Read time: 4min.
By Coach Yan Busset
Forget Perfect Pedaling: Key Factors to Improve Your Cycling Efficiency
Beguinner cyclists, especially triathletes, are often told to focus on perfecting their pedaling technique, aiming for a smooth, circular motion that reduces dead spots to maximize power. But for most age groupers, obsessing over technique might not deliver the results they’re hoping for. In fact, focusing on technique without the right foundation is like trying to mimic a ballet choreography without having the flexibility and mobility of a dancer. No matter how hard you try, without that physical base, you’ll struggle to achieve fluid movement. Similarly, for cyclists, without proper mobility, core strength, and positioning, focusing on pedaling technique can be a waste of your precious time. In this article, we’ll explore why pedaling technique is often overrated and what you should focus on instead to improve efficiency, reduce injury risk, and see gains across all disciplines.
1. Start with Proper Bike Fit: The Foundation Before Technique
Before even thinking about improving your pedaling technique, you need to make sure your position on the bike is correct. If your bike fit is poor, you’ll be working inefficiently from the start. A proper fit ensures your joints and muscles are working within their optimal range, allowing for better power transfer and minimizing the risk of injury. Without a solid fit, focusing on pedaling technique is like trying to run in shoes that don’t fit, you’ll always be fighting against your own body.
2. Mobility and Flexibility: A Win-Win for Cycling and Beyond
Improving your mobility and flexibility is a win-win for triathletes. Not only does better mobility allow for smoother pedaling, but it also reduces the risk of injury and leads to gains in your other disciplines. For example, hip and ankle mobility are essential for generating power on the bike, but they’re also crucial for a strong run and swim. Investing time in mobility exercises gives you more freedom of movement, allowing your body to work in harmony across the full triathlon.
3. Core Strength: Stabilization and Power Transfer
To ensure that your pedaling technique is efficient, it’s good to make sure that the energy you produce is not lost in the system. Strength is the major limiter in cycling, usually, your legs will give up before your cardio. So make sure your training regime includes strength training. Simple but effective moves with free weights rather than machines will work on your core stability at the same time. You can also use specific core drills on the bike (see part #6).
4. Motor Skills: Activating the Right Muscles at the Right Time
Motor skills play a crucial role in your overall ability to cycle efficiently. When increasing cadence, it becomes harder for your muscles to activate fast enough. Being able to engage the correct muscle groups quickly and effectively can be the difference between a smooth pedal stroke and one filled with dead spots. Similar to how high ground contact time in running or difficulty with swimming technique indicates poor neuromuscular coordination, a challenging pedaling technique can signal the same. Drills like high-cadence hypervelocity drills (where you push your RPM to the maximum in short bursts) and low-cadence, high-resistance efforts help improve the connection between your brain and muscles, allowing you to engage and fire the right muscles more efficiently. While neither cadence is ideal for efficient pedaling in race conditions, expanding your abilities across both ends of the spectrum will increase your overall pedaling economy.
5. Bike Volume: The Simple Path to Smoother Pedaling
Sometimes, the simplest answer is the best one. If you want to improve your pedaling technique, spend more time on the bike. As you increase your bike volume, your body naturally adapts to the demands of cycling, gradually improving your pedal stroke and smoothness.
6. Drills That Actually Help:
While technique drills may seem appealing, there are more effective drills that target mobility, strength, and coordination:
Single-leg pedaling drills: Help identify muscle imbalances and improve motor control.
Hypervelocity and low-cadence intervals: Enhance neuromuscular efficiency and balance across different effort levels and RPM.
Core stabilization during interval training: Next time you start to push an interval on the bike, try this: take a firm grip on the handlebar, stay seated from the start, and keep your upper body as still as a statue, no wiggling from side to side, and push hard on the pedals. This will force you to engage all your stabilizing core muscles. You’ll see it’s harder than it sounds.
Conclusion:
Focusing on pedaling technique might get a lot of attention, but for most age groupers, the real improvements come from building a strong, flexible, and coordinated body. This doesn't mean there isn’t a "right" pedaling technique, there certainly is. However, I prefer a reverse-engineered approach, instead of mimicking a perfect technique, first focus on eliminating the limiters, such as poor mobility, weak strength, core stability, and motor inefficiencies. By getting rid of these limiters, your pedaling technique will naturally smooth out. The added benefit is that this holistic approach will improve not only your cycling but also your swim and run, making you a more well-rounded triathlete overall.
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