Ayesha wrote:To categorise a hill in the big French race, a baseline unit was established. This was the energy taken to propel the car 10 km along the flat at 20kmh.
A hill is categorised on the car’s energy requirement to get from the base to summit.
All done at 20 kmh, resulting multiple of the car’s fuel use tells the Category of the hill.
Therefore, the difficulty of a hill is on how much total energy is required, not the gradient alone.
With a low enough gear, a cyclist could climb a 40% if it was 50 m long. He may not be able to climb that 40% if it went up for 1 km.
The 50 m long 40% wouldn’t qualify as a hill, and the 1 km long 40% would be a Cat 2.
wasn't it whether a 2CV could get up the climb in a certain gear rather than how much energy expended, 1st cat being the hardest and thus first gear for the vehicle to get up it?
As for the energy for a car to catergorise..I don't see how that is comparable to a human riding up as a humans varies hugely. their energy/effort levels required are not the same even though the hills/mountains themselves may have a very similar profile.
For quite some time the catergory has also being dependant on the positioning of the climb on that days route and what climbs came before and comes after. An HC after say 50 miles may well be 'easier' compared to a 1st or even 2nd catergory climb toward the end of the same ride. Different years have seen catergories changed for the same climbs..
Additionally doesn't the effect of altitude mean a motor vehicle uses LESS fuel relatively speaking to one at lower altitiudes meaning more difficult clinbs higher up could/would be judged as not quite as difficult using the how much used in fuel indicator??
