Yeah I don’t pay attention to averages, its all about what works for me.
From paying attention to my body, somewhat lower cadences seem to slow my breathing (so I assume use less oxygen) and slow my heart rate when doing endurance and tempo (low aerobic / endurance / sub-maximal efforts). Generally between 75-85rpm.
And at much higher power outputs, my body naturally uses higher cadences, generally between 85-100rpm.
Last week I was looking at threshold efforts, and from rides I tagged “ftp-test” - which includes one 8-min test, a bunch of TR ramp tests, various 10-min pacing efforts, some 20 minute tests, and a lot of longer 30-70 minute efforts - on flat ground those are generally between 80-90rpm. A bunch around 80-82rpm and another bunch around 88-90rpm. No real pattern here.
In training what appears to work well for me - work all the cadences to improve economy. Do some climbing or flatland efforts in the 50-70rpm range at tempo. Do some 100-110rpm work at tempo. Do some high/low cadence work at threshold. Sprints? On all-out sprints my highest power output is usually between 110-130rpm, and for the leadout my highest power outputs on sprints start with 300-500W at 90-100rpm and then standing for the all-out effort.
@CyclingPhotog I’d encourage you to experiment and keep an open mind!
Aside from whether or not you should focus on this, when I was a runner I would do drills with a metronome app on my phone to get the feel down. Seems like it might be a better option than staring at your head unit when you’re outside, at least for short periods of time.
Would like to note that average doesn’t necessarily matter as your average cadence during an activity that includes coasting and stopping will always be lower than your actual cadence while riding. So maybe don’t worry about what is shows as the average on the whole ride and just look at certain portions.
That’s an excellent summary! The analogy to singing fits, too.
You can use cadence drills to break up difficult intervals into smaller pieces. I do that all the time. Is 3 minutes at VO2max too long? How about 3 x 1 minute then? I’d usually shift one gear up or down depending on my mood/what feels easier.
I’m not addressing you personally now, but just to add to that: I think (impersonal) you need to have tried a lot of things to know whether they work for you — experience needs to be gained. Only then are (impersonal) you able to judge what works for you with experience.
Finding out your self-selected cadence at various speeds (rotational inertias) is very helpful, because that e. g. is important data for selecting the right gearing. Knowing that I like to spin faster at higher speeds was super important when picking the gearing for my 1x road bike. If I preferred 85 rpm instead, that wouldn’t have worked.
New riders in my experience tend to have a lower cadence. As do people coming from the offroad side (). It takes time to explore and see whether you prefer higher cadences or not.
I don’t know whether this is true, but I heard one of the reasons many triathletes prefer a lower cadence is that 85–90 rpm corresponds roughly to half of their stride frequency.
AFAIK that is the default on every bike computer I have seen.
If you have the gears to ride the environment you want at a cadence with which you are comfortable, great. But if your gearing is too hard, you’ll find that on hills you get to your easiest gear and then your cadence gets slower, and slower, and slower, and slower yet… because going slower and with a lower cadence is now the ONLY tool you have for managing your power output.
When I moved from Miami to New Jersey two years ago, gearing which had been lovely on the flats (46/33 and 12-speed 10-33) became a real disadvantage. On even moderate hills of 6% or 7% grade, I’m grinding up at 35 or 40 rpm, simply because I can’t put out more power and I’m already on my easiest gear.
So be aware that yes, a “self-selected cadence” is generally the ideal. But make sure you have gearing that’ll allow you to stay somewhere close to that number in practice.
Yeah, IMHO especially people who are new to the sport should almost always prioritize climbing gears. You will suffer much longer and much more on climbs with gearing that is way too hard than on a descent on (most likely public!) roads where you spin out a little earlier than others. So you stop pedaling at 60 km/h rather than 65 km/h?
I guess that’s why mountain bikers often have a lower cadence than road cyclists, you just have to grind on some of the uphill sections even on very low mountain bike gearing.
And they should find a good local bike shop (LBS), then listen to them. Mack Cycle in Miami strongly recommended 43/30 and 10-36, but I worried about spinning out. Really, really regretted my decision not to take their advice. I would have spun out 4.4 kph earlier…
43:10 @ 110rpm = 63.3 kph
46:10 @ 110rpm = 67.7 kph
Loss of speed: 6.5%
…but the reality is, by 60 kph I’ve stopped pedaling anyway and I’m just laser-focused on not making any mistake that might cause me to fall at that speed. And on climbs, the lower cadence is killing me:
33:33 @ 7kph = 45rpm
30:36 @ 7kph = 54 rpm
Improvement in cadence: 20%
And let me tell you, that 9rpm MATTERS because at very low cadence your muscles fatigue a lot more quickly. Others will explain why much better than I can… but trust me that a long, hilly ride with too-hard gearing is an exercise in misery.
Agreed, zeros should be INCLUDED FOR POWER, but excluded for cadence.
Treat Your 0s Properly
Most Garmin head units have power and cadence data recording options that can be configured on the head unit. Specifically, for both power and cadence, you can choose to include or exclude 0s. We recommend including 0s for power and exclude 0s for cadence. Here’s why. If you include 0s with power, then every time you coast (are not turning the pedals), the power meter will send a 0 (for 0 watts) to the head unit. The 0s while you coast will get averaged into your power data for the ride. The more you coast, the more 0s get sent to your head unit and the lower your average power. This is how it should be. It would be a bit meaninglessness only to average the power from when you were pedaling.
However the opposite is true for cadence. When we look back at a ride and focus on our average cadence figure, we want to know what our average cadence was while we were pedaling. Were you spinning at 80 RPM, 90 RPM, etc? If you average 0s into your cadence data, the number won’t tell you anything.
But how hard you pedal when you are pedaling is influenced by the rest you get when you are not pedaling. It is a mistake to focus on the former while ignoring the latter. As I said, doing so provides a distorted view of reality, and in no way, shape, or form allows valid comparison of workouts with different amounts of coasting.
ETA: “Consistency” when pedaling is irrelevant. As long as you’re not coasting when the person sitting on your wheel is expecting you to be pedaling, such that you disrupt their rhythm/that of group/pack, it simply doesn’t matter.
No, but it does change with power output. And how I feel at that moment.
Mentioned this above, for threshold efforts I see a lot of 80-82rpm and a lot of 88-90rpm. Somedays I prefer grinding and other days spinning a little higher. I’m naturally a grinder and have done many days in the mountains with 5-8 hours of climbing at 60-70rpm with compact gearing.
I don’t think about cadence, unless doing cadence work, or intentionally trying to lower breathing rate / HR on endurance/tempo rides.
With increasing fitness, yes. Most notably while climbing. Also, all things being equal, being lighter it seems easier to stay on top of the gear. Again most evident climbing. Whether any of this is true is questionable as I can’t prove it. FWIW Been feeling/thinking it for decades now.
More importantly as @The_Cog said above “just pedal”. Which brings me to the real reason i posted…
How in the hell do you multiquote here? I used to be able to just click on a post highlight something then scroll down to another post highlight a section to quote and press reply and boom. multiquote done.
This.
Groupset manufacturers seem quite slow, even going below 1-to-1 gear ratios on a road bike seems the exception even though it should be the rule for most customers in many places.
Especially with age, you want to enjoy being on the bike. Well, you want to suffer productively on the bike
). It takes time to explore and see whether you prefer higher cadences or not.
