Pedaling Circles

I've never been on a bike that required pedaling in anything except circles...

A smooth circular pedaling motion provides more even power throughout the cycle.  By pulling up on the opposite pedal you are switching muscle groups, and recruiting more of the leg muscles.

A smoother circular motion will also help you spin at a higher cadence. If you were to only push down at a high cadence, you body would bounce all over the seat. I see it all the time in the spin class I teach.

As far as stronger riders pushing harder on the downstroke and producing more power, I can see that. The downstroke is also using body mass and a large muscle group to produce the motion. The style of pedaling can vary with terrain as well. In a sprint or end of a flat TT pushing hard on the downstroke will provide the maximum amount of short burst power. If you were on a steep incline, the dead spot caused by the down stroke would cause a slight deceleration, and loss of speed.

What he said.

People may HAVE conflicting views that state pedaling circles is important, but there aren't any conclusive data to support them.

I'm a believer in shall we say "pedal in semi-circles". I like the idea of powering a larger part of the circle.  Pushing into your toes on the top, powerful downstroke, scrape backward a bit on bottom, unweight the pedal on the upstroke.  Smoother than mashing the downstroke and ignoring the upstroke, but not trying to pedal in pure circles.  I've found this feels natural to me.

I don't believe in the pure circles approach.  It stands to reason that your legs are naturally going to be far stronger on the downstroke, so why not take advantage of that?  It seems anti-common-sense to artifically limit your downstroke power to match your upstroke power, in the name of circles. 

You are correct.  There isn't any evidence for "pedaling in circles" improving cycling performance.  Go here: http://www.edb.utexas.edu/coyle/publications.php and look for paper 43.  This research paper on elite cyclists that shows they produce power predominately on the down stroke.  Less than 4% of the work load produced was on the upstroke during cycling. 

Single leg drills are still a good work out primarily for improving the symmetry of power output.  Most athletes are stronger on one side of their body.  Single leg drills help to even out the asymmetry in power output. 

Is there any evidence that this is important?  Otherwise, I'd assume not.  It doesn't really matter if my right leg is 10% stronger than my left in propelling the bike.  And I'd seem to be better off raising them both than trying to get one to catch-up to the other for the sake of symmetry.

There is no reason to do any pulling of the pedal on the upstroke.  It is highly inefficient.

Oysterboy - 2012-01-12 11:18 AM Reply just to get my count # up to 100

Glad you made it!

It's not at all important to pull on the upstroke.

Therefore there is no real need for cages or clipless pedals.

None of the Tour-de-France winners, or Kona Winners or such bother with silly devices like clipless pedals that supposedly allow power transfer throughout the pedal stroke now do they?

You are a bad person.

I need to wash my hands and bleach the screen now...

It's not for the sake of symmetry.  It's for injury prevention.  Fredericson, et. al. (2000) found that weakness in hip muscles is a contributing factor to ITBS.  Some athletes develop ITBS during cycling; some during running.  I used single leg drills (along with functional strength training) to develop strength in the weaker leg and maybe prevent an injury.  This is also supported by an orthopedist, 2 sports chiropractors and a sports PT I work with.  

OK, that's reasonable.  I'd probably look at other ways to strengthen the hip muscles that are more direct.  But it probably can't hurt.