Strength training for the MTB world has been slow to catch up to the unique and highly physical demands of our sport. Today’s average rider rips up trails that just 5-6 years ago would have been considered extreme and today’s extreme rider…well, let’s just say that they continue to defy all logic in their quest to progress our sport. Considering how fast our sport has evolved in such a short period of time it really comes as no surprise that most MTB specific strength and conditioning programs are stuck in the time when cantilever brakes were still viable options and anodized purple was a highly sought after fashion statement (not that there is anything wrong with that).

Today’s MTB world is not simply road riding on a dirt road. Muscling a 30-35 pound bike around on a technical trail requires a far different skill set and physical attributes than MTB riders needed at the turn of the century. As such, routines and exercise selection needs to reflect this fact. With this in mind, let’s review what I consider to be the top 3 exercises for the XC/ trail rider to include in their program (besides the deadlift, of course, which is a must for every rider).

1) Bulgarian Split Squat – You may have noticed that this one also made my top 3 list for explosive gate starts. One of the best things about this exercise is that, when done correctly, it serves as both a great uni-lateral leg exercise and a great hip flexor stretch. Prop your trail leg up on a bench, make sure that you start with your torso completely upright with your shoulders and hips square. Lower yourself under control (don’t just turn the muscles off and drop) and make sure that you keep your torso upright and everything square on the way down.

You may notice a tendency to lean over as you lower yourself, indicating weak or inhibited glutes. Leaning over lets you use your low back to help you get back up and should be avoided in order to establish the movement pattern we are looking for. You may also notice that you want to let your hips open up as you come down as well. This indicates tight hip flexors and every effort should be made to keep the hips square in order to maximize the stretch on this area during the exercise. Just like everything else with your strength training, it’s not just about going through the motions, it’s about doing the movement pattern correctly in order to get everything we can out of our time investment.

2) Pull Ups/ Chin Ups & Variations – Most XC/ Trail riders are very weak in the upper body. This really takes its toll as the trail gets rougher and the ride gets longer. Having good upper body strength and strength endurance is vital to controlling your bike and maneuvering down the trail. In fact, if more riders worried about getting stronger rather than how to shave a few pounds off their bikes they would be far better served.

Pull Ups, Chin Ups and their variations are a great way to strengthen the upper back and gain good body control. Let me clear up a few things – 1) it is not a chin/ pull up if you do not straighten your arms all the way at the bottom and allow your shoulders to come up by your ears as well. Most people who think that they can do an adequate pull/ chin up are really fooling themselves by not coming all the way down at the bottom. 2) Pull ups indicate that your palms are facing away from you and chin ups indicate that your palms are facing towards you. Both have their place in a program but I almost always start people out with chin ups as they are easier learn how to initiate the movement by pulling the shoulder blades down. 3) If you can do more than 8 reps in a set then strap some weight to yourself.

Adding more reps will only start to work on short term strength endurance and we want to get stronger through strength training (imagine that). Strength endurance should be addressed in the overall program but not when we are looking to add real strength. I can personally do a chin up with more weight than I can bench (bodyweight of 180 lbs. plus 95 lbs. strapped to me) and I feel that every MTB rider should be able to do the same.

3) Kettlebell Shoulder Press – As I have already commented on, most MTB riders need some more upper body strength and the standing shoulder press is one of the best exercises available for strengthening the pressing muscles. Over the last few decades there has been a real decline in the use of the standing press in strength training programs. Most have shied away from it for injury concerns reasons (I think ego is more of a factor since you can bench far more than you can press over your head). This is extremely unfortunate since, when done correctly, the standing military press will not only add upper body strength, it will actually help injury proof the torso and shoulders as well.

If you make sure that you keep the torso strong with no backward lean when pressing over your head then you not only protect the lower back, you help strengthen the torso like few other exercises can. Pressing over your head also forces all of the muscles around your shoulder to fire in order to stabilize the entire shoulder during the lift, helping to injury proof this area as well. Both of these areas are trouble spots for bikers during long, pounding rides with a heavy hydration pack strapped to them. The kettlebell shoulder press builds true functional upper body strength in a very efficient package.

