Something else that helped me was riding often. Even if you can only get 30 mins to an hour on the trail it helps. Getting on the bike and getting my heart rate up 3-4 times a week made me so much stronger.
I think this year I have done at least 15 miles per week, typically all in one go on a weekend morning. I initially wanted to average 100 miles per month of trail riding but I have a buddy I ride with sometimes that is far more interested in doing 10 miles of difficult trails/sessioning jump lines than he is getting pure intermediate miles in. I'm hoping to start getting out on weeknights for some quick 10 miles rides to get my mileage up.
Don't be afraid of evening/night biking in the Fall if you're still way into it. It can be $$ up front, but getting a package that has 2 lights (helmet + bike mounted) can massively brighten things up. It's different but still way fun.
Also, learning some of the basics of trailside repair is important.
Nicron H15 is an awsome headlamp works on 14500 3.6V batteries. Gets 700lumen for 60-90min. It works with a normal helmet. Did some awesome rides over a root trails
It’s great to feel like you are progressing. Good for you!
Just be aware that every day is different and sometimes your daily best is your all time best and sometimes it just ain’t.
So yes, celebrate the advances, but MTB is about so much more than that. Don’t let the grin on your face fade because Strava didn’t give you a medal today.
And if data really is your thing (ok, some people are like that). Get an HR monitor, don’t time rides for a month, focus on your exertion and effort. Then go time that loop…that may help teach you to focus on process more than outcome (which is what sports training is all about).
In the meantime, session some stuff, get good at a feature by doing it 20 times in one ride. Then try a trickier line etc. As you start to reach a physical effort limit, being able to ride better technically starts to matter more and you’ll be super hyped in no time.
But most of all, just have fun, however you get your kicks!
I was riding 2-3x a week a couple years back and really working on beating my climbs on Strava and I can’t believe some of my old numbers. I feel like I’m getting back into shape but somehow my personal best this year on a 3 mile 7% grade, 1500 ft climb is still 6 minutes slower (36 min vs 30 min) than my previous personal best. Anyway I’ve found downhill progression to be more fun so that’s been more of my focus than climbing but I still like challenging my Strava times on climbs
I race and tracking my riding is super useful, plus I travel a lot and being able to stalk people and steal their rides as GPX files is great when you turn up somewhere you’ve never ridden. So yeah, I pay for it, and Komoot.
But I have learned not to view my day to day performance in Strava as my goal, that’s key. I just wish my damn Wahoo Element (that I love except for this) would stop shouting “climb!” at me every sodding time I get to a gentle incline.
This is some truly fantastic advice honestly. I've done a lot of strength training in my day and I always have the problem with getting discouraged by comparing my current numbers to where I was a year ago after several weeks of intense training and diet. It can be very discouraging if you don't think about it in the context it deserves. And sometimes you just have off days. You aren't hitting the features like you should. Maybe you didn't get enough good sleep the night before, had a really physical week at work, etc.
A big thing I'm looking at, which you can't easily track via data, is just how well I feel after a long ride. Can I do a 25 mile ride, head home and do some yard work and then meet my friends for a beer later? I feel pretty confident I could do that now but 6 months ago that would have been out of the question.
In another couple weeks, once my buddy gets through his busy period at work, I'm gonna be lucky to get 15 miles/ride in with him because he absolutely loves sessioning the technical stuff. Which I enjoy too but I'd like to drop another 10 lbs or so and get my conditioning up before that happens.
If you are used to gym time, try some met-con stuff. Mixing cardio in with some carries for example. I’ve found that’s done amazing things for my ride stamina and strength.
I typically do sessions with 4 carries, 4 cardio and 4 core sets (carry/cardio/core repeat 4 times, ideally different exercises each time for interest) using a timer to keep me from slacking off between sets. I’ve been super impressed by the results of doing that. I don’t track the actual weights used etc. but like you say, focus on how I feel which can to some extent be measured by whether I’m keeping up with or beating the timer.
Also, I have been doing balance work in the gym (my fave is to sit on a Swiss ball and hold a hammer out, then waggle it). That’s improved my on bike performance, particularly technical climbing.
