# Climbs vs flat



## lightning33 (Jul 28, 2008)

I first began riding at a very flat place. I have since moved to a much hillier place. I struggled at first with climbing, but now I kinda like and am not that bad at it. Despite being a bigger guy (for riding...6'3" and 225#), I can piull away from several of my riding buddies. BUT, they can pull away from me on the flat sections. I feel like I am TTing just trying to keep up.

1) What's up with that?
2) How can I get better at riding on the flats?


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## Jwiffle (Mar 18, 2005)

Well, I'm not that great at flats, either. I'm lighter, only 155 pounds, so climbing is something I do well. But being tall, I catch a lot of wind, so that makes flats harder. 

However, I've gotten better on the flats, but without really focusing on it. Just focusing on getting stronger at riding overall has helped. 

Good chance you're working differently on the climbs than the flats, though. You probably run a lower cadence on the climbs, and a higher cadence on the flats, and you get winded from the higher cadence. That will just take some practice and training to get used to the higher cadence.


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## armands.liepa.al (4 mo ago)

lightning33 said:


> I first began riding at a very flat place. I have since moved to a much hillier place. I struggled at first with climbing, but now I kinda like and am not that bad at it. Despite being a bigger guy (for riding...6'3" and 225#), I can piull away from several of my riding buddies. BUT, they can pull away from me on the flat sections. I feel like I am TTing just trying to keep up.
> 
> 1) What's up with that?
> 2) How can I get better at riding on the flats?


The thing is- on hills you need extreme power for short time. Try longer intervals on flats. 3 minutesx4, 5 minutes x4; 8 minutesx3. As lower power, as longer intervals. Legs and glutes should really work (no idea, if you have powermeter or HRM). Check on youtube- there are plenty of interval training advices


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