There you have it, the Top 3 Strength Training Exercises for your average XC/ Trail riders. You guys make up the bulk of the riding world and can gain a lot from a good strength and conditioning program. For a long time now the bike industry has mislead you by making you think that a new bike or a new part will make the biggest difference on the trail when it is the engine that drive the bike that makes the real impact. Getting stronger will allow you to ride harder, faster and longer, adding up to more fun on the trail. Isn’t that what it’s all about anyways?

-James Wilson-

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Mountain Bike Strength Training, Mountain Biking

Most exercise professionals would agree that there are many components to fitness. A well rounded approach to fitness that addresses all of them is usually the best way to achieve lasting gains and continual progress from a program. Being deficient in even one of these components leads to slow progress and results in a condition I call “false fit”.

“False fit” is when someone perceives themselves to be fit when there are glaring holes in one of the 5 Fitness Components. While each area can cover other, more specific concepts here is a list and brief description of 5 Fitness Components you need to work on:

1. Mobility – Your ability to move freely while maintaining good posture. Also includes elements of body control and body awareness.

2. Core Strength – Your ability to properly use your core to create a strong platform around which movement is created. Emphasis is on stabilizing the lower back and mobilizing the hips and shoulder blades.

3. Power – Your ability to coordinate your muscles in order to create quick, dynamic movements. Life is dynamic and so everyone should have some sort of power training in their program, even if it is something as simple as slamming a medicine ball into the ground.

4. Strength – I define this a little differently than most. I define strength as your ability to create proper movement and maintain that proper movement under load. Creating a movement through compensation, such as using your lower back during leg exercises, is not true strength no matter how much weight you move.

5. Conditioning/ Endurance – Your ability to engage in your chosen activities without excessive fatigue. A good conditioning program will also act as a catalyst for fat loss. For most people proper conditioning should focus more on intervals than on traditional steady state aerobics.

Do you do yoga and/ or Pilates but do not work on power and conditioning?

Do you run or bike but don’t work on mobility and strength?

Do you “body build” but don’t work on mobility and conditioning?

If you answered yes to any of those questions, or if you see something on the list above that you are not addressing, then you have developed the “false fit” condition. You are fit as it pertains to the particular activities and exercises you engage in but the truth is your fitness is limited. Get you outside of your comfort zone and your true fitness levels will get quickly exposed.

Our body wants to maintain a balance between the 5 Fitness Components. When we lose that balance we slow down our progress and set ourselves up for pain and injuries. Sometimes the answer to achieving the fitness levels that you want is not in looking for different twists on what you are already doing but in looking outside your box for new elements.

I tell people all the time that if you do not want to look and/ or perform like everyone else don’t train like everyone else. Most people are dissatisfied with their current fitness condition so don’t take the same approach they do. Make sure that you work on developing true, well rounded fitness and avoid the pain and frustration that goes with being “false fit”.

-James Wilson-

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Mountain Bike Cardio Training, Mountain Bike Mobility Training, Mountain Bike Strength Training

Being the first post of 2012 I wanted to set the tone for the rest of the year with a book review. While I read this book a month or so ago I wanted to save the review for today because I think that the message in it is especially appropriate today.

One of my favorite parts of having a Kindle is how you get books suggested for you based on past purchases. Since I buy a lot of training books and books on mindset/ self improvement I was not too surprised to see Mike Mahler’s new “self help” book on my suggestion list but I was a bit hesitant to buy it. I know Mike as a kettlebell expert but I was not too sure what he had to offer in the way of mindset advice.

However, I was finally curious enough to get the sample of the book and after reading the first chapter I was impressed. I got the whole book and quickly tore through it. I can now safely say that “Live Life Aggressively: What Self Help Gurus Should be Telling You” is now my favorite book on the subject of “self help” and one that I strongly recommend it if you want to understand the mindset it really takes to succeed.

Despite what the title may suggest, it has nothing to do with being outwardly aggressive or having a chip on your shoulder. Instead, Mike quickly and effectively challenges you to re-think how you approach life in general. From accepting your current job and financial situation to dealing with past traumas, Mike makes you really think about what you want out of life and how to go about taking it.

Personally, I found the message very refreshing. I have quickly grown tired of the positive attitude-goal setting-self affirmation b.s. promoted by so many self help gurus. Movies like The Secret, “pump you up” books/ seminars and “how does that make you feel” psychiatry always seemed disingenuous to me. Life, when lived aggressively, is hard and no amount of visualization, daily sayings or talking about feelings can get around that.

