QUESTION: What is a false flat in cycling? I’m new to cycling but I’ve heard experienced riders moaning about these. —Alan R.
RBR’S STAN PURDUM REPLIES: A false flat is a section of road that looks to an approaching cyclist to be flat or nearly so, but is an optical illusion, because it actually goes uphill. Often false flats are part of a longer climb where the terrain before and after the false flat section is steeper. In fact, if you’re unfamiliar with that climb and you’re struggling upward, seeing the false flat but not the continuing climb beyond it can deceive you into thinking you’ve reached the top, only to have your hopes dashed when you round the bend and are greeted with more steep climbing.
In a 2004 thread about false flats, someone identified only as “Treebound,” posted the following:
Your eyes tell you it’s flat, maybe even a little downhill,
Your heart hopes it’s flat, maybe with a little tailwind,
Your legs have their own opinion, and your lungs are in agreement,
a false flat is a hill in repose.
Yup. That’s true.
A false flat was part of my personal nemesis near where I lived in my early years as a road cyclist. It was a hill so nasty that I tackled it only when I wanted a measure of my hill-climbing conditioning, and it took me three seasons of attempts before I could reach the top without dismounting and walking the bike the last few hundred yards.
This particular hill was deceptive, because the first sight of it came while wheeling down a spectacular decline that allowed a good speed buildup. But, like an armed camp surrounded with land mines to deplete any force moving against it, this hill guarded itself with speed-sapping topography.
First, the entrance downgrade concluded with a tight “S” curve that forced me to slow down so as not to careen off the edge of the road. Then the road ascended a short but steep foothill; I was standing on the pedals by the time I topped that.
But the real killer — the final approach to the big slope — looked like a gentle downgrade, but it was actually a false flat. When meeting it for the first time, I relaxed a bit and tried coasting, but that led to my bike slowing significantly; I quickly realized that if I didn’t resume pedaling, I’d soon be rolling backward. I couldn’t figure out how such a substantial incline could look like it went down, but the result was that when I finally got through it and reached the big climb beyond, I’d lost absolutely all momentum.
It was in that tired, near standstill state that I tackled the final grade, a struggle of downshifting, grunting and copious perspiration.
If you want to get philosophical about this and apply the false-flat concept to other parts of your life, read the article at this link, which is subtitled “What Cycling Teaches Us About Resilience, Perseverance, and the Climb.”
Stan Purdum has ridden several long-distance bike trips, including an across-America ride recounted in his book Roll Around Heaven All Day, and a trek on U.S. 62, from Niagara Falls, New York, to El Paso, Texas, the subject of his book Playing in Traffic. Stan, a freelance writer and editor, lives in Ohio. See more at www.StanPurdum.com.
and i thought ‘false flat’ was what i had the other day.;
out riding, tire goes flat.
i pump and expect it to be down again in 10 minutes
it lasts 2 weeks til i finally change it
turns out there actually IS a tiny hole
but why did it stop leaking after doing it the first time?
and i have had the opposite – the unfindable leak – you remove the tube and *there is no(findable) hole
(i did a calculation once, i made some assumptions and what i think is:
*if the tire takes more than 7-10 days, to go from 100psi down to 50psi – you cannot find that hole by dunking in water *
– the bubbles take over 5 minutes to appear. something like that. )
anyone else ever tried to figure that out?
Never heard of false flat applying to tires, but I get your allusion. As to not being able to find those super slow leaks, I just keep pumping the tube to an ever-larger size before dunking it in the water. I always find them and I never have had a tube fail due to over-pressure. I just did this with my wife’s bike where she only had to pump her tires every three-four days instead of the normal once per week. I knew it was a tiny leak before I pumped the tube for dunking, so I “went large” right from the get go and found the leak quickly (with patience for holding the tube under water).
As much as folks hate false flats when cycling, they are even worse for skiers! If one decides they’re in a nice flat area and stops to wait for buddies, they will end up with many yards of hard poling and perhaps even walking.
False flats are amplified when gravel riding in high desert terrain, where there are often few visual cues showing the overall landscape is “tilted”…..except when the bike computer shows your HR starting to spike….par for the course when rolling Utah desert gravel. Another opportunity to get Comfortable Being Uncomfortable. Hehehehehe
“False flats” and “false summits” are, in my lexicon, two different things and you seem to treat them as the same. False flats are as you describe them—a section of a climb that looks flat but isn’t. A false summit is a truly flat section of a road at the apparent top of a climb making you think you are done with it only to go around a curve and see yet more climb ahead. I find the first interesting–they remind me of an Escher drawing– and the second defeating.
Related to “false summit” the impression the tp of the climb is only around the next bend, only to find it’s not the case. Some climbs where some climbs have legendary false summits, where the top is even miles away.
My newish Garmin has climb profiles, a feature I thought I would hate because it lays out the suffering to come. Surprisingly to me, it’s the feature I have come to like most. It allows me to pace myself, because I now know the length and steepness of each climb, whether familiar or unfamiliar, and it eliminates any surprises from false flats and false summits.