How do the Pros Compare to You and I?
Mark your calendar for August 25th when the world’s best cyclists go to battle on Flagstaff Mountain in Boulder, Colorado. The pros in the USA Pro Cycling Challenge will climb this 3-mile ascent at breathtaking speeds.
So how do the pros do it? Why do they climb so fast? We decided to conduct a little experiment on Flagstaff Mountain in Boulder, where the finish of Stage 6 of the USA Pro Cycling Challenge will be staged. We asked both a pro who specializes in climbing, as well as a better than average recreational cyclist, to do a training ride up Flagstaff. The riders we chose were Chris Butler, age 24, on the Champion System pro team (Chris raced the 2011 USAPCC for Team BMC), and TrainingPeaks’ CEO Gear Fisher, age 42. They both rode up Flagstaff and recorded the ride using SRM power meters so that we could analyze the data afterwards.
Flagstaff is a well-known local 3.2-mile climb that averages 6.5% grade and climbs 1140 ft in altitude. As we look at the two files we can see how Butler rode the climb at about 90% effort while Fisher rode it near his maximum. The difference in finishing times was more than 10 minutes between the two riders. Butler finished the climb in 15:08 while Fisher rode it in 26:14. MORE..
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