The only benefit of actually riding on hills is you can’t avoid them, so simulating a 20 minute climb effort on the flat takes willpower.

Unless you are a fully certified member of the pie eaters association, it’s not much different as you don’t go and do 20 mins @ LT on a climb during normal riding either. Plenty of willpower required for both, as that duration of interval is an exercise in hurting yourself for long durations.

Well worth the pain in advance though – mountains are awesome when you are fit enough to enjoy them.

if you can get 250 people to Glenlivet then you ought to be able to get 250 people anywhere.

Indeed.
Glenlivet is a pain to get to even from somewhere relatively close like Fife.

Bit sad that sponsors have pulled out at this stage – assuming this is indeed the problem i’d like to see some naming and shaming so I/We know which brands to avoid. Not that i’m saying brands should be obliged to sponsor events, but once you’ve put your hand up, it should stay up.

Well you’ve not given us too much detail, but as a basic outline it looks sound.

Few points to note:
1) You’ve left it a bit tight for time allowing a ramp up from 5mi->20mi then a taper. Possible, but listen to your body and don’t overdo it – especially not in the last 3 weeks.
2) Focus on duration rather than miles for the midweek runs
3) Assume Friday will be a speed session?
4) I wouldn’t do a spin session the day before your long run

Edit: Ah, I got ninja’d!

Been said already, but you don’t need hills to train for hills. Interval sessions will work just fine – for the mountains focus on longer intervals. 2×20 @ LT, 3×20 @ SS.

That said, I hop in the car for a 30min drive once a fortnight or so during the spring/summer to go hit a perfect training hill.

+1 for bourbons.
Get very close to a 1p/smile ratio which is hard to beat.

500 miles a month between Nov-Feb sounds horrible. Best of luck to you but count me out!

Relentless24, surely doesn’t get much more inspiring than beasting yourself for 24hrs on some great trails.

Imo its not about raw grip strength, muscle mass OR cardio conditioning. It’s muscular endurance.

I can be super fit from months of road riding, but if I then jump on the MTB and go and do a rough trail my forearms are mangled.
On the other hand if I ride my MTB more my forearms become more resistant to the beating.

Not exactly rocket science.
OP, not the most exotic equipment ever, but I’ve found one of these helps (not the exact same one):

Cheaper entry level components.
For example most entry level bikes used to come equipped with Sora and in some cases Tiagra. Now Sora is often not seen until 2nd or 3rd model up the range.

I don’t think the guys&gals nearer the pointy end are anywhere near as slack as you are makeing out

No, I agree, was just having some fun. I don’t think there’s a whole lot of flab hiding under the pyjama tops at the top end of the field.

On a more serious training related note, I don’t think the training at this time of year varies very much from other disciplines. Plenty of easy base miles (will be hard to achieve on a MTB with soft knobby winter rubber), and some sessions focused on technical riding.
As the season draws closer replace some of the easy miles with hard interval sessions from 15s sprints to ~5mins. Again not easy to do on the MTB unless doing hill reps.
In the last 4 weeks or so before your event try to combine the intervals and technical such that you are dropping into trail sections already redlined.

Bait taken – reel me in!

I was under the impression the phrases ‘Enduroist’ and ‘Training Regime’ were inversely proportional. That’s why they wail like a trodden on cat every time a stage features pedalling! 😆

At the other end of the scale I’ve seen a guideline for racing cyclists: take height in inches and that’s your weight in Kg.

Can someone donate me 10kg of chub, I seem unable to get up to my racing weight… 😀

I did the Rapha 500 challenge

plus

Loss of motivation, constantly sore legs and feeling fatigued

equals

suffering from a bit of overtraining

Certainly take a week off, probably 10-14 days after doing 500mi in a week.
1 hour easy spin every 3rd day until you get your mojo back.

I have both and don’t really have a preference either way. I guess one advantage of no pad is its cheaper.

https://www.evanscycles.com/scott-scale-710-plus-2017-mountain-bike-EV286102

Off in about 30mins – work year 2016 will not be missed.
Back on the 4th.

Nice work Stoner 🙂
Be careful though or someone might offer you a job as a software tester.

All in the same place like a festive forest, or scattered about the housecastle?

Isotonic sports drinks

Snow gates closed at Glenshee

Its pretty pathetic how little effort they put into keeping that road open given the complete lack of alternatives.

I had a nice relaxed drive and passed

That’s kind of the key to it i think.