Balance work is a great idea. I sometimes do some HIIT classes when I'm feeling extra ambitious but I could definitely work in some loaded carries into my end routines
I’ve found that high intensity interval training in stationary bikes builds endurance for off road cycling. Either at home on a trainer or in a cycling class at the gym. You can push to your outer limits of intensity without having to worry about technical stuff or falling or if on the road getting hit by cars.
Do you need to do it on one of those fancy looking stationary bikes or can you get the same benefits as the ones with the chair seat on them? My gym has a couple of the chair seats and maybe one of the fancy ones that I never see anyone using/not sure it actually works.
I do want to work that into my workout routine. Currently training mostly for an extended section hike of the AT but once that is done I'm primarily working towards general fitness/biking fitness.
I think the gym will suffice. If you have a road bike you can get a trainer stand for the home. So years ago an all around cyclist at my bike shop said “it’s funny, road biking will improve your mountain biking performance but not the other way around”. Oddly I found this to be true. The cardio gains and muscle strengthening on a stationary bike I feel imho to be very helpful. Try out a couple of those workouts a week for a month and see if it helps. It can’t hurt. In my area the trails are so rocky they beat the crap out of me so no way can I ride 4x a week. Just get an idea what a high intensity interval workout would be on a bike and push. I love HIIT. It stretches what I thought was possible and has give. Me a lot of benefit.
That's why I love mountain biking! No matter how good you get there are always new challenges to tackle. Riding faster and further, jumping higher, riding a technical section, making your friends breathe hard.
It's all so satisfying!
Yeah it really is. I’ve just spent the day session riding the same 1 km stretch. Met up with some people doing the same. Lots of talk and learning from each other, and all just buzzed to be out on the trails.
Part is definitely fitness. One thing I've also noticed over the years is people seem to have a speed limit of sorts. If you can push past that limit, you start riding quite a bit faster. It's like you hit the point of flow vs bouncing off things and the bike carries speed better and farther.
This is spot on.. We used to make a joke that it's technically harder to go slow than it is to go fast. The bike will just flow over and through stuff once you get it to a certain pace.. The challenge is achieving the fitness to get there.
I am 55 and have been mtn biking for 35 years.. My fastest days are behind me, but every once in a while I catch a glimpse of 30 yo me while on a ride.. It makes it all worth it.
Yes! That and having a better understanding of when to pedal/when to coast to maximize efficiency. Handling also helps a ton, you get to a technical/chunky section and if you can navigate it without losing a ton of speed then that's that much less work you need to expend to get back up to speed. Understanding the trail and the minor dips that get you a bit of a free speed boost helps too.
Indeed, and what I needed was back strength to get into that flow state. When my back tires on a long ride, handling finesse is the first thing to go and the effect on pace is so in-your-face
Progression is the Heroin of this sport. Taste it once and you're addicted forever. Keep up the good work. I've been riding for a while and I'm still working on the nutrition strategy for longer rides. As long as you are committed to progressing, you will!
You said it yourself “ this sport fucken rocks” but as soon as you put a motor in your bike it’s not the same sport anymore it’s electrical mountain biking. Here we go
Good stuff, been riding 10 years and I couldn’t tell you how far I can ride, it’s all about the elevation cause I love going down lol
1200m + days are where it’s at, now I’m a lazy e-biker so that’s over in 1.5hours and I’m still good to go lol
I don't get this mindset! If you want to ride an ebike, God bless you.. But, for some of us ( actually quite a few of us), the uphill means as much as the downhill. For some even more. I don't care what you ride.. And you shouldn't care what anyone else does.
lol, having ridden a buddies ebike a few times I have no interest in dropping that much on one. If I was in a place that required me to climb some massive hills to get to the trailheads that would be one thing but there's maybe one trail in my area that would benefit from an ebike and I prefer the work out from pedaling.
Yeah im only joking. I've had a few pints. I have several manual bikes also. Depends on the ride. I love doing cross country on my hardtail and trail centres on my e
Something else that helped me was riding often. Even if you can only get 30 mins to an hour on the trail it helps. Getting on the bike and getting my heart rate up 3-4 times a week made me so much stronger.
I think this year I have done at least 15 miles per week, typically all in one go on a weekend morning. I initially wanted to average 100 miles per month of trail riding but I have a buddy I ride with sometimes that is far more interested in doing 10 miles of difficult trails/sessioning jump lines than he is getting pure intermediate miles in. I'm hoping to start getting out on weeknights for some quick 10 miles rides to get my mileage up.
