There is a whole scheme to "hill training"

[Kolesar]

We do most of our pedaling using easily available carbohydrate-derived products that are in our bloodstream. They are continually released into your bloodstream from food that you have eaten. You can go pretty far with those, then you eventually tire.

When you "hill train", your body consumes that easily-available energy in a minute or so, then has to switch to fat-derived energy because the carb-based energy has played out and cannot be replentished fast enough.

If you do a few cycles on hill training on each ride, you "train" your metabolism to activate that fat-burning chemistry all the more effectively. In time, you will be burning more fat and burning fat sooner in each ride.

As a result, you will be burning fat on your rides and looking lean. You will also be gaining impressive endurance and be able to do long rides. Happy cycling!

[Longhorn]

1. I'll remember that the next time I'm huffing and puffing up a hill

in my lowest gear with my feet spinning as fast as they can, barely staying upright! :D

"I'm burning fat, I'm burning fat, I'm burning fat . . ."

[BiggJawn]

2. You might be spinning TOO fast...

It is written:
If your legs burn,
you're pedalling too slow.
If your lungs burn,
you're pedalling too fast.

[Longhorn]

5. The problem is, if I spin any more slowly, the bike will fall over.

And my muscles aren't built up enough to handle a higher gear and I'm already in my lowest gear. But I'm making improvement.

I read this tip yesterday on another bicycling forum: To make it up a hill without walking, stop and rest until breathing is under control. Pick out an object or landmark ahead and focus on making it at least that far. When you reach that object, keep going if you can or stop and rest and pick out another object. Someone else called it the "Jack Rabbit" method -- lots of short stops and starts. I had already done that yesterday and it works. I'm sure the more I ride, the more my lungs can take.

[BiggJawn]

6. That must be some low gear!

I have a 24-tooth front sprocket and a 28-tooth rear sprocket and a cadence of 90 RPM gives me 4 MPH with that combo.

The Jack Rabbit method sounds good, but I have difficulty getting clipped in when trying to re-start on a hill.

[Longhorn]

7. I tend to unclip before I climb a hill for that very reason.

In fact, I'm thinking of ordering some new Shimano pedals that are platform on one side and clipless on the other for times like these.

I don't think it's my gear ratios -- it's me! My bike has a Shimano TX71 48/38/28 crankset with a SRAM 850 11-32, 8 speed cassette. Maybe you can tell me what that means. ;)

[BiggJawn]

3. But don't you "bonk" when you run out of Glycogen?

Before you get the fat metabolism going?
Or do you have to "ease off" when you feel the tank going dry?

Long rides sounds just fine to me.

[Kolesar]

8. "Bonk" is the extreme condition

I understand Bonking as having worked hard for a long period and then getting so played out that you "just cannot get going again". My impression of reasonable hill training is to hit a hill for just a few minutes during your ride.

Yes, I think it is running out of Glycogen. I am recalling this from an article I read in Bicycling a few years ago. It may be on their website, somewhere, www.bicycling.com .

I prefer to just roll through the countryside myself. I like to ride so evenly that I don't have to get out of the saddle to crest a hill and I can do the whole ride just breathing through my nostrils. Unfortunately, my "new neighborhood" has these relics of the last ice age, which are steeply eroded valleys as the drainage patterns have changed since the ice left. I actually bought new chainrings and a cluster to get lower gearing for the hills. I am also in a "recovery" phase. I have been quite inactive since surgery last year and am having to get back in shape again. I empathize with the new riders here.

("Bonk" isn't in Skinner's spell-checker, but "bong" and "boink" are )

[BiggJawn]

9. I'd *LOVE* to be able to "boink" on a ride!

I think that was covered in Bicycling's "Sex!" issue last winter...:evilgrin:

Yeah, "Le Bonk" is being so far out of gas that you're cooked, shot, blown-away, toast, etc... Hitting the hill for just a few minutes shouldn't get you THAT depleted, unless you're already borderline.

Sort of sounds like doing "interval" training, only uphill. And I like to ride the same way you do, never out of the saddle, never huffing and puffing, but there's some places I want to go that require some heavy breathing.

[happyslug]

4. I remember that the next time I bike up to Ebensburg from Johnstown.

The difference in altitude is only 940 feet, so the next time I climb up Allegheny Mountain to get to Ebensburg I will remember your words (By the way I generally walk up the Allegheny Mountain, after about 15 minutes of pedaling my knees start to say "What are you DOING to us?" and thus I dismount and walk.

For more on Pa see: (Where I obtain my various attitude above sea level):
http://www.idcide.com/citydata/pa/index.htm