“I want to do the Everesting challenge. How do I become a better climber?”
Climbing. People think it’s this magical thing that only lucky or skinny people can do. This is a misnomer. Anyone can climb. Anyone who likes to ride a bike can ride up a hill.
Yes, riding up a hill is harder than riding on the flats due to fighting gravity. Fighting gravity requires more effort, more leg strength, more fitness, and more stamina – both mental and physical. However, there are a few things you can do and techniques you can learn to make climbing feel easier, more efficient, and more enjoyable.
1) Climb
As silly as it sounds, it’s true- the more you climb, the better you get at it. You’ll learn to relax when climbing, your legs will get stronger, and your fitness will improve.
2) Learn to climb out of the saddle
Being able to climb both seated and standing gives you a chance to change positions, use different muscles, and breaks the climb up. Often times, people stay seated for the duration of the climb. They think that if they stand it will make them more tired. This is true if you accelerate when you stand. Any time you accelerate, you will make yourself more tired. The secret to standing and pedaling is shifting into one (or two) harder gear(s) before standing. This way, once standing, you maintain constant speed and are able to use your body weight to push down the pedals.
3) Change positions
This idea not only applies to climbing in and out of the saddle, but also to hand positions. Our road bikes have three different hand locations (hoods, tops, drops), use them. You don’t have to stay still when climbing.
4) Change cadence
Just like standing when climbing, being able to push both a big gear and spin a small gear helps climbs go by more quickly. The idea is to change up what you are doing to recruit different muscles and/or energy systems throughout the duration of the climb.
5) Pacing
The longer the climb, the more aware of your pacing you will need to be. The goal when tackling a climb should be to start a little conservatively, so you can continue to climb strongly and finish strong. Avoid starting too hard, and then slowing down and becoming more and more tired as the climb goes on.
6) Be OK with being uncomfortable
Climbing is harder than riding on the flats. There’s no way around it. This means it’s going to be hard, and it’s going to be uncomfortable. And that’s OK. It’s OK for your legs to hurt a little bit and it’s OK to be breathing hard.
Good luck, work hard, and climb away!
Thanks to Alison Powers and Cycling Tips for the content!