Strava. This "feature" is new as of today it seems (I rode yesterday and it wasn't like this)

Yes I'm cheap and I don't want to pay $5/month for the chance to be KOM (I never will be) or track my power/HR since I don't use that equipment. I only want to record and compare what I've done :shrug:
 
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No one eh? I've read that Strava and Mapmyride can be run at the same time so I might try that and see how they are different if they do actually work together and not crash. My wife gave me grief last night for being cheap :P
 
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