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Training advice needed for 100 mile mountain bike race

bkcomiskeybkcomiskey
in General Training Discussions

I am planning on racing the Lumberjack 100 on June 16th on a 29r hard tail.  It is a 3 loop course with lots of singletrack in Michigan. My thoughts right now are to do the OS as planned starting in January and then ramp up mountain bike volume in May and early June. Fortunately, I only live about 15' from excellent single track and multi track trails.  

I am also focusing on building upper body strength for this type of race and getting light.  I think I can figure out the nutrition and pacing pretty well from IM experience.  Any suggestions would be welcome. Thanks.

Comments

  • jhbinscjhbinsc

    I assume you will be doing some X training on the road bike as well. How many BBW are you doing and have you cosidered how to work them into your build up to the MTB century? Also, how long do you anticipate a century on MTB will take you?

    For me, I'd finish JOS and really focus on bike last 6 week block then throw in at least 2 BBW in early and late May. I'm assuming you are doing tri and possibly long course tri also in 2012 but you don't mention this. Plus is this an "A" race or what? More info would help.

  • bkcomiskeybkcomiskey
    Jeff: Thanks for your help. Lumberjack is more of an epic fun thing as it will be my first ultra endurance mtb race. I will be training on the road bike as well and do at least one BBW end of May. Some of it will depend on weather and trail conditions as to the mix of road and mtb. I expect race should take around 9 hours. I have a sprint tri on 6/2 and then no other tri's until IMOO.
  • NortonNorton
    Although I'm no MTB racer I do go long on the bike. The key to success in long distance anything is proper pacing. Controlling athletic arousal is one of the most difficult concepts for a coach to instill in an athlete. It'll be a bitch to truly dial down your early efforts and watch the ravening hordes roll away. It takes discipline and practice, and best of all, success. Early fueling is also key as it's all too easy to let a couple of hours roll by without taking meaningful calories, creating a hole that is often impossible to fully recover from.

    To summarize: start out easy, fuel early and well, enjoy being strong at the end when it counts.
  • Coach RichCoach Rich

    Brian,

    That sounds epically cool! I really need to get a mtn bike...

    I think your IM pacing experience will really pay off on stuff like this. 

  • jhbinscjhbinsc

    Agree w/ at least one BBW, I'd do two if I were biking 9 hours. I once did a double road century for kicks and spent a few months building up to 6-7 hours on bike then did 202 mile in 10:47 solo. Even did a t-run so I still felt good but went super conservative ealry and picked it up late. It was 4/15/06, just a month before I got my first PM so no data but RPE was1 at start, maybe 7 by finish. With MTB, I assume you'd have a lot more spikes and higher VI than a road ride so maybe get your VO2 work...

  • jetskrjetskr
    Posted By Bill Russell on 21 Dec 2011 09:17 PM

    Controlling athletic arousal is one of the most difficult concepts for a coach to instill in an athlete. 

    Bill,  that's probably one of the best quotes I've read on here.  LOL.

     

    Brian, this sounds like an AWESOME race.  You'll have to keep us up to date with the training and the race.

  • Paul HoughPaul Hough
    I just opened my new Spinervals tape tonight: "Ascending Mountains at Leadville, Co." It's a very hard hill sim work out that you might want to add to your schedule occasionally.
  • trigirl1203trigirl1203
    BC- You are a beast. Good luck with training image
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