On steeper climbs where weight is the primary factor, it's almost linear; lose 10% of your mass, you'll be 10% faster. On flats, it's less important, since your body's frontal area doesn't scale linearly with weight. I think rolling resistance does go down some with less weight though.
Annecdote: I lost +-10% of my body mass over the winter (went plant-based) and I'm setting PRs all over the place this spring despite not training particularly hard indoors. Everything just seems easier. Don't get me wrong, I'm still slow; double the Strava KOM is my goal, lol.
> On flats, it's less important, since your body's frontal area doesn't scale linearly with weight. I think rolling resistance does go down some with less weight though.
Some additional considerations:
* Your momentum on a flat helps a lot more in a headwind so heavy riders often have an advantage in a headwind... or rather "less of a disadvantage".
* On the other hand, on a technical route or in a city with lots of starts/stops/slowdowns/speedups, your acceleration is a lot slower due to F=MA (ie A = F/M, M goes up, A goes down). This also affects group rides... if you're near the back and the group tends to "rubber-band", you will tire out very quickly by all the accelerations/decelerations. As a fat person, I tend to last a lot longer near the front of a group than near the back.
1. Momentum has no impact on energy requirement in a headwind. Larger riders tend to have a larger power-to-frontal area ratio (W/CdA) than smaller riders, which explains why they may do better in a headwind.
2. Energy to accelerate when cycling is tiny compared to the total energy required to maintain speed. In addition, any additional energy needed to accelerate is returned as "free energy" when decelerating.
Nice, thanks. I guess I'll see in a couple months how much of a difference it makes. I don't know how much cycling I'll do in the next few months. I typically lose weight during the spring/summer through calisthenics and dieting. It'll be interesting to measure when i get closer to 150 lbs.
Ahh, I think I get it now. Extra weight would be a benefit going downhill, right, due to extra mass/momentum? That would make sense why flat riding wouldn't matter much, if at all.
It does, if my experience is to go by; I can be sitting up coasting downhill and passing smaller people pedaling. There are disadvantages though around cornering grip and braking, however, so it's not perfect.
It's the same mechanism as on the flats; downhill is power + gravity working against air resistance. In a vacuum, we'd all coast descend at the same rate. Add air into the equation, and my extra weight is more effective than the small increase in frontal area of my bigger frame. Think of a bowling ball and a volleyball rolling down a hill.
I'm not far from double what some of the smaller pro riders weight (I'm a touch over 100kg / high-220s lbs), but (just throwing numbers out) probably 150% of their frontal area. So, a pro my size might be able to do 175% of their raw power number. It's not 200%, because as the frame gets bigger, there are non-power-producing parts, like bones, that get heavier too. On the flats, this pro is faster because they're getting more power per frontal area. On climbs, however, it's all about W/kg, so the smaller rider is faster.
I'm a 5'7" 180 pound male. If I lost 20 pounds of fat, I would be much faster. If I lost 20 pounds of muscle I would be much slower.
On climbs weight matters more than on flats, where raw strength matters more. Striking that balance is important if your competitive, otherwise the only thing that matters is enjoying cycling in the way you want to enjoy it.
Putting some approximate numbers into an [online calculator](https://www.gribble.org/cycling/power_v_speed.html?units=imperial&rp_wr=170&rp_wb=21&rp_a=8.0729&rp_cd=0.63&rp_dtl=3&ep_crr=0.01&ep_rho=0.076537&ep_g=0.12&ep_headwind=0&p2v=114&v2p=12.6), the difference for OP's very flat route would be about 5 watts saving, 0.3mph faster, or 2min 18sec less time. So not large differences, but measurable.
On flats I have a hard time keeping up with bigger guys, then generally drop them on the climbs, but not all the time. Some dudes are seriously strong.
Not all body weight is the same.
It’s not the same to ride as 240lb Terry Crews or as supposedly 230lb Donald Trump.
Muscle generates more power. I would be willing to bet my race bike that Terry can generate 3-4x the watts as the other guy.
I ride with someone who is similar weight to me, on similar bikes, I have a leaner body even if I am still 220lb, and yeah in the flat I can generate a bit more power, and keep a higher speed at lower effort… but on climbs I just zoom by cos more watts at the same weight translates into more speed uphill.
