Hill training (bike)

And MY answer is to build strength but ON the bike. Lifting weights won't help you to go up hills or make you faster at all. Let’s see, if you hold a 70 cadence going up a hill (140 rpm for both legs) for 60 min that’s 8,400 pedal strokes in one hour and the strength demands to do so are very specific to pedalling as they are just a fraction of what it takes your muscles to squat 50 pounds for instance.  READ THIS

I don’t see how 3x20 low resistance squats or even 5x5x20 (insert here squats, leg press, lunges, etc) will help you. To improve your strength for climbing you have to do hill repeats, or on the trainer you can do low cadence big gear reps and power spin ups and of course ride lots!

In terms of triathlon training, if you want to improve on all 3 sports your best investment of your time will be to swim, bike and run. Specific training it is what will make you better.  But if you tri more for the health aspect of it THEN adding other type of strength training might be a good idea. 99% of the strength training I do or recommend to those I help is tri specific  (swim with paddles, drag suit, hills repeats, running drills, etc) and the only time I hit the gym is because of time constraints is either getting JUST a gym session or nothing…

While you can't get on the hills now, you can build your strength on the bike which is what will help get you up those hills.  Add some hard intervals into your cycling sessions.  Even if they aren't on a hill, they will help you build the "strength" you need to get up a hill. 

The trainer is a great investment because then you can train on your bike more often.  Follow Jorge's advice above.  If you want to climb better, ride more.

Everyone listed above have made great comments, and I agree with them all.

Living in the midwest I get locked indoors during the winter as well and ride primarily hills during the season.  To keep my "HILL LEGS" I incorporate "stomp" drills and "low cadence" drills into my trainer workouts.  Stomps are just that, you put the gearing in the toughest gear and stomp for 30 seconds, max effort, then recover, do again.  Low cadence drills are more of a grind for several minutes.  I'll stay seated in the lowest possible gear and spin circles at 40 rpm for ladders (2,3,4,5,6 minutes with equal recovery).

Just my 2c.

Yes... it tells you that Lance trained his legs to do so for racing, but it does NOT mean he didn’t train at lower cadence at all. (A discovery channel special in which they show him going up long climb mixing standing up and sitting down efforts at different gearing/duration comes to mind)

1. The discussion here is on training, not racing.
2. Lance is a freak!
3. Even when racing, higher cadences aren't necessary best for everyone: http://www.trifuel.com/triathlon/bike/cycling-cadence-and-pedaling-economy-001048.php

haygosl - 2007-02-13 10:07 AM I suppose I was generalizing based on personal experience/opinion. I have skinnyish legs, so I have never been capable of turning massive watts/pedal stroke. High cadence works best for me, though! Sam bear- no comment about how my marathon went?

Looks like it went well, congratulations. Just think what you could do if you train.

I'm new at this, too and have the same issues getting outside during the week.  When possible I adjust my schedule to do my hills on the weekend.  When not possible I've found a spin class to be a decent workout.  Yes - lots of pros/cons on spin class, but for a break in the routine (and the spin class I attend is run by a cyclist/triathlete - she's training for IMLP) I find its a decent workout on hills building the resistance, keeping a steady cadence, etc.

Side note, I avoid the other classes run by the personal trainers that yell at you if you are not standing up/sitting down, sweating, breathing hard like they are.  I find them pretty worthless.

similar issues here

Can generate a decent pace on the flats but can't do the hills well . In a group ride , usually get to the front on the flats but come the hills and am bringing up the tail ! So figured i need to work on my hill climbing .

Unfortunately don't have the time/schedule to make an actual hill climb on my bike (except the weekend and thats a group workout so don't have any control over that) . Acc. to my plan , I just have an hour at lunch maybe 1.5 and figure that am going to put this to good use by hitting the "Hill-workout" on the stat. bike and then doing some strength workouts . Now , it may not be the best i.e. ride outside and ride hills but figure thats the best i can do .

OP , not sure if this helps , but thought I'd share what my approach is . if there are any workouts for the time-constrained , then am all ears . IMO , all the prev. posts while very informative , don't seem to address the constraints of the OP.

This will only be effective training if you plan on standing on the pedals when you climb during a race. Which, of course, will be detrimental to your run.

Actually, I think the suggestion is get on the bike and ride.  Ride hard at times, then ride easy to rest and then ride hard again.  Repeat until it's time to get off the bike.  Do it outdoors on real hills whenever possible for the best adaptation.  When it's not possible, use what you got (trainer's best, spin bike next and exercise bike last).  Here's a specific workout someone could do in your 1hr slot:

20' warm-up

3 x 30/30, 1' easy
4' at LT, 1' easy
4 x 30/30, 1' easy
4' at LT, 1' easy
5 x 30/30, 1' easy
4' at LT, 1' easy

10' cool-down

The "30/30"s are 30" hard (best effort), 30" VERY easy.  The "LT" segments should be at an effort that you have to really focus on to maintain, but can hold for an extended period of time.  Enjoy!

low cadence drills do work and work well. 

Look at it this way... what makes a hill hard?  You fight gravity, meaning that you have more resistance to your pedaling.  It takes more energy to climb 1 mile of a hill then fight 1 mile of air.  So how do you train (regardless of cadence)?  You increase resistance.  It actually translates into training at higher power levels (which is cadence independant).

So whether you want to train at high or low cadence levels, you have to increase the resistance.  It just happens that for the same resistance level, lower gearing equates to more force resistance at the pedals.  If you want to train at high RPM, then you just have to increase the resistance more.

No matter how fast you spin the pedals, sometimes you just have to make it hurt

I don't disagree with training in each sport to get better, faster and stronger, but weight training is also very important.  Look around at every serious athlete in the world, no matter what sport, they are weight training.  It's called cross training, building different muscles, using different muscles to make your entire body bigger, faster and stronger.  Don't get me wrong, not telling anyone to bulk up, just train your entire body.  3 reps or 12 or 15 builds strength and endurance.  Not to be rude, but it's foolish to believe lifting does not help an athlete.  Use all  resources avaliable to get better.

Train smarter not just harder.