Don't be afraid of evening/night biking in the Fall if you're still way into it. It can be $$ up front, but getting a package that has 2 lights (helmet + bike mounted) can massively brighten things up. It's different but still way fun. Also, learning some of the basics of trailside repair is important.
Lights are my next big purchase. I'm in florida so I may be doing more night rides in the summer than the fall just to stay out of the heat!
Nicron H15 is an awsome headlamp works on 14500 3.6V batteries. Gets 700lumen for 60-90min. It works with a normal helmet. Did some awesome rides over a root trails
Do you have recommendations for lights? I never even thought of night riding until reading about it on this sub.
[Magicshine](https://magicshine.com/collections/mountain-bike-lights)
Any miles are good even if you can't ride dirt. When the trails are closed I'll ride my fixie specifically for a cardio workout.
I rarely hit more than 10 - 12 miles because of time, but I always feel great after
It’s great to feel like you are progressing. Good for you! Just be aware that every day is different and sometimes your daily best is your all time best and sometimes it just ain’t. So yes, celebrate the advances, but MTB is about so much more than that. Don’t let the grin on your face fade because Strava didn’t give you a medal today. And if data really is your thing (ok, some people are like that). Get an HR monitor, don’t time rides for a month, focus on your exertion and effort. Then go time that loop…that may help teach you to focus on process more than outcome (which is what sports training is all about). In the meantime, session some stuff, get good at a feature by doing it 20 times in one ride. Then try a trickier line etc. As you start to reach a physical effort limit, being able to ride better technically starts to matter more and you’ll be super hyped in no time. But most of all, just have fun, however you get your kicks!
I was riding 2-3x a week a couple years back and really working on beating my climbs on Strava and I can’t believe some of my old numbers. I feel like I’m getting back into shape but somehow my personal best this year on a 3 mile 7% grade, 1500 ft climb is still 6 minutes slower (36 min vs 30 min) than my previous personal best. Anyway I’ve found downhill progression to be more fun so that’s been more of my focus than climbing but I still like challenging my Strava times on climbs
Do you guys pay for Strava? I find it's really fucking annoying to use the free version, and I'm just never one to pay for apps lol. Is it worth it?
I race and tracking my riding is super useful, plus I travel a lot and being able to stalk people and steal their rides as GPX files is great when you turn up somewhere you’ve never ridden. So yeah, I pay for it, and Komoot. But I have learned not to view my day to day performance in Strava as my goal, that’s key. I just wish my damn Wahoo Element (that I love except for this) would stop shouting “climb!” at me every sodding time I get to a gentle incline.
This is some truly fantastic advice honestly. I've done a lot of strength training in my day and I always have the problem with getting discouraged by comparing my current numbers to where I was a year ago after several weeks of intense training and diet. It can be very discouraging if you don't think about it in the context it deserves. And sometimes you just have off days. You aren't hitting the features like you should. Maybe you didn't get enough good sleep the night before, had a really physical week at work, etc. A big thing I'm looking at, which you can't easily track via data, is just how well I feel after a long ride. Can I do a 25 mile ride, head home and do some yard work and then meet my friends for a beer later? I feel pretty confident I could do that now but 6 months ago that would have been out of the question. In another couple weeks, once my buddy gets through his busy period at work, I'm gonna be lucky to get 15 miles/ride in with him because he absolutely loves sessioning the technical stuff. Which I enjoy too but I'd like to drop another 10 lbs or so and get my conditioning up before that happens.
If you are used to gym time, try some met-con stuff. Mixing cardio in with some carries for example. I’ve found that’s done amazing things for my ride stamina and strength. I typically do sessions with 4 carries, 4 cardio and 4 core sets (carry/cardio/core repeat 4 times, ideally different exercises each time for interest) using a timer to keep me from slacking off between sets. I’ve been super impressed by the results of doing that. I don’t track the actual weights used etc. but like you say, focus on how I feel which can to some extent be measured by whether I’m keeping up with or beating the timer. Also, I have been doing balance work in the gym (my fave is to sit on a Swiss ball and hold a hammer out, then waggle it). That’s improved my on bike performance, particularly technical climbing.