Most people seek “help” because they want to avoid pain and stress and a lot of people are more than willing to take your money to tell you what you want to hear. Mike, on the other hand, slaps you in the face by telling you things that you need to hear, especially a society raised to play it safe and to think that if it is hard or stressful it isn’t worth it.

For example, if you say you hate your job but don’t quit and follow your dreams then on some level you are exactly where you want to be. This is one message I can relate to 100%. Personally, I am amazingly lucky to be living my dream – but “luck” had nothing to do with the fact that I married the girl of my dreams, live in mountain biking heaven and make a living by helping riders all over the world. It took guts, tenacity and a lot of hard work to make it happen – which happen to be things that everyone can apply as well.

When I decided to start MTB Strength Training Systems I was managing a gym in Tyler Texas. I owned my house and was making a good salary – and hating it. Texas is known for many things but mountain biking is not one of them. After spending my time riding in Southern California and Hawaii I was burned out on the one trail in the area pretty quickly. Managing a gym meant I had to deal with all of the crap from unhappy customers and I was starting to look at them as the enemy instead of people I wanted help.

After going to my sisters wedding in Grand Junction Colorado I knew I wanted to move there and start training people again. However, the smart move would have been to either stay put and enjoy my 2 weeks of vacation each year or to make a long term plan and slowly work towards moving. Walking away from a well paying job when I had a wife and new born baby girl was not “smart” or “responsible”.

What’s more, I had been discouraged from going into the mountain bike strength training business by a very successful online business consultant since it was not a popular market. The money was in fat loss or muscle building, both markets I cared nothing about. However, I knew that something had to give so I quit my job, rented my house out and was in Grand Junction within a few months of deciding to make it happen, ready to create a niche if I had to.

After trying to make a go of working in a couple gyms I decided that I was over working for someone else and having to conform my training philosophy to them. I had dreamed of opening my own place and running it the way I wanted and so I found a space and signed a lease. I had 3 clients and did not really know how I was going to pay the rent but I knew that I would rather fail on my terms than succeed on someone else’s.

Fast forward 5 years and past countless struggles, set backs and moments of self-doubt and here I am – I have a successful online business and training facility, get to ride some of the best trails in the world whenever I want and gain immense satisfaction from helping countless riders through my blog, articles and training programs. I still have set backs and problems but in the end I can’t imagine doing anything else.

I tell you this not to impress you but to impress upon you that there is nothing special about me – or Mike, who has a very similar story to mine that he relates in the book – except that at some point we refused to be passive and take what life gave us. I am not exceptionally smart, my family is not wealthy and I had no “breaks” along the way. I simply think different than most people and luckily mindset is something that you can learn.

I think that Live Life Aggressively is one of the best books I have read in a long time. You can live life scared or you can live life aggressively – the choice is yours alone and after reading Mike’s new book hopefully you’ll have the perspective to stop being held back by your own mindset.

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Mountain Bike Strength Training

Being the last post of the year I wanted to reflect on some of the big lessons and take aways I had from 2011…

#1 – Do less stuff and do it better. I got deeply immersed in the kettlebell culture in 2011, attending an RKC course and reading a half dozen or so books on kettlebell training. While everyone likes to show off their fancy kettlebell lifts, one of the central themes among the best is the mastery of a handful exercises.

The Swing, Goblet Squat, Turkish Get Up, Clean, Shoulder Press, Snatch and their variations comprise the bulk of kettlebell training and cover almost everything you could possibly need. I cut out a lot of fluff from my workout programs and hammered people with the basics and saw a marked improvement in execution, strength levels and overall results. You just have to get past the “entertain me” mindset and have a “train me” mindset to appreciate doing the same thing over and over.

#2 – Read more. The best investment I made was in a Kindle. I had started reading more a few years ago but it wasn’t until I was able to instantly download books and easily carry my library with me that I really started to read a lot. The secret to reading is making it convenient and so the Kindle app on my phone and tablet make it amazingly easy to read a few pages here and there which add up to several extra books a year.

