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For me I find by dropping the cadence I can produce higher watts at a lower heart rate.

Lower cadence reduces your heart rate? The opposite happens with me (when the speed is the same).
 
Yes for the FTP test. A heavier gear and a lower cadence is more efficient. But that's just me. It's worth experimenting with and easy to test. Do a lap average power in different gears (lap average speed would work on a trainer too). Afterwards look at the cadence and HR data to compare.

However, this is only a means to get a good test score or hit a certain power in an interval. For longer rides/races, the optimal cadence will be different, in my case higher.

Andy

www.jyonnobitime.com/time
 
Yes for the FTP test. A heavier gear and a lower cadence is more efficient. But that's just me. It's worth experimenting with and easy to test. Do a lap average power in different gears (lap average speed would work on a trainer too). Afterwards look at the cadence and HR data to compare.

However, this is only a means to get a good test score or hit a certain power in an interval. For longer rides/races, the optimal cadence will be different, in my case higher.

Andy

www.jyonnobitime.com/time

Efficient in what way? Maybe for an engine that doesn't experience 'fatigue'. For humans, we are dealing with standard physiques with the added 'feature' of fatigue. Lower cadence and a heavier gear needs more muscular power to push than a higher cadence, right? This leads to fatigue faster. Does with me anyway.
 
Efficient in terms of getting out the highest watts at the lowest heart rate for 20 mins. Like I say, this doesn't necessarily translate to longer rides/races as like you say fatigue sets in.

Really, your FTP test should mimic your regular riding style. But when you are doing it you just want to get out the most watts possible...

Andy

www.jyonnobitime.com/time
 
Efficient in what way? Maybe for an engine that doesn't experience 'fatigue'. For humans, we are dealing with standard physiques with the added 'feature' of fatigue. Lower cadence and a heavier gear needs more muscular power to push than a higher cadence, right? This leads to fatigue faster. Does with me anyway.


I think the main reason one get less WATT with higher cadence is that you lose efficiency due to poor pedalling techniqe. This improves with training at high cadence and thus you get even more performance boost
 
No, higher cadence at the same speed, on the same terrain requires an easier gear, which requires less torque to spin. Heavier gears need more torque to turn (with everything else being equal).

Edit; and it is lower cadences (ie, heavier gears) with everything else being equal, that send my heart rate higher than everything else being equal, but an easier gear and higher cadence.
 
No, higher cadence at the same speed, on the same terrain requires an easier gear, which requires less torque to spin. Heavier gears need more torque to turn (with everything else being equal).

My point is that everything is NOT equal with higher cadence. The brain have a harder time to tell your legs to turn those pedals the same way at 100rpm as you do at 80 rpm. At 120rpm most people end up bouncing up and down on the saddle instead of pedalling in an efficient way.
This is one reason people have different "optimum" rpm.
 
My point is that everything is NOT equal with higher cadence. The brain have a harder time to tell your legs to turn those pedals the same way at 100rpm as you do at 80 rpm. At 120rpm most people end up bouncing up and down on the saddle instead of pedalling in an efficient way.
This is one reason people have different "optimum" rpm.

Well your argument doesn't mesh with comparing the two in a scientific manner does it. :)

I am not sure it is an issue with the brain not being able to control movement effectively at higher cadences. I do agree that at very high cadence, bouncing starts, but I think that is more to do with centrifugal dynamics (ie, harmonic distortion lolz) than motor control.

I agree that different people have different optimum cadences too. They also have different optimums for different terrains too, for a person. And different cadence for that person at different fitness levels, etc. At the moment, I find anything under about 97rpm to feel heavy. Never used to, but I do now. My times have not really changed on regular terrain (in fact I have battered some previous times at higher cadence).
 
I find that mixing my cadence when climbing really helps. When seated, I prefer a higher cadence but I like to interrupt the monotony with lower cadence while standing. The variation seems to keep my legs fresher.
 
45km this morning, swiped in and kept going. Some rain this aft., continuing into tomorrow.
 
My point is that everything is NOT equal with higher cadence. The brain have a harder time to tell your legs to turn those pedals the same way at 100rpm as you do at 80 rpm. At 120rpm most people end up bouncing up and down on the saddle instead of pedalling in an efficient way.
This is one reason people have different "optimum" rpm.

Interesting subject.

