Global Ride Cycling Training DVDs

Cycling Up Hills

Cycling Up Hills is a hilly topic that all of us Cyclist have had nightmares over. The dreaded hill climb. WOW, I still remember when I first started riding just how bad I beat myself up over going so slow up hills. It seemed like every hill was a huge struggle and I fell off the pack every time. I blamed the bike, I blamed my body weight, heck I even blamed my shoes.

The biggest thing I learned about cycling up hills was that 95% of the challenge was all MENTAL. Yep, it was all in my head. The day I decided to start thinking of hills as a positive and fun challenge is the day I started smiling every time I rode up any incline. Don’t get me wrong, hills still hurt, just not quite as bad as they used to.

The second biggest thing I learned about cycling up hills was to not try to fly up the hill. By this I mean trying to get your speed up and hammer all the way to the top. It just isn’t gonna work that easy when your starting out cycling. Intermediate and seasoned riders, sure, they try to hammer out the hills. They have trained to do this. You can do it to, it just takes time, the right mentality, and practice.

Now that I’ve shared my overcomings, here is a few tips that I learned to be helpful in training for cycling up hills.

Tips for Cycling Up Hills

1. Ride a steady consistent pace. Not too fast, not too slow. This takes a combination of gears and cadence. I try to shoot for a cadence of 68 to 75 on good inclines.

The pace is what gets you thru the long hauls. When you start riding in the mountains, or should we say up the mountains, you have to find a sit in pace else you want make it far at all. You have to avoid the burnout when cycling up hills.

2. Sprint to the hill. While your out riding your routes, you should be aware of your hills ahead. Make a good practice of sprinting to the base of the climb. Don’t sprint up the hill, sprint to it.

The goal here is to get your legs twitching and your heart rate up ahead of time. Once you hit the base of the climb settle into the steady pace.

3. Point your BIG TOE up: A lot of newbie riders don’t understand that peddling is a two way street. Yeh, we all peddle down but guess what. When your clipped into the peddles you can also pull up on the peddle stroke. Seasoned riders understand that peddling both down and up helps promote an over all round peddle stroke. This increases your wattage and most importantly engages all of your leg muscles and not just your quads. Your hamstrings are very powerful and can help spare your quads and help them recover.

So what does pointing your big toe up do? I learned this from a professional racer friend of mine. Pointing your toe up helps drive your heels down. When your heels are down, this helps you engage your hamstrings on the upstroke. It’s easy to try, you just have to practice it and before you know it it becomes instinctive.

4. Drop the hammer over the crest: O.K. now we are near the top. Do we stop and celebrate? uh….NO. Now is the time to let it all hang out. When you see the crest, do what ever you need to to pick up the cadence and get over the top. This is where you can gain distance and separate from the wheel suckers behind you while cycling up hills.

Just remember this, once you crest the hill, you get to rest. Well sorta……

5. Indoor training: There are some good indoor training DVDs that you can ride to on your indoor trainer or rollers. Global ride sells several training DVDs. they have one called Urban Assault on Italy. And if that isn’t enough for you give their Climbing Sufferage DVD a try. Another good Hill training DVD that I use is called Spinnervals Hilly Hellacious. Some of these sound painful but in reality they are all great training programs that will certainly help you cycling up hills.

6. When in doubt hang on to the wheel in front of you. Hey, if the wheel is there take it. Focus on the wheel and not the pain. Let the wheel be your guide.

7. It’s just a HILL. You can climb it over and over again. Think positive and have fun while cycling up hills.

John Finney
A.K.A. The Cycling Guy

This post was specifically about

Cycling Up Hills

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For your riding pleasure, please view these other cycling post:

Increase average 40km speed | Cycling Interval Training | Cycling Up Hills

Tags: beginner cycling training program, beginner cycling training programs, beginner road cycling training, beginning cycling training, bicycle pedal cadence, bicycle resistance trainer, cycling workout programs, endurance cycling training program, indoor cycling training, road bike beginner training program, road cycling training programs, road cycling training tips