Here are some of the best books I read this year:

- Easy Strength: Pavel and Dan John

- Purposeful Primitive: Marty Gallagher

- Convict Conditioning: Paul Wade

- The 10X Rule: Gant Cardone

- Kiss or Kill: mark Twight

- Ultimate MMA Conditioning: Joel Jamison

- Sugar Nation: Jeff O’Connor

- Mind Over Money: Brad Klontz and Ted Klontz

- Little Bets: Peter Sims

- Live Life Aggressively: Mike Mahler

#3 – Bodyweight training needs a place in your program. The book Convict Conditioning completely changed my view of the importance of bodyweight training. I realized that I had been paying lip service to the notion of “master your bodyweight before adding load” – I was far from truly mastering bodyweight and the exercise progressions outlined in the book made that very clear.

I realized that strength training is as much about handling your own bodyweight as masterfully as you can handle an external load. I also realized that some exercises, like the bridge and handstand presses, were really vital to overall fitness and health. Your body responds to bodyweight training differently than weighted training and it needs a place in your program.

#4 – Energy Systems Development is a much better term than “cardio”.  In the book Ultimate MMA Conditioning Joel Jamison does a masterful job of laying out the concept of Energy Systems Development (ESD). I have often said that you don’t want “cardio”, you want better endurance and ESD is how you can systematically develop better endurance. By understanding how your body both supplies fuel and utilizes that fuel for different types of efforts you can develop a plan to optimize both.

I’m sure I feel this way every year but 2011 was a great year overall. I came into the year knowing that I had a few holes in my game as a strength coach and I did a pretty good job of shoring them up and seeing my programs evolve as a result. Of course, now I have some other areas I want to work on in 2012 but I’ll worry about that next year.

So, what were some of your big lessons/ take aways from 2011?

-James Wilson-

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Mountain Bike Strength Training

One of the things that really separates strong riders from everyone else is the ability to stand and hammer on their bike. If you are a downhill or 4X/ Dual Slalom rider then this seems pretty self evident – the fastest guys are just as strong while standing at the end as they are at the beginning of a run while everyone else is fighting the urge to sit down and rest.

However, this also holds true for trail and XC riders as well. Sure, you’ll hear from all he detractors who will tell you that standing is less efficient, that it makes your suspension bob or that you get less traction on the rear wheel but the truth is that the fastest riders, like single speed world champ Ross Schnell, do not run a granny gear up front and tend to run a 34 or 36 tooth chainring. This means that they will stand and hammer a lot more than us mere mortals will.

I look at it this way – sitting down to pedal is like jogging, standing up to pedal is like sprinting. Sure, jogging is more efficient IF you are running a marathon but sprinting is the best way to go if you are running a100 meters. If you are riding in the Leadville 100 then you better jog, if you are out on a 1-2 hour trail ride then being able to easily throw some sprints in will help you cover more ground and have more fun in the process.

What most riders mean when they say that standing up to pedal is less efficient is that it is much harder for them and they can not sustain it for very long. The fact is that standing pedaling is more powerful, which is why you can go increase speed or grind up climbs faster when standing, but it does place more of a strain on your core and upper body to support your weight while also requiring more hip drive to pedal. When you are sitting down your seat supports a lot of your weight and you are in a more quad dominant position so your core, upper body and hip weaknesses are masked.

This is why single speed riding has gained a reputation as a great way to train or to increase core strength. Because single speeds force you to stand up in sections that you would normally just downshift you expose your core, upper body and hips to the demands of standing pedaling and therefore get them stronger. It is not that there is something magical about single speed riding, simply that it exposes your weaknesses and forces them to adapt and get stronger.

But you can use strength training to make those gains in a faster, more efficient manner. One of the most common bits of feedback I get from clients is that they simply feel stronger on the bike and that standing pedaling efforts don’t seem as hard anymore. This is from nothing more than getting the core, hips and upper body strong in a systematic manner.

Using core exercises like planks, side planks and bird dogs to increase core stability is very important since the less stable your “platform” the less strength and power you can produce when relying solely on it.

Using upper body exercises like push ups, chin ups and inverted rows to increase upper strength is important because standing pedaling requires you to hold yourself up and stabilize your position with your upper body.

Using hip dominant exercises like deadlifts, single leg deadlifts and swings to increase hip strength is important because standing pedaling requires much more hip drive than seated pedaling does.

So there you have it, a blueprint for overcoming the weaknesses that keep you from easily standing and hammering out singletrack. Standing pedaling is only a bad option if you don’t have the strength and endurance in the core, upper body and hips to sustain it. Attack those weaknesses with a good training program and that is no longer an issue. Sure, you’ll have riders in your group tell you that you will tire yourself out quicker, you’ll just have to wait for them to hear what they were saying at the top of that steep hill you were killing them on.

