How to increase anaerobic capacity

There are several factors involved in hill climbing.

1. Aerobic fitness level--on a long, sustained climb, your aerobic fitness capacity is the "base" for your efforts. If you don't have the basic fitness level then the "running out of air/legs on fire" can easily be due to the fact that the aerobic demand of the climb is beyond your ability.

2. Weight. Every ounce of excess weight hinders your ability to climb. This is one of the most significant factors to performance. If you are heavy, you will struggle on climbs.

Nos 1 and 2 account for the issues that most recreational riders face. However, sport-specific training can also help.

1. Threshold training: After 10-15 min of warmup, try to ride 10 min at a "threshold pace". This is a pace that is the fastest and hardest you could sustain for 20 min or so. Ride at a 'recovery" pace for 10 min and try another interval. Do this once or twice per week.

2. Ride more hills: Find some hilly routes. On a climb that might take 10 min to climb, alternate 1-2 min of focused climbing with intervals of standing on the pedals, all out sprinting for 20 pedal strokes.

3. Finding a long, gradual hill, alternate pedaling slower in a higher gear with your regular cadence. Click into a higher gear so that cadence drops to 50 or so and maintain that for 1-2 min, then go back to regular gear/cadence for 5 min.

4. Work on stroke mechanics. Climbing up off-road hills requires good pedaling technique, as often the changes can be abrupt or you are required to pedal up very short, steep pitches. Being able to maintain a good "circular" pedaling style will be helpful.

I ride road bikes, and being overweight- hills are a real killer to me also. This is probably obvious but better safe....

Riding on the flats I try to maintain a 90+ rpm- so I need to use lower gears to get that rate. As I approach a hill I drop gears to try to maintain an 80 to 90 rpm. I find it is much better for me to stay in the saddle and drop the gears than to stand up and really mash the pedals.

My bike does have a triple chain ring - so I do have the "granny" gears and on long climbs I aint afraid to use them.

I assume you already have bike shoes and clips- which are also really helpful.

Lastly, and I apologize if this is too basic, spend some training time working on your pedal stroke. An earlier poster talked about pedaling "circular"- I really struggled with this idea.

Basically it means learn to use all four muscle groups when you pedal. Glutes for the downstroke, hamstrings for the bottom pull through (the scraping your shoe scenario), hip flexors for the upstroke in the back and thigh muscles for the push through over the top.

to practice, find a quiet street, switch to moderate hi gear, clip one foot in - and pedal with that one foot. the high gear means a slow rotation and high force so you can really feel the muscles you are using. For me, I got most improvement from thinking "light foot" on the upstroke. I was letting my non-driving leg rest on the pedal during the upward part of the cycle. so my driving foot not only had to move me forward, it had to lift me other leg.

switch sides and do the other leg.

now days when I climb a hill, I focus on drawing back with my hamstring- takes some practice but makes a difference.

godspeed
Len

Most relegate the base training to the winter because you're right, nobody wants to do the boring base stuff when it's so nice outside. When you get to it though, it'll pay huge dividends!