Hill classifications

There are loosely 4 Categories of climb. They are classified from ages ago as to the capacity for a Citroen 2CV to climb the hill and if so in which gear. I know this sounds like madness but it is 100% true. A category 3 climb it could climb in 3rd gear ( a small rise ) category 2 2nd gear, cat 1 First gear and Hors Categorie or H.C is where the little old 2CV could not climb it no matter what!

You make think I am making this up but it is true and has stuck to this day. Any new climbs are rated against existing category climbs. It does have an element of slope and gradient etc but has been simplified in a fantastic, old school method.

Thanks Blip,

That is incredible. I have searched the web for an explanation to no avail. I'm grateful for your explanation.

I wonder how we should rate climbs in Australia? Perhaps we should use the FJ Holden as the measure - although it may be difficult to find enough to categorise all the climbs.

I've just done a week riding down the east coast of Tasmania from Launceston to Hobart - definitely some Cat 1 climbs on that, especially in the first couple of days. Second day we did 145 km with a howling northerly pushing us down the east coast between St Helens and Bicheno. With a group of 6 riders in the bunch it was a real hoot. Also had a 8 km downhill off the Blue Tier in the morning on the way to St Helens (after a 4 km Cat 1 uphill), a real test of bravery. Tassie is a road cyclists dream on a day like that.🙂

Interesting as I am moving to tassie In February. I am keen to get into a club and continue racing. I have been living on the north coast of NSW for the year and there is some really good racing / training up here. From what I can gather there is a lot of track racing in Tas and not much road would that be a fair call? Lemme know from the locals perspective what it is like as a cyclist in Tas.
I cannot wait.

Quoted post said:

Originally posted by blip
Interesting as I am moving to tassie In February. I am keen to get into a club and continue racing. I have been living on the north coast of NSW for the year and there is some really good racing / training up here. From what I can gather there is a lot of track racing in Tas and not much road would that be a fair call? Lemme know from the locals perspective what it is like as a cyclist in Tas.
I cannot wait.

Blip, The Vets in both north and south of Tassie have a road race every weekend. Some very competitive cyclists including some World Champs. Races include crits., 30 to 64km handicaps etc.

Check out www.tvcc.asn.au for the current racing program.

There is quite a bit of track cycling at Club level in the north due to the availability of high quality tracks and good competition (esp. Devonport, Latrobe area).

During summer there is an open to all TT held from Lower Sandy Bay to Bonnet Hill in Taroona every Tuesday fortnight.

There are also heaps of opportunities for group rides and Audax with Salamanca Cycling Touring Club www.biketas.org.au/SCTC

I heard that Hors cat climbs meant that the car had to go in reverse up the hill.

There must be some correlation with distance and slope (%) surely. The category sounds pretty subjective. Does anyone else want to contribute to this discussion?

Better still, does anyone know where we can find out more information about hill climb categories and profiles of some of the major pro-circuit climbs?

Quoted post said:

Originally posted by Spider1977
There must be some correlation with distance and slope (%) surely. The category sounds pretty subjective. Does anyone else want to contribute to this discussion?

Better still, does anyone know where we can find out more information about hill climb categories and profiles of some of the major pro-circuit climbs?

It´s a very interesting subject. I´m very interested on the climbs in cycling.
Unfortunately, still nobody have invented a “perfect” method to obtain a coefficient or a relation for climb’s classification.

It´s very subjective. For example, in Quebrantahuesos we usually climb Marie Blanque (only 9 kilometres but 4 kilometres at 10%) and Portalet (29 kilometres at 4%, the maximum slope is 8%) What´s more hard to climb? Perhaps you say Marie Blanque, but I´m not sure, because after ride 200 kilometres, you must climb Portalet, and these 29 last kilometres are endless. Or what´s more hard, Tourmalet or Lagos de Covadonga? Both are “Hors Category” mountains, but in Lagos the slope is very irregular (in some sections the slope is very steep, but in others there are descents); in Tourmalet, the slope is more regular.

In this website you can find some articles (very interesting) about the subject (in Spanish):

http://webs.adam.es/rllorens/categori.htm

In short, it´s very subjective to obtain a coefficient. The author of the webpage thinks that is possible to create a method:

Coefficient of Difficulty: 10% of the unevenness of the climb + % maximum.