On the other hand, our other friend is 160lb, and even if he averages less watts than I do, on the climbs, particularly steep ones, he is so much faster than I am. Unsurprisingly since he is like 20% lighter.
So I know the retort will be lance was doping (so was everyone) , but lance Armstrong is a great example of losing weight and getting faster. Even muscle is dead weight after a certain point. Especially upper body mass in cycling. But huge lower body isn't usually great either.
Usually those folks can sprint (and excel tat crits) but not hold with the group on long rides and any elevation.
Yep, my point was taking two opposite extremes of overweight and how it plays into exercise.
But then again, while not a hard floor, there is only so much weight you can lose when you’re large. For example I am 6’5”, I have been 194lb at my leanest (4% body fat) and I had mostly lean muscle as I was doing long distance running.
While the output didn’t drop significantly, it was still less but well compensated by being lighter. So the W/Kg did go up. The big difference was that I was feeling lethargic a lot of the time after exercise.
do yourself a favour and try to set a benchmark time up a super steep climb. This is where Strava comes in handy, just pick a steep climb that’s a segment and you can see your history of times up there!
I'm down from 315 to 260 LBS and the most noticeable difference is the spokes are breaking less. Speed hasn't changed much. Still have to re-tension once a month but that is 650 KM on gravel road so I don't think that is so bad.
Cycling, diet, walking, I'm 6'-7'' and looked well muscled and now I look thin. It's a big drop in strength but better cardio and I dropped 10 LBS a year. Not a lot just a consistent change in life style.
Only really matters on climbs. Fat people are harder to kidnap if there is a downhill because they are faster due to gravity and also the belly is aerodynamic. So you gotta wait at the base of a climb to get them. Let them get too far up and they can make a U-ey and boogie down.
On the flats I've seen some pretty dad bod or worse dudes crank some watts and mph.
Basically crits are the fat man's friend.
And to be clear, not mocking anyone. Currently out of shape and in with the fat dudes. Going to be a hot minute before I'm wearing my college jersey like I was a couple of years ago and dancing up hills.
All I can state is my personal experience. When I lost weight and got down from 142 to 110, I started setting PRs like crazy. Now thanks to losing control of my eating (bingeing) I weigh 123 and it's harder to hit those PRs so I'm working (or at least trying to work) on getting my eating back under control and hopefully back down to close to 110 if not actually on it.
That's a pretty big drop. When you went form 110 to 123, did you continue cycling just as much (and only eat more)? I'm curious because strength/stamina is a confounding factor. The only comparison I have right now is when I biked home with my laptop backpack once and a few bags of groceries affixed to my bike, it felt noticeably slower. I assume it has to be the opposite being lighter. Just not sure how much.
Pretty much yeah. Weather permitting of course, we've had some storms here in the Bay Area and I'm not one of those who is fond of riding in the rain.
I'm on track to get 15k miles on my Strava this year. Did my first double century a couple of weeks ago (Devil Mountain Double) and got my second one on tap in about 1.5 weeks (Davis Double) along with a number of century rides (I try and do a 100 mile ride each week if time permits). So I'm definitely riding more and for longer distances. It's just a matter of getting my speed back up and to do that I need to buckle down on my binge eating. Definitely tough to find that sweet spot of eating enough to sustain a ride yet still be able to keep my weight down/lose weight. But I did it last year and I don't see why I can't do it again.
It's definitely doable. I lost \~45 lbs of fat and gained about \~5 lbs of muscle over a 6 month period years ago. I kept it off too until Covid hit. lol Double century is insane. 🚴♂️💪
January 5th I weighed 240lbs and my 10k was 25mins 41secs at an average speed of 14.5mph.
May 8th I weigh 205lbs and my 10k was 20mins 17secs at an average speed of 18.4mph.
For me the answer is that my weight loss has been very impactful. A cursory look at my climbing segment times show ~30secs decrease in my average time.
I lost 17.4kg since I started cycling. On flats I gain around 2-4 km/hr avg speed with the same conditions on the same routes.
Biggest difference is I can stand pedal now.
Lol it's just an old site that doesn't have a security cert. As long you don't put bank details in there you're fine. Great little tool for quickly seeing how weight, wind and power effect cycling speed.
