Tips for increasing endurance on a bicycle

In My Humble Opinion
21

You mixed up two different terms. Our bodies adapt and respond very quickly to endurance activities ie long slow efforts well below threshold (aerobic). On the other hand, our bodies are very slow to build and develop muscle strength (anaerobic). What’s nice about this is that our bodies are also very slow to lose strength, but fast to lose endurance.

This is often confusing to people at first because when just starting out strength and endurance can limit each other.

So for a given individual, there is a level of effort that would allow them to bike for several hours–that’s endurance. If they want to go faster, they’ll need more strength.

The research documenting this is long and exhaustive. Have you measured your exertion with a power meter and compared it to your heart rate? Not to mention the fact that heart rate is impacted by a dozen other factors independent of the work done.

Heart rate has to lag, there is no reason for your heart rate to go up before you get to the hill. And by the time your heart rate shoots up the damage is done, you’ve burned a match. Your heart rate will then respond differently on the next hill as you fatigue, tire, dehydrate, etc.

22

To clarify a few things in this post:

In cycling there is something called Functional Threshold Power (FTP) which represents the maximum amount of effort you can put out in one hour, after which you are totally destroyed. For me it’s about 220W and at my current weight means I can cover about 23miles in that time. Some people also call this Critical Power. It represents the point at which your body can’t flush lactate as fast as you’re making it, so it’s also known as Lactate Threshold. But it is not the same thing as VO2max.

If you take that number and bike at 105% you will max out in about 20min, this is by definition the 20min threshold test. Biking at 120% will destroy you in about 5min.

It’s unlikely you could hold 150% for more than 1min. However, you’ll be able to recover after a few minutes and do it again because this is an anaerobic effort. But you won’t be able to do this for more than a few times. This is what I referred to as matches. Think weight lifting.

In the other direction, if you lower it to 95% you’ll be able to bike for much longer than an hour. You’ll probably be close to maximum heart rate and have trouble breathing. At 85% I can bike 56 miles in less than 3 hours then get off my bike and run a half marathon.

Drop the number down to 75% and you’re completely aerobic to the point that you can pretty much bike forever. That’s my target during an Ironman which allows me to bike 112 then run a marathon.

All of this is completely independent of terrain/hills/wind. It doesn’t matter what the course is as long as you stick to your target power. What’s happening in the OP is that on the hills his power is spiking up over 150%, which is fine the for the first hill. It’s tiring but easy to recover from when coasting down the other side. It works again on the next hill, and the hill after that. Problem is that eventually the body runs out and reaches its threshold, after which there isn’t anything left.

There are two* solutions to this problem. One is to learn how to stay below threshold going up the hills. The other is to increase your overall threshold. A third less popular solution is to lose weight.

I am currently in the process of building my threshold power because it is pathetically low. It takes 1 hour sessions 4 times per week and will take months to improve. Once I improve it’s unlikely I’ll lose it quickly, even if I take months off and have less endurance. Keep in mind that the percentages won’t change. I’ll still only be able to bike for 1 hour at threshold, but that will now be slightly faster. I’ll still have to stay under threshold for hills, but I’ll climb slightly faster.

Endurance essentially refers to anything over an hour. Once you can bike for an hour, it’s a matter of backing off your effort to a point that will let you bike forever. If you go out harder, or fly up a hill, you won’t last forever.

23

I don’t think so.

Yes there is aerobic adaption. Certainly six months of aerobic training is enough to build a solid aerobic base. And there is anaerobic adaption. AND there is strength. And there are other muscle fiber adaptions other than strength. And they are interrelated things .

This article (and its links) may a good place to start.

  1. VO2max, a.k.a aerobic power, aerobic capacity and maximal oxygen uptake: “an individual’s maximal aerobic capacity.” Six months of training is enough to get people up near their genetic potential for aerobic power and there “also seems to be a genetic upper limit beyond which, further increases in either intensity or volume have no effect on aerobic power (5). This upper limit is thought to be reached within 8 to 18 months (3).”

  2. Training gains are also made by elevating the anaerobic threshold (a.k.a. “lactate threshold”). That’s most easily thought of as the percent of an individual’s VO2max that one switches from being able to maintain an aerobic level for a prolonged period of time to where anaerobic metabolism switches to be a large enough share that the activity level cannot be maintained for very long. That most commonly means interval training. Anaerobic threshold improvement does not however equal strength gains, although strength training may improve anaerobic threshold some and some strength gains may result from high intensity interval training aimed at improving the anaerobic threshold.

  3. Strength is another thing. A power lifter may have strength but does not necessarily have a high anaerobic threshold. The first weeks of gains from a strength training program are mostly due to neural adaptions. Muscle hypertrophy is a later response. Muscle power is a function of how many muscle fibers (generally fast twitch) can be turned on at once through the range of the movement and how much force each of them can bring to the party. The neural adaptions get them firing at once; the hypertrophy gets each one putting out more force. Significant hypertrophy changes, building up the quads for serious cycling for example, without which hills will be a big challenge, takes months if not seasons.

As an Ironman triathlete (I asume) you are least focused on muscular power. You’ve long ago gotten to your genetic potential for VO2Max and no doubt do some interval training to move your anaerobic threshold to as big of a percent of your VO2Max as you can. When you go long you are appropriately focused on staying on this side of that threshold even if just. And you are very focused on efficiency of movement, in your stroke, in your stride, in your bike position and cadence.

