How to Be a Stronger Climber in Cycling
- 1). Visit a gym and work on developing the strength in your legs and your back. These are the muscles that you will be using when you move your bike up a hill and they will need to be strong. A good exercise is the squat, in which you stand with your feet hip width apart and bend your knees until your thighs are parallel with the floor. Hold the position before slowly straightening up. Start by repeating the movement a few times and as your thighs gain more strength increase the repetitions.
- 2). Stay seated as much as possible when riding the bike up a hill because even though you gain power while standing up on the pedals you lose a lot more power by not being in contact with the saddle. When your pelvis is not in contact with the saddle your back and thigh muscles have to work harder to move the bike so remaining seated during a climb uses your core strength more efficiently. To train yourself to stay seated when climbing, find a hill that is steep but relatively short. Hit the bottom of the hill at as high a speed as you can and move the bike up the hill while sitting in the saddle for as long as you can. Repeat the exercise and gradually build up the length of time that you stay seated. When you can go all the way up the short hill, move onto a longer one. If a hill is particularly steep you will need to alternate between standing and sitting so that you don't overwork one muscle group which could cause the muscles to cease up on you. When you are out of the saddle you should let the bike rock from side to side under you. An arc of about 6 inches will help you to produce the leverage that is needed to move the bike up the hill.
- 3). Keep your body in an upright position. Bending over the handlebars may be the best position for moving quickly over flat ground, but for climbing you need to sit as high as you can. Keep your upper body as straight as you can and your shoulders back. This position will keep your airways as open as they can be so that you can get the oxygen into your body that it will need to complete the climb.
- 4). Adopt a regular breathing pattern and you will deliver more oxygen to your muscles, which will allow them to produce more power to help you move the bike up the hill.
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