Hills are too hard, do i need a better chainset?

[TheDoctor]

34/50 I take its a compact then. Same BCD as old style mountain bikes plenty of those rings about in all sizes take a look on Ebay.

Not so fast! A compact chainset is 110mm BCD, and the smallest possible ring is 33T. If you're worried (and I know I would be was) then fit the largest cassette you can (that'll be an MTB one if you're running 9 speed or less) and do the climb from Sault. It's a mere (!!) 5% on average from there up to Chalet Reynard, and I did it on the middle ring. The top 6k from the Chalet to the summit is a vicious 10% bugger, and it's never going to be easy. But even the ride up to the Chalet is a huge achievement - it's not as steep, but jeez it's long.
Then descend to Bedouin and revel in the 60 mph terrorfest of speed

 

[iendicott]

I found to make hill climbing a bit easier I used my heavy hybrid with clipless pedals to build up leg muscles, the way I tackled it was to just train on hills but never getting out of the saddle whilst doing it so sitting down pedaling.
This has built up my legs very quickly and I only get out of the seat if the hill is a killer or I need a break.

 

[RedBike]

I've never had the honour of doing Mnt Ventoux for real but I used to very regularly virtually ride up in on the turbo. If tacx are to be belived the resistance of the turbo would realisticly vary according to the terrain/gradient as you pretended to ride up the climb.

I can't remember the gradient ever going beyond about 10%, which for North Yorkshire is nothing. Its a completely different sort of climb to what you get in the Dales. Ventoux is all about being able to maintain a high power output not about how strong your legs are. (Hope that makes sense).

The lower the gearing you have on the bike then the slower you can go and still pedal at a reasonable cadence. The slower you go the lower the wattage you need to maintain.

Most of the climb will be approximately 5%. At this sort of gradient you should be able to happily stay seated and spin the pedals at a reasonable cadence, say 80rpm. If you can't then you need to change the gearing. The hill is far too long to stand up to climb or mash your way up in a big gear.

 

[gavintc]

Most of the climb will be approximately 5%. At this sort of gradient you should be able to happily stay seated and spin the pedals at a reasonable cadence, say 80rpm. If you can't then you need to change the gearing. The hill is far too long to stand up to climb or mash your way up in a big gear.

Most of the gradient is a damn sight steeper than 5%. I do not have a Ventoux profile, but I seem to remember going past km marker after km marker informing me that the average for the next km was 7, 8, 9 %. I honestly do not think there is a 5% gradient on the mountain. It is not UK steep, most European mountains are grinds going on for a distance. For me, it was the continual pressure of not relaxing and just pushing away, wanting a respite even for 100m.

Just found a profile - it starts easy till you hit the forest and then.....

http://www.montventouxwebcam.com/pdf/Bedoin.pdf

 

[TheDoctor]

I suspect redbike is talking about the climb from Sault, which is nowhere near as steep.

 

[RedBike]

Its amazing how you remeber things.

Despite Tacx claims climbing on the turbo was never that realistic. I didn't think the gradient was that steep!

The sensation I used to get was more of "does this hill actually have a top?" rather than "blimey this is steep".

 

[Fab Foodie]

How much did you eat and drink?

Oh plenty, I'm pretty OK on hills and as I said, I'd plenty practice of some big slogs on the France-Spain border the week before. But in the airless forest as Gavin states, sun overhead and the heat reflected from the tarmac I just couldn't deal with the heat. I'm not good in the heat anyhow. I'm going back to beat the bitch at a cooler time .