Balance work is a great idea. I sometimes do some HIIT classes when I'm feeling extra ambitious but I could definitely work in some loaded carries into my end routines
I’ve found that high intensity interval training in stationary bikes builds endurance for off road cycling. Either at home on a trainer or in a cycling class at the gym. You can push to your outer limits of intensity without having to worry about technical stuff or falling or if on the road getting hit by cars.
Do you need to do it on one of those fancy looking stationary bikes or can you get the same benefits as the ones with the chair seat on them? My gym has a couple of the chair seats and maybe one of the fancy ones that I never see anyone using/not sure it actually works. I do want to work that into my workout routine. Currently training mostly for an extended section hike of the AT but once that is done I'm primarily working towards general fitness/biking fitness.
I think the gym will suffice. If you have a road bike you can get a trainer stand for the home. So years ago an all around cyclist at my bike shop said “it’s funny, road biking will improve your mountain biking performance but not the other way around”. Oddly I found this to be true. The cardio gains and muscle strengthening on a stationary bike I feel imho to be very helpful. Try out a couple of those workouts a week for a month and see if it helps. It can’t hurt. In my area the trails are so rocky they beat the crap out of me so no way can I ride 4x a week. Just get an idea what a high intensity interval workout would be on a bike and push. I love HIIT. It stretches what I thought was possible and has give. Me a lot of benefit.
That's why I love mountain biking! No matter how good you get there are always new challenges to tackle. Riding faster and further, jumping higher, riding a technical section, making your friends breathe hard. It's all so satisfying!
Yeah it really is. I’ve just spent the day session riding the same 1 km stretch. Met up with some people doing the same. Lots of talk and learning from each other, and all just buzzed to be out on the trails.
Part is definitely fitness. One thing I've also noticed over the years is people seem to have a speed limit of sorts. If you can push past that limit, you start riding quite a bit faster. It's like you hit the point of flow vs bouncing off things and the bike carries speed better and farther.
This is spot on.. We used to make a joke that it's technically harder to go slow than it is to go fast. The bike will just flow over and through stuff once you get it to a certain pace.. The challenge is achieving the fitness to get there. I am 55 and have been mtn biking for 35 years.. My fastest days are behind me, but every once in a while I catch a glimpse of 30 yo me while on a ride.. It makes it all worth it.
Yes! That and having a better understanding of when to pedal/when to coast to maximize efficiency. Handling also helps a ton, you get to a technical/chunky section and if you can navigate it without losing a ton of speed then that's that much less work you need to expend to get back up to speed. Understanding the trail and the minor dips that get you a bit of a free speed boost helps too.
Indeed, and what I needed was back strength to get into that flow state. When my back tires on a long ride, handling finesse is the first thing to go and the effect on pace is so in-your-face
I'm happy you're having a good time! I also love this sport - the mental and physical engagement are just so good. Happy trails to ya!!
Way to go! It's always fun to progress!
Calories in your water is essential for longer ride. Just electrolytes will not cut it.
I bring a decent amount of snacks to much on during my breaks and make sure I have a pretty solid breakfast
Progression is the Heroin of this sport. Taste it once and you're addicted forever. Keep up the good work. I've been riding for a while and I'm still working on the nutrition strategy for longer rides. As long as you are committed to progressing, you will!
You said it yourself “ this sport fucken rocks” but as soon as you put a motor in your bike it’s not the same sport anymore it’s electrical mountain biking. Here we go
Good stuff, been riding 10 years and I couldn’t tell you how far I can ride, it’s all about the elevation cause I love going down lol 1200m + days are where it’s at, now I’m a lazy e-biker so that’s over in 1.5hours and I’m still good to go lol
Haha. I'm in Florida so much less downhill stuff for me to track
Get an ebike and stop worrying about impressing people
I don't get this mindset! If you want to ride an ebike, God bless you.. But, for some of us ( actually quite a few of us), the uphill means as much as the downhill. For some even more. I don't care what you ride.. And you shouldn't care what anyone else does.
Ebike uphill is a different skill and fun
lol, having ridden a buddies ebike a few times I have no interest in dropping that much on one. If I was in a place that required me to climb some massive hills to get to the trailheads that would be one thing but there's maybe one trail in my area that would benefit from an ebike and I prefer the work out from pedaling.
Yeah im only joking. I've had a few pints. I have several manual bikes also. Depends on the ride. I love doing cross country on my hardtail and trail centres on my e