And he makes a table with the results:

Hors Category: + 140
1ª Category: 80-140
2ª Category: 50-80
3ª Category: 30-50
4ª Category: 20-30

For example:

ANGLIRÚ (In Spain):

Unevenness: 1245 metres
Length: 12,5 kilometres
% Maximum: 23,5%
% Average: 9,96%

Coefficient: 10% * 1245 + 23,5 = 148 (Hors Category)

But this is an imperfect theory, very simple, because there are some “mistakes” (in my opinion).
For example, a climb can be very long (17 kms) and not very steep (% medium: 3%) but perhaps in a concrete section the % can be 15% (for example). In this case, the coefficcient will be increase a lot, but the final result will be a not-real result, because the climb is not steep.
Other example, a climb A with a maximum % of 20% but with a % medium of 4%; and other climb B with the same unevenness and the same % medium, with a lot of zones with a maximum % of 15%. In this case, with the theory of this person, the A climb is harder than the B climb, but I´m not very sure about this (because B have a lot of steep zones, and A only one).
And in this theory, the unevenness is too many important; according this method Veleta is more harder than Anglirú and although I don´t climb Veleta, I think Anglirú is more harder because have 17,5% in a kilometre!!!!!. This mean that you climb 175 metres in 1000 metres, it´s incredible.

But at any rate, in this website there are a lot of articles about this matter. And others methods to obtein the “COEFFICIENT OF DIFFICULTY”:

Other method is (created by Blas Santamaria, in the same page):

Coefficient: L * % * exp ( % / 10)

L= length of each zone (1000 metres, for example).

But:

If the % is: 0 <= %<8,70 -> the method will be “recalculated” with: Coef.: L * (%)1 + (% / 21,5)
If the % is: 8,70 <=% <= 12,10 -> the method won´t be “recalculated”
If the % is: % > 12,10 -> the method will be “recalculated”: Coef.: L * (%)1 + (% / 25)

And :

Hors category: + 240
1ª category: 120 – 240
2ª category: 60 – 120
3ª category: 30 – 60
4ª category: 15 – 30

With this method, the Coefficient of Anglirú is 570 (Hors Category).

I think that this method is much better than the other (but also are some “mistakes”, because don’t consider some things: altitude, road…).

Here, in Basque Country, there is a great website with a lot of profiles of Spain and France (an essential website):

www.altimetrias.com

The authors of this page have created other method for obtein the coefficient. You can read some articles (in English) and see a very simple (but good) program for calculate a
Coefficient.

I think that the best method was created by Mario Ruiz. Ruiz was a basque journalist (from Bilbao), very popular in Spain, and he wrote in a Spanish magazine (Ciclismo a Fondo). His profiles were suberbs, unsurpassables. And he had a method to obtain the coefficients. Unfortunately, he never publiziced it.

And for see others profiles:

* www.salite.ch The greatest database about European climbs. Very interesting
* www.altigraph.fr It´s the website of a publishing house of France (Altigraph), they have published a lot of books about TDF’s climbs. In this site you can read something about “The Altigraph Method”.
* www.ediciclo.it Similar to Altigraph (Ediciclo is an Italian editorial). You can see some profiles of Giro.
* www.ciclomaniac.com More profiles (Italy)
* www.salitomania.it A interesting website about Italian climbs (and others climbs of Europe)
* http://home-1.tiscali.nl/~edwinsel/index.htm Another interesting page

P.D. Sorry my English, but this subject is very difficult for me.

scheesus!
Methinks that makes it all too difficult. I have ridden up many large mountain climbs in europe and various other places and let's just say that they ALL hurt! I would safely say that I could physically ride up any mountain on earth at my pace. The issue realy is whether you can ride up said mountain at race pace with your fellow racers and then drop them. I have been left gasping for breath with heavy legs on climbs that would not even go close to registering category 3 because of the pace of the race with attack after attack.
My thoughts are this:
Any climb longer than 10kms at a gradient that is steep ( you know what I mean) is a tough climb. That same hill can be climbing a wall if you are on the wheel of some climbing machine with you DS willing you to stay on his wheel no matter what! Category's do not matter when you are being put under the hammer.
Spider, thanks for the tassie info I cannot wait to move there.

Azurki, thanks for the detailed explanation and the links - well done. Climbs of 17%, I think I'd get friction burns on my nose from the front wheel!

You guys must have some incredible leg strength to do those climbs.