Cadence newbie question

General advice tends to be to try and keep your cadence above 80, too low puts the strain on your muscles and joints and too high wastes energy. I find around 90 works for me and allows me to keep going for longer.

It did take a few rides to get used to 90 as upping your cadence does work your cardiovascular system more. Experiment with a few different pedalling speeds and see which one suits you.

I think it is just a power band issue(like a motorbike engine), once you get to a certain power o/p for a given gear, you can spin it faster. then at a certain point, spinning faster doesnt really generate any more power, but jumping upto a harder gear drops you back into your power zone. That is my take of how my speed creeps up if i use a harder gear versus spinning.

'i have a coach, higher cadence is always better, it will improve your fitness more quickly'

I *am* a coach, and the above sentence is nonsense.

i have a coach, higher cadence is always better, it will improve your fitness more quickly, and also pushing bigger gears makes your muscles sore and recovery is slower. I agree a good 90 rpm is about right, although my Zone 1 sessions on turbo are all at 100+.

I found my legs are fresher for longer if I spin over 90 rpm but I go quicker if I use a bigger gear around 85 rpm. Now I just need to keep going for longer, faster at the lower cadence

I'd aim for around 90, which will take a bit of practice on the road and will probably feel faster than you've been used to. The better your bike fits, the easier you'll find it to maintain a higher cadence but a good peddling technique takes conscious practice. Styles vary (eg Froome) but generally it should help to focus on keeping a stable core and focussing your movement from the hips down.

Once you start working on it, you'll notice how many cyclists waste energy grinding along and gyrating all over the place

I got a cadence sensor recently because I wanted to concentrate on upping my cadence during flat sections etc. I realised that I was probably pushing too high a gear most of the time and so have been using the cadence reading to give me a prompt to change down and spin a little more.

Anyway the result of this is that I'm fairly familiar with my cadence atm. This may not relate to other people but I find that an average of around 70-80 is good for me on the flats but I find much more power for the hills down at around 60.

The only times I've hit 100 is pedalling frantically down hill.

What ever feels comfortable for now.
Some people are quite happy to ride at a cadence of 100+, others around 70-80. And everything inbetween. There is no hard and fast number