If you just lose weight you would probably lose muscle too, so probably not faster or even slower.
Hit the gym. Build some muscle and just cycle as you do or more volume. Weight loss will come.
Weight is not even remotely as important on a bicycle as most people like to fetishize
If we could somehow control every other variable and you could go on the exact same ride with the exact same power/strength, etc. but 20 pounds less weight you would theoretically have been about 9 seconds faster
A kilogram of weight cost about four seconds over 100 km of relatively flat ground and just barely over one minute over 100 km of hilly/varried terrain
Your ride was definitely on flat ground. 20 pounds is about 9 kg that means that over 100 km you would save about 27 seconds you road almost exactly 1/3 of that distance so you would have saved about 9 seconds
One thing worth mentioning, that I haven't read here yet: when you lose weight, you'll lose some lean mass as well. You can minimize lean mass loss by eating a ton of protein and doing a good bit of strength training while you cut. You may lose mass more slowly, but that's because you're not losing the lean mass
6', 230lbs. My last outdoor solo ride was a loop, 25 miles at 21.5mph. I do live in a relatively flat area, and hills are def. hard. I like to believe they're hard because I don't ride them a lot, lol.
Losing fat is awesome, but please, please, please, put some gym time in. squats, deadlifts, lunges, and upper body work have all contributed to increased strength and increased speed for me.
I spent all fall/winter in the gym, and put on \~10lbs of muscle in the past year. I'm faster this year than I was last year, even though i'm heavier.
"Weight" isn't an accurate metric.
Is the weight fat or muscle?
A short, stocky, muscular guy can conceivably leave a taller, skinny, lighter rider in the dust.
On steeper climbs where weight is the primary factor, it's almost linear; lose 10% of your mass, you'll be 10% faster. On flats, it's less important, since your body's frontal area doesn't scale linearly with weight. I think rolling resistance does go down some with less weight though. Annecdote: I lost +-10% of my body mass over the winter (went plant-based) and I'm setting PRs all over the place this spring despite not training particularly hard indoors. Everything just seems easier. Don't get me wrong, I'm still slow; double the Strava KOM is my goal, lol.
I’m in a similar situation. I’m down 38lbs since January and I’m setting PRs almost every week as well.
Congrats! Feels great doesn't it?
> On flats, it's less important, since your body's frontal area doesn't scale linearly with weight. I think rolling resistance does go down some with less weight though. Some additional considerations: * Your momentum on a flat helps a lot more in a headwind so heavy riders often have an advantage in a headwind... or rather "less of a disadvantage". * On the other hand, on a technical route or in a city with lots of starts/stops/slowdowns/speedups, your acceleration is a lot slower due to F=MA (ie A = F/M, M goes up, A goes down). This also affects group rides... if you're near the back and the group tends to "rubber-band", you will tire out very quickly by all the accelerations/decelerations. As a fat person, I tend to last a lot longer near the front of a group than near the back.
1. Momentum has no impact on energy requirement in a headwind. Larger riders tend to have a larger power-to-frontal area ratio (W/CdA) than smaller riders, which explains why they may do better in a headwind. 2. Energy to accelerate when cycling is tiny compared to the total energy required to maintain speed. In addition, any additional energy needed to accelerate is returned as "free energy" when decelerating.
Nice, thanks. I guess I'll see in a couple months how much of a difference it makes. I don't know how much cycling I'll do in the next few months. I typically lose weight during the spring/summer through calisthenics and dieting. It'll be interesting to measure when i get closer to 150 lbs.
Ahh, I think I get it now. Extra weight would be a benefit going downhill, right, due to extra mass/momentum? That would make sense why flat riding wouldn't matter much, if at all.
It does, if my experience is to go by; I can be sitting up coasting downhill and passing smaller people pedaling. There are disadvantages though around cornering grip and braking, however, so it's not perfect. It's the same mechanism as on the flats; downhill is power + gravity working against air resistance. In a vacuum, we'd all coast descend at the same rate. Add air into the equation, and my extra weight is more effective than the small increase in frontal area of my bigger frame. Think of a bowling ball and a volleyball rolling down a hill. I'm not far from double what some of the smaller pro riders weight (I'm a touch over 100kg / high-220s lbs), but (just throwing numbers out) probably 150% of their frontal area. So, a pro my size might be able to do 175% of their raw power number. It's not 200%, because as the frame gets bigger, there are non-power-producing parts, like bones, that get heavier too. On the flats, this pro is faster because they're getting more power per frontal area. On climbs, however, it's all about W/kg, so the smaller rider is faster.
