Hey everybody, welcome to the single tracks podcast. Today it's me, Jeff, and I'm here with Greg

and Aaron to talk about endurance training for mountain biking. It's a new year and a lot of people

are making goals for the rides they want to do this year and races they want to compete in. So

we thought it would be a good time to talk about endurance training. I'm going to start it off by asking you guys, what does endurance mean to you when it comes to mountain biking?

Like what's kind of your threshold for a ride that requires having extra endurance?

I would say if you're basing it on time, I would say anytime you're getting into like the three plus hour territory,

to me that's endurance, you know, and that's actual riding time. That's not like you were out in

the woods for three hours total and you were stopping and having snacks and taking photos.

That's like sandwich time doesn't count. That's right. Sandwich time is not ride time.

But I think maybe a more, I don't know, classical definition of endurance training is, you know, like the 50 mile and up races or, you know, six hour races, that kind of thing.

Yeah. Personally, I found that you can generally fudge it up until about 30 miles. And then once you move beyond that, and you really need to be diligent in your training and preparation,

which is, I think that falls pretty close to Aaron's like time threshold, though.

I guess it depends how faster I do.

Right, and it also depends on where you're riding.

You know, I was just up in Pisga over the holiday break and riding with one of my buddies.

And he says they measure rides in hours, not miles, because the trails are so difficult.

And it's true, you know, you could be gone for six hours on a ride in Pisga and you get back and you've got like 25 miles just because there's a lot of hike of biking and, you know, just really technical slow going.

So, you know, it's kind of a squishy definition, I guess.

Yeah.

I mean, when we summoned it to Antaro this fall, like, it was about seven hours door to door.

I mean, that includes, like, sitting on the summit time.

But, you know, we covered 25 miles.

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