I'm a firm believer in spin up, hammer down, with a goal of even power distribution. Every race that I have attacked on hills has ended in an expensive long walk, every race that I've power managed I seemed to out bike a lot of the crowd who is powering hills early on and my wheels don't go flying off with 5 miles to the finish line.

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Regards,
J. Smith

Yep - easy up, hard down.

 I did Ironman Wisconsin a few years ago and prior to the race, I was told by friends, who had already done the race, to spin easy up each hill and hammer it down the other side. Also they told me to pay attention to the people hammering it up the hills, at some point you will pass them and that's what happened. You'll see a lot of people at the hilly races hammering it up hills and then they stop pedaling once at the top and coast down the other side. It's a lot more efficient to spin easy up and hammer it down.

Agree with all...but don’t stop and coast at the top of the hill. Keep pedaling over the crest so you’ve got momentum to power you down the other side

Great advice from all. Thanks everyone!

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Not everything is as it seems -Mr. Miyagi

At what point do you stop peddling 90 cadence in your highest gear? 100?

I guess I’d say 100rpm

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Not everything is as it seems -Mr. Miyagi

wrote:At what point do you stop peddling

90 cadence in your highest gear?

100?

100+ sounds about right, I watch power and HR all the time but don't frequently monitor cadence while on course like I do on the trainer. The only time I stop pedaling is when I have spun out the 50-11, at that point I lower my head into my aerobars and try not to piss myself.

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Regards,
J. Smith

The advice so far has been pretty backwards. Going 'hard' when you're going slow makes the fastest race time for equivalent efforts. The best write-up I have ever seen came from Alan Couzens in part 3 of his "Know Your Enemy" series at http://www.endurancecorner.com/2015/09/14/know-your-enemy-part-iii-optimal-pacing-for-different-courses/.

Joe Friel also discusses it (and simplifies it) at http://www.joefrielsblog.com/2010/08/coast-or-pedal-on-a-downhill.html.

Edit: Corrected Joel Friel to Joe Friel

This!

Whilst there is a physiological benefit to even pacing, if the hills are steep then this is outweighed by the aerodynamic component (effort required for increased speed at higher speeds)

I used the push harder going up and easy going down this past weekend. Worked very well for me

Thank you.

This is consistent with what I've read here on ST in the past as well. If you take a look at the recommended power profile on BBS, it is also consistent with this methodology (more power when going slow, less power when going fast).

You can create a free profile on BBS and get a recommended power profile for the race course.

I'm also doing a hillier course next week (IMLP) and am planning on going with this strategy. Hope it works out!

When gravity dominates your resistance, increases in effort give nearly proportional increases in speed. When aero dominates your resistance, increases in effort give only small increases in speed. Furthermore, you spend a lot more time going uphill than going downhill.

So, it tends to be worth it to put more pedaling effort into climbs than descents. But this doesn't mean that you should blow up on the climbs; burning up your matches makes you overall weaker later. Nor does it imply that you should immediately stop pedaling the moment you start to crest a hill.

There's not an easy answer because it depends on your strengths and the actual profile of the ride. Like, a shallow descent with a tailwind can merit putting much more effort in than a steep descent with a headwind, since your efforts aren't being squandered as much by air drag in the former case.

If you believe the physics engine behind BestBikeSplit, then it seems that the 'optimal' approach would be to go slightly harder than your target NP on the uphills, up to nearly FTP for a short duration on the steepest climb, and going ~20% below target NP on the descents. I think BBS has a free trial where you can model one course/race for free so you can see for yourself what it recommends, and also which parameters you can modify. For example, after some experimentation I chose to reduce the target max. power in the model from 110% of FTP to 95% of FTP and that really helped me have fresher legs coming off the bike.

Agree, BBS and a lot of other people who understand this much better than i do suggest a similar pacing strategy. I have used these methods in TT's over the past years to great effect. In general slightly above goal power on hills, slightly below goal power on downhills, coast only if i go over 100RPM in the 54x11. Length of climb will also play a factor as well as wind direction. Push harder into the head wind, slightly less into a tail wind.

Bolded is my input into this debate, totally agree and I don't think it is emphasized enough in the articles linked. I agree that the bigger efforts up the hill (to a point) will equate to better times, but you need to continue to work as you crest, and even a bit down the other side to get your speed back to where gravity will hold it for you. There is so much more to be gained by getting back up to speed quicker, and going from 10mph up a hill to 20+mph down, sure gravity will get you there, but a few extra good turns of the cranks will get you there much faster, at very little cost.

Those guys are good

https://www.bestbikesplit.com/