Taken from a thread on here

It is certainly more technical and proficient descenders do have plenty of opportunity to make time up on the descents on the XC race whippets.

In general I have never seen this to be the case. Generally amongst your average rider at an event your good climber is as good or better than the slower climber. They get fitter by spending time on the bike which improves skills generally.

If you are a good descender then start to get much fitter, do you loose the skill? I doubt it.

The only reason I can think of is bike choice. Someone who is a good climber will pick a bike for an event that compliments there skill for climbing while not necessarily being ideal for a fast downhill run. Still seeing good xc racers, they are not short on skill or bravery when descending.

People who win races are fast everywhere. Other people are jealous of this.

If the slow people didn’t believe that they’d have to admit other people are better then them.

They’re fatter, ergo they’re heavier, ergo they go faster downhill 😉

I’ve found it to be true when racing.
The top racers are fast both up and down.
The rest of us tend to be either one or the other.

As a general rule, if the climbs are wide enough for two bikes to pass and the descents are on singletrack, then anyone who overtakes me going up hill will get in my way going down the other side.

It’s generally bollox but you do get a few roadies entering xc races who are genuinely poor on the technical stuff. Not many like, but enough to grow a stereotype around.
Top XC racers are phenomenal up, down and across.

Depends where you are in the race really, if your fast and generally clear of traffic, you might not notice. If you’re down the field a bit almost certainly someone will overtake you just before a single track section and then hold you back. You will remember them, but you wont remember all the others that were near you, but didn’t hold you up.

Has happened to me a few times, generally it’s people gtting their pacing wrong as you usually get past them on the next climb and don’t see them again. (But cheers for letting the guy in front take 200m out of me while you were dicking about!)

Hi, you’ve quoted me at the top so I thought I had better clarify my comment.

The Sam Houghton challenge, which is what that comment was made about, includes a number of very rough descents upon which a more trail orientated bike rather than a xc race whippet will make up time on the descents. All but the very best will be carrying on the climb from Kentmere up Garburn and the descent from the top down to limefitt will be significantly faster on the longer travel bike. This is in contrast to the Whinlatter challenge which the OP in the other thread was asking for a comparison against. My comment was to illustrate that in the Whinlatter challenge there is absolutely no point in making any concession to anything other than getting up the hills as fast as possible as the downhills are pretty much billiard smooth.

Sorry for the confusion.

PS I am less than 11stone myself and flatter myself that I can hold my own on the descents!

Top XC racers are phenomenal up, down and across.

What he said.

Jealousy.

then anyone who overtakes me going up hill will get in my way going down the other side.

This coming from someone that can’t even ride down a tame bridalway because it’s got a bit of sand on it. 🙄

TheBrick and Rorschach have both given the correct answer.

smuttiesmith it was nowt personal, I hear it all the time from a variety of sources you just made me think of it.

There is a lot of it about when people talk about the olympic xc course as well.

Anyone I know that is fast uphill is absolute lightning on the descents.

Top DH racers are phenomenal up, down and across.

FIFY

Garry +1

XC racing tends to attract some road orientated riders to enter usually as a “fun” alternative. They ride XC like they ride road focussing on the fitness side, “sessioning” anything is an alien concept

even I have passed roadclubmen at events such as mayhem on downhills

in their defence however, when they focus on getting the DH’s right they will trounce most, their riding skills are not less, just different, for example; most mtbers can’t ride efficiently in a group etc

I’ve certainly seen it in the very lower echelons of amateur XC racing… At Big Dog you could have split the fast up and fast down by Lycra+bottles and baggies+camelbaks. But the quick people at the front are quick both with gravity and against gravity!

in my experience there are riders that are fast up and down, fast up and slow down, slow up and fast down, slow up and down and everything inbetween. the rest are just c***s. get over it.