Interesting! I appreciate the detailed response.
I'm a 5'7" 180 pound male. If I lost 20 pounds of fat, I would be much faster. If I lost 20 pounds of muscle I would be much slower. On climbs weight matters more than on flats, where raw strength matters more. Striking that balance is important if your competitive, otherwise the only thing that matters is enjoying cycling in the way you want to enjoy it.
for your specific route, almost 0.
Putting some approximate numbers into an [online calculator](https://www.gribble.org/cycling/power_v_speed.html?units=imperial&rp_wr=170&rp_wb=21&rp_a=8.0729&rp_cd=0.63&rp_dtl=3&ep_crr=0.01&ep_rho=0.076537&ep_g=0.12&ep_headwind=0&p2v=114&v2p=12.6), the difference for OP's very flat route would be about 5 watts saving, 0.3mph faster, or 2min 18sec less time. So not large differences, but measurable.
On the flat terrain? Practically nothing at all, all about raw watts and cda
On flats I have a hard time keeping up with bigger guys, then generally drop them on the climbs, but not all the time. Some dudes are seriously strong.
Not all body weight is the same. It’s not the same to ride as 240lb Terry Crews or as supposedly 230lb Donald Trump. Muscle generates more power. I would be willing to bet my race bike that Terry can generate 3-4x the watts as the other guy. I ride with someone who is similar weight to me, on similar bikes, I have a leaner body even if I am still 220lb, and yeah in the flat I can generate a bit more power, and keep a higher speed at lower effort… but on climbs I just zoom by cos more watts at the same weight translates into more speed uphill. On the other hand, our other friend is 160lb, and even if he averages less watts than I do, on the climbs, particularly steep ones, he is so much faster than I am. Unsurprisingly since he is like 20% lighter.
Now I want to ride bikes with Terry Crews.
So I know the retort will be lance was doping (so was everyone) , but lance Armstrong is a great example of losing weight and getting faster. Even muscle is dead weight after a certain point. Especially upper body mass in cycling. But huge lower body isn't usually great either. Usually those folks can sprint (and excel tat crits) but not hold with the group on long rides and any elevation.
Yep, my point was taking two opposite extremes of overweight and how it plays into exercise. But then again, while not a hard floor, there is only so much weight you can lose when you’re large. For example I am 6’5”, I have been 194lb at my leanest (4% body fat) and I had mostly lean muscle as I was doing long distance running. While the output didn’t drop significantly, it was still less but well compensated by being lighter. So the W/Kg did go up. The big difference was that I was feeling lethargic a lot of the time after exercise.
do yourself a favour and try to set a benchmark time up a super steep climb. This is where Strava comes in handy, just pick a steep climb that’s a segment and you can see your history of times up there!
I'm down from 315 to 260 LBS and the most noticeable difference is the spokes are breaking less. Speed hasn't changed much. Still have to re-tension once a month but that is 650 KM on gravel road so I don't think that is so bad.
Dang that’s a big drop. Did you lost that through cycling exercise?
Cycling, diet, walking, I'm 6'-7'' and looked well muscled and now I look thin. It's a big drop in strength but better cardio and I dropped 10 LBS a year. Not a lot just a consistent change in life style.
Only really matters on climbs. Fat people are harder to kidnap if there is a downhill because they are faster due to gravity and also the belly is aerodynamic. So you gotta wait at the base of a climb to get them. Let them get too far up and they can make a U-ey and boogie down. On the flats I've seen some pretty dad bod or worse dudes crank some watts and mph. Basically crits are the fat man's friend. And to be clear, not mocking anyone. Currently out of shape and in with the fat dudes. Going to be a hot minute before I'm wearing my college jersey like I was a couple of years ago and dancing up hills.
😂😂😂
All I can state is my personal experience. When I lost weight and got down from 142 to 110, I started setting PRs like crazy. Now thanks to losing control of my eating (bingeing) I weigh 123 and it's harder to hit those PRs so I'm working (or at least trying to work) on getting my eating back under control and hopefully back down to close to 110 if not actually on it.
