Roadies with super-fast cadence

Joe Friel has a decent read on using a Power Meter.

P = F x v

“All of this means that in order to raise your power while riding, you can either increase the force (F) you apply to the pedals or you can increase the cadence (v). In the real world of riding a bike, the way to increase the force is to shift to a higher gear and the keep the cadence the same. That will increase your power output, which in turn will increase your bike’s speed.”

If a few minutes is 5% of your “decent length ride” who are you to throw stones?

You know nothing of how often. duration or type of rides I do. so Why try to score internet points?

Average. Sustainable Max and all out Max Cadence are not the same thing.

I’m not interested in debating my own personal experience of the subject. I find it quite strange others are even questioning it.

In the real world of riding a bike, the way to increase the force is to shift to a higher gear and the keep the cadence the same. That will increase your power output, which in turn will increase your bike’s speed.”

All pretty obvious I’d have thought 🙂 Though it does lead to a few things that can be quite useful to keep in mind if you’re riding hard and trying to balance speed/power and cadence. Can be good to know what impact in cadence a 1t gear change has for the same power or speed, and what the difference in power is between 1t gears for the same cadence.

Also you can’t really shift to a higher gear and keep cadence the same. Cadence will have to drop and you need to then accelerate the cadence back up to what it was before, which needs an increase in power. This’ll be the same as if you’d just increased the cadence in the same gear but will require greater force to accelerate the bigger gear. Which is why you try and up your cadence a bit before you change up.

I’m a roadie and a MTBer.

Natural cadence for me is 90-100. A higher cadence on a big effort can help reduce muscle damage/fatigue, meaning you can sustain it for longer or recover quicker before the next big effort. When training on a turbo or doing an FTP test I will often top 120rpm, as for a given power the higher the RPM the longer I can sustain that power/ the more often I can repeat it.

Also you can’t really shift to a higher gear and keep cadence the same. Cadence will have to drop and you need to then accelerate the cadence back up to what it was before

Yes I see what you’re saying but beginners/unconditioned riders have a tendency to drop disproportionately when changing up and see it as a way of relaxing. Whereas you should crack straight on, assuming the strength of course.

Why ‘should’ you do anything? At the end of the day it’s personal. There may be a point where it’s more efficient, and we’ve all seen beginners riding along in their top gear doing 30 rpm, but it’s not necessarily wrong. Just making life harder.

I’d check out they’re not riding triples with the oh so difficult to adjust correctly front mech’ meaning they are stuck in the granny ring until the fashion police turn up and drag them to the LBS and make them switch to a compact

WhenI first connected the cadence magnet to my Defy and paired with the Ride-sense I was astonished that 10 mins into my first ride with the new computer I was acheiving 240rpm cadence on the first fast downhill stretch. Wow I’m quick I thought.
Then I also noticed that I was also managing an average of 124.1mph for the ride.
On the flat.
Darn, I then realised I needed to change the battery in the Ridesense and I came back to reality.

FWIW I tend to average about 70-90 rpm with the new battery