When you think about the various Tours, you almost immediately visualize riding over a hundred miles for streaks of days on long stretches of flat roads.  But for sheer excitement, it is when the Tour moves into the mountains that are hearts start beating and we ask, what would it take for me to do one of those climbs.

In this section, we examine the physical aspects of climbing and how to quantify specific challenges into a numerical form that we can compare against our own abilities. In doing so, we can then answer the question as to who gets to eat whose lunch: yourself or the hill.

Next Topic:   Hill Ascents