When it comes to what's better, high cadence or low cadence, I'm in agreement with you on this one.
I think it depends on the rider's pedalling technique.
Riders with a sloppy pedalling action are better suited to lower cadence as they tend to bounce around at a higher cadence and lose the rhythm of their power transfer.

Also, pedalling a bigger gear at a lower cadence requires power in the legs, some people have it ( e.g. @Mlac Peek ) others don't.
That could offset a higher heart rate because the legs are used to grinding away.

I would say that in the majority of cases though, a lower cadence in a bigger gear would lead to a higher heart rate than a higher cadence in a smaller gear at the same speed.
A lot of other factors come into it if you step off the trainer and ride outside, e.g. road surface, gusty wind, etc.

I personally like to mix it up when TTing.
 

Also known as 'every second you spend on your bike'. Lolz.

But yeah, I too like to mix it up. Well into big ringing climbs when the mood takes me. My best times up climbs have been when I have big ringed as much of it as I can. High cadence is cool too, and doesn't end with torn knees.
 
For the record, my heart rate is usually less when pedaling at a lower cadence at the same power on a trainer. It's probably not that different at low power but when the power gets higher it seems to be a variable that affects things. This is just something I have noticed though and not something I have really tested properly.

As an aside, when I was racing as a kid, our gearing was limited. Everyone rode a 'junior block' and as a 14 year old for example, we were limited to a 52x18 or something close to that. At the time, we were told that this limit was for our own good and that pedaling a harder gear at lower cadence for long times would cause the walls of our hearts to grow thick too young and it would mean our hearts couldn't develop and get larger with us (ie better to keep the heart rate high). I have no clue if this is in any way true or not but it is what we were told as young racers by our cycling club. Maybe it was all hear-say. Would be interested to learn if it was true or not. I raced from about 11 until 17 so my current bike is the first time I've had access to all the gears :)
 
I did do some roundabout testing on myself on the trainer at the same power varying cadences and came up with the same thing @wexford has stated. At lower cadence at a given power my HR is lower than at the same power with a higher cadence.
Going into the Fuji HC I did this fairly regularly and decided I needed to get used to low cadence as I usually ride over 100. In July I will be tackling three long climbs and I am not very familiar with that kind of riding so wanted to train my legs to cope with low cadence at high power. On a few rides out with TCCers I tried this out but it is not great for me, personally, on the steep short climbs we find in Saitama. I am better in that situation with a high cadence. On Fuji itself I had an average of around 85ish and felt more than fine. My HR was higher than I had expected but there are many factors to take into account there (event buzz, altitude, sleep deprivation, hydration, weather, time, and lack of a structured warm up, to name but a few).

If I look back through time I can certainly see a trend towards higher average cadence throughout all the riding I do. On the trainer I am aware of my rpm but on the road I don't pay attention and only look when I get back. Naturally I spin like a humming bird.

I still think youth racing is limited to certain gearing.
Something I couldn't be bothered to read through before posting
 
Yesterday I visited the @GSAstuto laboratory and torture complex in Akasaka for a Gomore calibration.

the Gomore is styled as a "fuel gauge monitor" for athletes. Apparently its chest strap sensor is much more sensitive than a regular Garmin or Polar heart-rate monitor and more akin to an EKG. (Only two electrodes, though.)

Based on the current HR and immediate and historical ride/run data it purports to let the athlete know just how fecked they are. Thus I call it the Fecktometer™. (Hopefully @Musashi13 and @wexford, at least, being the living playboys of the western world, will appreciate this ギャグ.)

It involves an iOS app with gratuitous iconography. I think I can manage 45 km...

SafariScreenSnapz001.png

According to the Fecktometer, I can handle 215 W and 140 bpm pretty much all day long. For intervals, I can go somewhat higher if there are intervening rest periods. We shall see. Unfortunately the testing phase (much akin to an FTP test) aggravated my knee joint problem - osteoarthritis dammit.
 
I must have a go at that Fecktometer. It would probably say I was fecked immediately.
 
Was planning a nice gentle ride up the river this morning. I turned off towards onekan for some reason though. Didn't feel like doing that though. Found myself at yomiuriland instead thinking I'd pop up there. Got wondering about a repeat or two before heading home. Ended up doing 22 repeats - most of them slow. Not sure why I did that but was enjoying it at the time.
 
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