Assessing your strengths and weaknesses as a MTB racer

By Rob Boldt

Getting the most out of limited training time is the challenge of every recreational racer. Moving from the realm of haphazard conditioning to a scientifically based training program will certainly result in an improvement in performance. This step in and of itself, however, will not result in the maximization of your training investment. The strict adherence to a generalized or standardized program can and will present limitations in obtaining the highest level of performance you are capable of. To truly maximize the set of God given abilities you have for racing mountain bikes, you must first identify what those abilities are. Only when you identify where you excel and where you are limited can you apply the principles of scientific training to assure you are getting the most out of your available training time. The following is a step by step process by which you will be able to systematically identify your strengths and weaknesses as it relates to mountain bike racing. I have divided mountain bike racing into five fundamental elements.

1: Climbing....The ability to ride up medium or long climbs.

2: Endurance....The ability to hold your pace for the entire race.

3: Lactate Tolerance. The ability to maintain a high pace. Performing repeat hard efforts with little recovery in-between and riding at a sustained hard effort (2+ minuets)

4: Technical Skills...The ability to ride single track fast, pass in single track, descend with abandon and negotiate obstacles.

5: Power...This is the ability to exert high force levels in a short period of time. In mountain biking, this translates into the ability to ride hard on short sharp hills, to accelerate quickly and sprinting.

The following questions will help you identify if each of the skills listed are a strength or a weakness....

1) Climbing. Ask yourself.....do I usually pass more people on climbs than pass me? Can I usually maintain my intensity during long climbs? Do I enjoy riding on courses with a fair amount of climbing? Do I hammer over the crests of hills?

2) Endurance. Ask yourself...do I usually pass more people at the end of a race than pass me? Have I ever "blown up" late in a race? Do I prefer longer races? Am I confident in my endurance at the start of a race?

3) Lactate Tolerance. Ask yourself....Can I go hard shortly after my last hard effort? Can I remain strong during repeat hard efforts? Do I pass more people than pass me during hard efforts? Do I recover quickly after a hard effort?

4) Technical Skills. Ask yourself....am I faster that others in tight single track? Do I descend with abandon, only light use of brakes? Am I comfortable riding off camber trails, tight single track turns, quick dismounts and remounts and negotiating obstacles? Do I fall often?

5) Power. Again ask yourself...Can I out sprint most of my peers? Can I "hammer" up short steep hills? Do I drop more people than drop me on short steep climbs? Can I hang with the leaders at the start of the race?

Rate your ability in each category on a scale of one to ten. One means you really struggle in this area. Five means you are average in this area and a ten means you excel. After you have rated yourself, find two or three other friends who you ride with regularly and ask them to rate you according to the scale. It is impossible to be totally objective about your own ability. Finding out what others think of your strengths and weaknesses will be invaluable in accurately identifying what they are.

Hopefully, your rating will be close to your peers. It is inevitable however, that there will be some differences. Take the average of three or four results as your final result. Make a list of things in which you struggle (4 or less), are average (5 to 7) and those at which you excel (8 to 10).

Armed with this information you can now design your training program to spend more time working on those areas that you are weak in to change them into strengths. Eliminating a weakness will result in a better overall performance improvement than "perfecting" a strength. Chances are that areas you identify as strengths are strengths due to natural ability. They will remain strengths even if you spend more time developing your weak areas. In the overall scheme of racing, however, if you can now remain consistent in more areas of the race, you will find your self moving up in the standing. Good luck to all.