Over the years of riding my tricycles, I have found that my cadence is most comfortable in the 70-75 rpm range – and on longer rides, my cadence is even slower.

I record my rides with a Polar s720i, capturing cadence, speed, distance, and altitude data.

For the uninitiated, cadence is how fast you pedal.

With over 5 years worth of data collected, it has become easy to see trends and where I need to improve.

To improve on my form and abilities on the trike, staying at a slower cadence is not always a good thing.

Although a slower cadence allows me to use more power when pedalling, it does expend more energy, good for climbing hills, terrible for endurance rides. A faster cadence allows me to go faster and farther with less effort over a given period.

Having a trainer and using it on a daily basis gives me the means to create a predictable routine that I can use to gauge my progress towards a given goal.

My goal over the coming months is to increase my cadence speed.

With this in mind, I rode to a new podcast from PodRunner called “Sunchaser”, 169 bpm, 85 rpm, 56 minutes.

I lasted about 35 minutes with my cadence at 85 rpms, so there is room for improvement.

When I record my rides outside, I can see how effective my training routines are, especially when I focus on a technique like cadence.