-James Wilson-

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Mountain Bike Strength Training

One of the more common responses I get to the early phases of my programs is that they look too easy, especially for those riders who have some strength training experience under their belt. For a rider who has built up to doing 50+ push ups at a time (although I have yet to see 50 perfect push ups from anyone) only doing 5-20 reps seems like an insult to their pecs. Surely they should do more, right?

Not so fast…I am not impressed when someone tells me that they are not challenged by an “easy” exercise. In fact, when I hear this I know that true strength has eluded that person since strength consist of the ability to not only make heavy weights feel light but also the ability to make your light weights feel heavy.

You should be able to do 50 reps and be able to wear yourself out in 5 reps. When you can make 5 bodyweight reps feel like the hardest thing you’ve ever done then you truly have control of your ability to produce tension, which is the root of strength. If you are always relying on the load or the number of reps to tell you how strong to be then you don’t really own your strength.

This leads us to the Internal-External Intensity Continuum. This is something I made up one day while trying to explain this concept to a ride who trains at my facility. In a nutshell, explains where the “hard” is coming from during an exercise or workout.

If you are Internally producing the Intensity – like getting really tight and staying that way during bodyweight squats – then you are purposefully producing more tension than you need to in order to complete the movement. If you are Externally producing the Intensity – like doing a max effort lift or amount of reps – then the load is causing the body to reflexively produce tension in response to it.

You want every workout to be “hard”, you just don’t need or want to be going to the External side of the Intensity Continuum every time you train. Being able to benefit from the Internal side will round out your strength and support the other side of the spectrum.

This explains how you can have a “hard” workout without training balls-to-the-wall every time you hit the gym. When I tell riders that they should walk out of the gym during week 1 of a new program knowing that they could do more the old bodybuilding mindset starts to creep in – how can you get results if you don’t max out every time you train?

Notice, though, that I didn’t say that the workout should be easy; you should simply not max out how much weight and how many reps you can do. If you don’t have the ability to internally produce more tension than the weight or reps call for then this sounds ridiculous, however, for those who have learned the art of strength this makes total sense.

For example, during my current training phase I have a workout that calls for me to do 3 sets of 8 reps on the deadlift. I wanted to use week 1 to set up the next 2 weeks and so I didn’t want to go too heavy or I would not leave myself anywhere to go. So, I used conservative weights and built up to doing 185 pounds on the last set.

During week 2 I built up to 205 pounds and then in week 3 I hit 225 pounds for 8 reps, which was my max effort – I walked out knowing I couldn’t have done 1 more good rep. While a bit off topic, I’m going to finish the cycle with 3 sets of 5 reps with 205 pounds to back off a bit after my peak effort.

The point is that if you look at the weight progression (185 pounds to 225 pounds) my week 1 effort looks easy – its 40 pounds less than my max weight. However, I can tell you that week 1 was not easy (I was there). Week 1 was more on the Internal side of the Intensity Continuum, Week 2 was in the middle and Week 3 was on the External Side of it, making every week “hard” in its own way.

This concept also applies to training phases and plans. You have to spend some phases focusing more on the Internal Side and some on the External side of the Intensity Continuum. This is why the early phases in my workout programs confuse some riders – my programs advance from Internal Intensity focused phases to External Intensity focused phases and since they have never been told the value of working on the Internal side of the continuum it makes no sense.

Unfortunately, our training culture seems to have largely forgotten and dismissed the Internal side of the Intensity Continuum. Go heavy and hard or go home is the battle cry for thousands of well meaning riders limping their way to the gym or “boot camp”, never realizing that there is another side to the strength coin that is needed to complete and round out their strength.

So if you have an “easy” workout then take that as a chance to work on the Internal side of the Intensity Continuum, not as a chance to breeze through it and tell yourself how super fit you are. For a lot of people it will be very humbling to realize how little body and tension control they really have but with focused practice it will come pretty quickly.

Make sure that you have a balance of Internal and External Intensity focused exercises, workouts and phases in your overall program. True strength demands a balance between the two sides of the Intensity Continuum so make sure you respect and practice them both.

-James Wilson-

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Mountain Bike Strength Training