Heart Rate

[BikeGary]

I also suspect that hard bar pulling might work for hard efforts as well - not because it generates work (it does not), but because being isometric effort it considerably rises your blood pressure, which might compensate drop in blood pressure in your legs due to recumbent position.

Hard bar pulling (while "sitting up") does improve my climbing ability. But only for short spurts. (50 ft?) It seems to work by giving my legs something to push against, my rigid body, vs my seat back. I use it only on short steep hills. Mostly my arms aren't up to the task for much longer distances.

I am still working on the "use your upper body in conjunction with your legs the way you do standing on a DF" technique. I don't have it down yet. I can sprint for short distances on the flat doing it but I find that I "wobble" from side to side and have trouble holding a straight line on a hill. This is a serious issue when I'm climbing in a bike lane on a 50mph road as I cannot afford to swerve into traffic, and there is a steep curb on the other side. So lots of side street practice and until then I spin (90 to 100 rpm) and use a combination of a stretch of pull only stokes and push mainly strokes with my legs when I am climbing on my commute.

The technique seems to be a combination, push, pull with the arms in time with the legs. It's not intuitive at all to get the rhythm in sync.

And yeah on my first ride on the commute I was about 20% slower. Now I am about on par with the DF. Weather and how I feel can make either bike slow on a particular day. "It's not about the bike, it's the rider...."

 

[ed72]

My maximum HR on a bent is about 168-169 and 181-183 on an upright. I'm almost 60. I thought I had hit 171 on the bent once but a review of power files on GoldenCheetah says otherwise. I have only been out on the upright twice in the past year and that was to do a few maximum effort hill climb to prove to myself I wasn't just getting old. The old power and HR was still there....surprisingly.

 

[chicorider]

All I know is that I ride century rides 60 to 75 minutes faster on my V20 and S30 than I ever did on a DF bike. The miles fly by and my ass and shoulders don't hurt. While everyone else is shaking our their hands and coasting to give their butts a break, I'm still motoring along with a stupid grin on my face and a 20 to 22 mph average for the ride. I don't know what my heart rate is for all that, but it sure does feel good.

 

[Rick Moore]

Wow! Lots of info to think about. A little more about me. I’m 63 years old and have been riding since age 43. I’ve got about 500 miles on the V 20. Today I went out 1.5 hours and did 30 minutes at tempo. Looking back at my records, today I rode about the same speed as on my DF in the same conditions with the same perceived effort but with avg heart rate about 5 beats lower. Anyway, I love the bike and my butt and back doesn’t hurt and my wrists don’t ache, so as of now I love the bike and I’m looking forward to my first race....the 12 hours of Sebring! Hope to see y’all there!

 

[Balor]

If you are only 500 miles in, and only about 5 beats lower, than you might see full adaptation yet!
The most telling sight of 'recumbent allergy' is foot numbness (and much greater propencity for 'hot foot' as well).
If you don't have it (and most people do not) - you will likely get close numbers to DF.

 

[DavidCH]

foot numbness

That's when i changed my shoes and pedals... look pedals spread the load nicely. Many here use speedplay. Let's hope you don't get foot numbness.

 

[Balor]

Foot numbness is basically transient nerve damage due to localized hypoxia. Unlike most other tissuee, nerve tissue does not tolerate hypoxia all too well. It can be from pressure (think your legs/arms going to sleep from awkward pose), but I never had those problems on DF. My rather comfortable MTB shoes became utterly unrideable, so I've had to finally had to switch to road shoes with speedplay cleats and wedges. They are nigh unwalkable (which can be actually dangerous on brevets - try negotiating a slippery (steel steps) railway overpass carrying a 20kg bent while being stoned from exertion...), but at least rideable.
Anyway, 10" of BB to seat does not work for me at all, basically. About 6 inches 'kind of' works, but I still get transient numbness even without climbing on longer rides. 3 inches works even for longer rides, I only get transient numbness when lots of climbing involved (yet, likely, it still involve some power drop because there is anecdotal data that suggest that power drop onset happen long before foot numbness starts to manifest - plus, my speeds suggest that).

BB at or below seat seems to work fine and even does not really result in drop in power if my HR and PM data is of any indication, but makes one's aerodynamics only marginally better than a road bike.

 

[Rick Moore]

If you are only 500 miles in, and only about 5 beats lower, than you might see full adaptation yet!
The most telling sight of 'recumbent allergy' is foot numbness (and much greater propencity for 'hot foot' as well).
If you don't have it (and most people do not) - you will likely get close numbers to DF.

Thanks. However, what you said about hot foot might be bad news for summer....I already experience hot foot on my DF and was hoping the V-20’s laid back position would make it better. As of now during the winter I’m not experiencing very much hot foot....just some minor numbness in my feet. I use Look pedals and have my foot as far forward as possible so I’m using the whole foot to pedal (not just my toes). Anyway nothing bad now and hoping for the best in warmer weather.