Originally Posted by Felt_Rider
Sorry for the extremely snarky response yesterday in regards to my cadence.
It's become a touchy subject since I started cycling and being in group rides with veterans trying to be helpful constantly remarking throughout each ride on my use of gears and slow cadence became quickly annoying. Typically with a lead out of, "Well you know Lance has a cadence of 110 rpm" or something like that. I tried to make those guys happy by shifting down to emulate their faster cadence and all I got in return was more complaints that I was causing the group to go slower because I couldn't keep up while trying to spin fast (or trying to be something that I am not).
Coming from one of the more influential guys to me personally for cycling training told me with being very time crunched that I would be better off using my limited time focusing on improving sustained power output at a submaximal effort rather than chasing after cadence drills.
So in relation to being on topic for this thread I personally started looking for what I could day to day with a balance between what is intense enough for stimulation and yet not so hard that I cannot train the next day. In my typical work day I do good to get right to the point by a short warm up and then get to my goal target of 91% for durations of greater than 10 minutes, but more likely I shoot for durations of 20 minutes or greater. During my warm up and cool down I may use that time and lighter gearing to focus on cadence, but again the intervals are far more important to me.
What I liked about those who were giving me advice (seems like most have leaned toward a Coggan/Lydiard style) that none of them harped on my lower cadence and it was more "do what you need to do to hit the target intensity for the prescribed duration." When I asked about cadence the response generally was, "whatever you feel comfortable doing while trying to hit the goal." (Prescribed intensity and duration)
What feels natural to me indoors on the rollers with resistance at my 91% FTP for the duration is about a 67 cadence like the image I posted.
What feels natural to me outside on a flattish course with a TT type pace is about a 78 cadence.
Anyway the constant harassment from my local friends commenting on my cadence in years past has me a bit jumpy. On the bright side since my fitness has improved and now when I am in the front break away with this same group of guys the harassment of my cadence has stopped.
No worries, your post was fine. It is good to have different opinions
There was some humor in 50 watts in 6 weeks, otherwise I would leave my real job and become a full time coach.
This is my last post in this thread, as it is has been spoiled somewhat by those who feel threatened when their own opinions are challenged.
I can only share my own experience with you, riding personally and with team mates through the years.
Some of us have muscle fibers lending us towards high cadence (fast twitch) some low cadence (slow twitch) The percentage of the two determines what RPM we are comfortable with.
I rode as a juvenile, then junior in competition way back, we were regulated and not allowed to race with gearing allowing low cadence, to teach us how to spin, later I rode senior amateur and then professional for one year before college got in the way. I also had a few lapses where I stopped riding, the last was almost for 10 years.
I believe I am naturally a low cadence rider, and because of that I train and work my program towards high cadence whenever I possibly can. It is a problem I have to continuously work on.
Throughout the years, every time I have stopped riding, when I got back into it the most painful thing was to get my high cadence back. The last time after being off the bike for 10 years, for the first six months of training, the only thing I focused on was high cadence and it was pretty painful. No focus on how fast I could go, or what my power output was, only working towards doing a 4 hour ride at an average cadence above 95.
Today, there is no way I could get to my current FTP below an average cadence of 98, but that is purely related upon conditioning and how I train.
Every new cyclist I have ever helped starts off with a very low cadence naturally. Way back, I use to be a low cadence rider, when we still had 6 speed cassettes my easiest gear was a 42/18 and I was doing fine in a one day races. But in stage racing, by the third day my legs would be totally blown, so I had no choice other than to get my cadence up, or get left behind. Once I got my cadence up, I was a much better rider all round.
I do not race velodrome anymore, and have not kept up to speed with trends there, but during my years dong track days, no one with a low cadence would have survived on the track.