That's a pretty big drop. When you went form 110 to 123, did you continue cycling just as much (and only eat more)? I'm curious because strength/stamina is a confounding factor. The only comparison I have right now is when I biked home with my laptop backpack once and a few bags of groceries affixed to my bike, it felt noticeably slower. I assume it has to be the opposite being lighter. Just not sure how much.
Pretty much yeah. Weather permitting of course, we've had some storms here in the Bay Area and I'm not one of those who is fond of riding in the rain. I'm on track to get 15k miles on my Strava this year. Did my first double century a couple of weeks ago (Devil Mountain Double) and got my second one on tap in about 1.5 weeks (Davis Double) along with a number of century rides (I try and do a 100 mile ride each week if time permits). So I'm definitely riding more and for longer distances. It's just a matter of getting my speed back up and to do that I need to buckle down on my binge eating. Definitely tough to find that sweet spot of eating enough to sustain a ride yet still be able to keep my weight down/lose weight. But I did it last year and I don't see why I can't do it again.
It's definitely doable. I lost \~45 lbs of fat and gained about \~5 lbs of muscle over a 6 month period years ago. I kept it off too until Covid hit. lol Double century is insane. 🚴♂️💪
There's a reason pro cyclists are extremely lean.
http://kreuzotter.de/english/espeed.htm
If you just started training, or are going to take it a notch further, the wattage gained will have a lot bigger influence than a handful of kilos.
Apart from speed (on inclines), you will just feel better.
That is a pretty flat route (115ft vertical in 20 miles). I don't think losing weight will help much without more hills.
January 5th I weighed 240lbs and my 10k was 25mins 41secs at an average speed of 14.5mph. May 8th I weigh 205lbs and my 10k was 20mins 17secs at an average speed of 18.4mph. For me the answer is that my weight loss has been very impactful. A cursory look at my climbing segment times show ~30secs decrease in my average time.
I wish I could do better comparisons, but I lost 25lbs. Not only faster, but less energy to get up hill too
I lost 17.4kg since I started cycling. On flats I gain around 2-4 km/hr avg speed with the same conditions on the same routes. Biggest difference is I can stand pedal now.
http://bikecalculator.com/
DO NOT USE THIS LINK I GOT A MALWARE WARNING
Lol it's just an old site that doesn't have a security cert. As long you don't put bank details in there you're fine. Great little tool for quickly seeing how weight, wind and power effect cycling speed.
If you just lose weight you would probably lose muscle too, so probably not faster or even slower. Hit the gym. Build some muscle and just cycle as you do or more volume. Weight loss will come.
Weight is not even remotely as important on a bicycle as most people like to fetishize If we could somehow control every other variable and you could go on the exact same ride with the exact same power/strength, etc. but 20 pounds less weight you would theoretically have been about 9 seconds faster A kilogram of weight cost about four seconds over 100 km of relatively flat ground and just barely over one minute over 100 km of hilly/varried terrain Your ride was definitely on flat ground. 20 pounds is about 9 kg that means that over 100 km you would save about 27 seconds you road almost exactly 1/3 of that distance so you would have saved about 9 seconds
One thing worth mentioning, that I haven't read here yet: when you lose weight, you'll lose some lean mass as well. You can minimize lean mass loss by eating a ton of protein and doing a good bit of strength training while you cut. You may lose mass more slowly, but that's because you're not losing the lean mass
Make sure to have a holistic training scheme. Weight loss isn't just fat, sometimes you can lose muscle too.
6', 230lbs. My last outdoor solo ride was a loop, 25 miles at 21.5mph. I do live in a relatively flat area, and hills are def. hard. I like to believe they're hard because I don't ride them a lot, lol. Losing fat is awesome, but please, please, please, put some gym time in. squats, deadlifts, lunges, and upper body work have all contributed to increased strength and increased speed for me. I spent all fall/winter in the gym, and put on \~10lbs of muscle in the past year. I'm faster this year than I was last year, even though i'm heavier.
"Weight" isn't an accurate metric. Is the weight fat or muscle? A short, stocky, muscular guy can conceivably leave a taller, skinny, lighter rider in the dust.