I had some i problems getting my test booked after doing my theory, and as a result was up to about 20 lessons before my test. But for the last 4-5 of those it was more about keeping my eye in – i was getting in the car and instructor was asking me where I was driving him today and just pointing out minor things as we went along.

As a result when it came to the test I was pretty confident and the time flew by. As a general rule people make mistakes when they are pressured/stressed, so if you can be in a position where you don’t really feel under too much pressure then you’ll be on to a winner.

I am not a racer, so my goal is just to be fitter and leaner for summer to enjoy my riding more

That’s an awesome reason – wish more people i know would grasp that idea.
I have a friend that loves riding his MTB, but hardly ever rides as every ride turns into a torture session as he’s barely fit enough to climb a speed bump.

If a bit of erg mode now can give you +grins in summer then totally worth it.

+3

After posting it was OK on the other thread, i then tried to narrow the window to half a screen and all hell broke loose.

I strongly suspect i’ll not be getting one, but still a couple of days before i’m officially disappointed.

I’m away in the US for a week ….. so I plan to ….. trim down

Good luck with that after the 4 stacks of pancakes for breakfast every day.

Just a reminder that for anyone desperately seeking a way to escape the inlaws there’s the festive 500 😀
http://singletrackworld.com/forum/topic/the-2016-festive-500-thread

Working well for me on Chrome on PC, and CRC adds aren’t really too intrusive – I even clicked them and found some good deals I may indulge in after xmas.

I’ve only ever used Conti RevoSealant – seems to work so haven’t seen a reason to change.

Where did you find a 2700ft off road climb?!
Not sure what my biggest off road was, i’d guess around 1000ft.

Also not sure my exact mtb mileage as i don’t keep record of road/mtb split, but reckon around 1500ish.

I’ll trade, you go to work for me, and i’ll take care of your cycling.

Where I live – pensioners who drive a Honda Jazz

Generally unpredictable driving.

Ditto, although you can predict two things.
Any Honda Jazz will be driven by a pensioner, and it will never exceed 40mph.

I seem to remember my childhood was filled with sunny days

Strangely, that is also how I remember my childhood.

Which leads me to two conclusions:
A) There’s been a shift in weather patterns over the last 25yrs (damn i’m getting old!)
B) My corner of Fife at least seems to see the best weather before 3pm then clouds over = i miss all the sun while i’m at work.

But anyway, the end result is its always cold and cloudy when i’m riding 😥

er, did you read the whole post? Quite clearly not just from this case, there is an issue with the standard of evidence required to prove a driver was doing something wrong when they’re in a collision with a cyclist – which I can only presume is based upon dodgy assumptions about correct behaviour of cyclists and drivers.

I’d disagree, and ask you if you read the whole post?
What I read was that the kid was doing tricks on his bike in the street and already made one driver swerve to avoid him.

Whilst this bloke does indeed seem like a tool, sadly being a tool is not a criminal offence.

move out of Fife Andy!

Unsurprisingly i’ve had that thought myself!
But for all I moan about the weather, i’d miss the miles and miles of quiet rural roads/tracks.

Here’s to cycling in the evening in shorts n’ t-shirts on dry and dusty trails in the sunshine until after half 9

In 6 years of bike riding I don’t actually recall that ever happening to me……

crosshair – Member
@Fifeandy- I have the MTB Training Bible published in 2000.
Will post a pic later when I find a file hosting site that works

Great, thanks for the info. There’s clearly a difference there between the cyclists bible (2009) and mtb bible (2000).
He’s just released a totally new version of the Tri bible, and according to his blog is in the process of re-writing the cyclists bible with an ETA of Nov’17.

Guess it may have to go on next years xmas list 🙂

@Crosshair:
Not sure what edition of the bible you have, but mine has a little box that says; ‘Workout options listed by code (select only one)’. Which to me is a pretty clear instruction to not mix within one session.

It is a book that i come back to time and again though.

Fully agree with Ferrals and Kryton in that it can be quite mentally punishing training for extended periods. Definitely plan for some races/events (even if its something less hardcore like MBO) to keep you motivated, and plan 2-4 weeks of downtime every 6 months or so.

You need to concentrate to keep that nice 90rpm at first, but stick at it a month or so and it’ll become second nature. No special drills required, but if you wish you can do 5 min blocks at 100-110 which will make 90 seem more normal.

After trying various methods over the years i decided to just not bother even trying with this car and has been quite a success.

Location: Fife

Winter: Yes, definitely, but not harsh.

Been quite dry, and generally mild (~8°C) during the day, but barely above freezing when out riding in the evening. Definitely full on thermal riding kit.