Views: 11 Author: Site Editor Publish Time: 2022-02-21 Origin: Site
Electric bikes are growing quickly in popularity, but what are the benefits of adding a motor to your pedal power?
Whether you’re new to cycling or are already a regular rider, there are a number of reasons why you might want to try an electric bike, from health and fitness, through to financial and environmental benefits.
From riding to work, to fast-tracking your route to the top of mountain bike trails, here are 5 benefits of riding an electric bike.
Like cycling any bike, riding an electric bike will up your aerobic fitness level.
The effort required to keep yourself moving may be less than on a normal bike, but you’ll still be turning the pedals and putting in a significant amount of the energy required to move yourself along.
Studies have suggested that ebike riders’ hearts can be working at more than 90 per cent the level of riders of non-assisted bikes, but they perceive less effort.
Researchers at Brigham Young University in Utah monitored the heart rates of seasoned mountain bikers riding ebikes and bikes without motors.
The participants on e-MTBs reached 94 per cent of the average heart rate they did when riding purely pedal-powered on a 10-kilometre test circuit. This effort placed them in training zone four.
The same scientists concluded that riding an electric hybrid bike to work brought most of the benefits of commuting. Riders on ebikes averaged 89 per cent of the mean beats per minute they recorded riding without a motor.
In a similar BikeRadar test, 2021 National Hill Climb Champion Tom Bell hit 198bpm, close to his maximum heart rate of 208bpm, riding an eMTB on his favourite off-road test loop.
Bell says: “You can still push as hard as you like on an ebike, you just have added assistance.
“So, although it can be used to make climbing and riding in general easier if you want to back off, it’s also possible to put in a lot of effort but just go faster for that effort.”
The exercise will strengthen your muscles and up the efficiency of your cardiovascular system, so you’ll be able to do more off the bike and feel fresher too.
Many cyclists struggle on hills, and even if you’re a climbing ace, your speed is likely to drop below 15mph on many climbs. That means that the motor will cut in and provide assistance, with the amount dependent on the level of support you’ve selected.
Once you’ve crested a climb, you’ll be fresher too, so you’re less likely to want to stop to recoup and more likely to press on.
An ebike will enable you to ride faster, regardless of your fitness level. That’s down to quicker acceleration and the faster hill climbing.
An ebike’s motor will cut out once you ride over 25kph/15.5 mph in most countries (although that increases to 20mph in the USA), so you might find you’re riding unassisted if you’re already quite fit and riding a performance machine.
But even so, unless you ride somewhere absolutely pan flat, your speed is likely to increase overall.
An ebike should enable you to ride further too.
An analysis of health and transport data from seven European cities found ebike riders took longer trips than cyclists without motors. Therefore, ebikers gained a similar amount of fitness to pedal-powered cyclists.
Range varies hugely between bikes, but you have the option of fitting a second battery to extend it. This enables you to take in places further afield, while the assistance will help you get up climbs and into terrain that you might not have been able to reach before.
The ebike’s motor will help you get up to speed from a standstill, cutting in to help you accelerate faster and with less effort. That means it’s easier and less stressful to keep in the traffic flow at junctions and lights.