24

Yes, you managed to repeat what I wrote slightly better. Notice you said it can take 8 months to reach your maximum potential for VO2max, but that’s an upper limit that stops us from getting better. Most of us are operating way below that and will be able to bike 100 miles without ever reaching our potential VO2 max.

The reason is that the next term you used, lactate threshold, limits us first before we reach our VO2max. And as you mentioned, genetically we are all limited by our VO2max.

To put this in terms of the OP, it doesn’t take much conditioning to bike 100miles. The first session sucks, a few weeks later up over 40miles, and within 6 most people would be easily reaching 100–but they’d be slow and no where near VO2max.

To go faster, they’ll need to work on their lactate threshold. This takes a long, long time. And eventually they will be limited by their VO2max. For cycling, increasing threshold means 1hour rides just below threshold (85-95%). VO2max requires interval training at 120%. Together they will increase overall performance.

As an Ironman triathlete I am only concerned with my lactate threshold (FTP) and I know I am a long way from ever reaching my genetic VO2max, although I do some VO2max interval sessions to keep things interesting.

I was running into the same problem as the OP, and the solution was to learn how to pace hills.

25

The best advice I can offer is – always be in control of your breathing. If you start gasping or are otherwise short of breath, stop and take a breather.

I say go as slow as you need to go uphill in order to keep control of your breath. Don’t worry about cadence or consistency or anything else. Eventually you’ll get to that. Right now, just keep the oxygen flowing into your system.

Oh, and drink a LOT of water.

26

:slight_smile: I actually started before that second post but got waylaid by family call.

27

If you scroll down the page here you’ll find this graph:

The guy is biking on a trainer and increasing his power output (shown as speed) by increasing his gears. Notice the way HR always lags behind a change in power. Then notice the way his HR struggles to recover on the second set, and then stays elevated.

28

Except he’s doing intervals and incurring an oxygen debt. Of course HR will lag while the body tries to repay the debt.
I always saw the same thing when running intervals. Much different when running (or riding)a steady pace and hitting a hill. I always saw an immediate increase in HR before feeling the increase in aerobic effort.

Also, there’s no such thing as a power meter for runners so HR is the only way to go.

29

Going 40-50 miles means you may be depleting your muscle glyocgen at about the 2 hour mark.

I believe fructose is best for refilling liver glycogen, whereas glucose is better for muscle glycogen. Taking a 4:1 ratio of glucose to a fast acting protein is supposedly the best supplement for muscle glycogen. So try taking a protein drink that has 25 grams of protein and 100 grams of dextrose in it (dextrose can be bought in stores, if you don’t have access to it right now you can use sugar which is 50/50 glucose/fructose).

Also be sure to eat the same thing (a 4:1 ratio of glucose to protein) immediately after exercise to refill glycogen stores.

On another note, I’ve noticed HIIT helps me increase my stamina. But not to the point where I can maintain for 2+ hours straight.

30

I think emacknight is generally right: If you can go 100 miles on the flat no problem, but can’t do 50 with hills, you should slow down going up the hills. Or, maybe better put, don’t pedal as hard up the hills.

(I say this because, for most people, they pedal too hard on the flat, too. In fact, it’s not really power so much as pedaling hard – you can go much farther pedalling quickly and lightly than you can cranking hard and slow, even if the power ends up being the same both ways. The biggest thing a cyclist can do is to learn this, and train himself to overcome his body’s instinct to push harder. If the OP is finishing 100 mile rides, he’s probably gotten this).

31

Keep in mind that the OP was having trouble with cycling and hills, and DSeid specifically asked about heart rate. For steady biking heart rate works reasonably well, but as that chart shows it lags behind effort during intervals. Someone that tries to hold a steady speed will have a power graph that looks like they’re doing intervals, and I firmly believe that is what’s happening to the OP. The problem with cycling is that you can burn a lot of matches before your heart rate monitor starts beeping.

No, but power when running is a function of weight, speed, and elevation gain. A guy named Dr Skiba worked out a formula called Gravity Ordered Velocity Stress Score. It’s obvious that running 8min/mile on a flat is a lot less work than up a hill. So by knowing pace and having a good sense of the grade it’s possible to maintain steady output. I also find with running it’s a bit harder to blow up in that sense. Hills do usually get people that don’t know how to slow down or walk.

To rewrite the OP’s situation for running would look more like, “I can go for 10mile runs easily. But if there are traffic lights I tend to sprint to catch them, and end up toast after 5miles.” A case of going over threshold, where a HR monitor would only show up after the fact that those 30sec sprints were burning him out.

32

I did it!!

Earlier today, I rode 51 miles through the hills. Thanks to all of the information in this thread and linked sites, I was able to make it with steam to spare. I even sprinted up the last hill before coasting home. My legs are a little sore though.

Thanks everyone for your excellent advise! I can’t wait to do it again!

33

Congratulations!

34

Good job!
Glad you made a breakthrough.

35

What did you do differently?

37

Reported.

38

His breakthrough was he got himself banned, so he had more time to ride his bicycle. I’m just impressed that zombies ride bikes. I would have thought they didn’t have the braaaaaaiiinnnss.