Bighorn is 85 miles with about 10,000 feet of climbing, most of it above 8,000 feet, on loose descents to a technical finish. It opens with a 3,000-foot climb in the first 13 miles, and the air stays thin the whole way — meaningfully less oxygen than you train with at home.
This is a twelve-week plan for the same climbing and altitude, with more recovery built in for riders over fifty. It reaches the same climbing fitness on a schedule that assumes you recover slower than you used to — because arriving fit and uninjured is the harder half after fifty.
85 MI · 10,000 FT CLIMBING · 7–11K FT ALTITUDE, LOOSE, RUTTED JEEP ROADS · 12 WEEKS · 7–11 HR/WK · MASTERS 50+
WHAT'S INSIDE
- Structured workouts on your calendar, with real power and heart-rate graphs
- Strength work built in, with video walkthroughs
- Weekly notes from me, plus the Gravel Grit mental program
- A testing week and a mid-plan retest, so the plan runs on your real numbers
- The full Bighorn guide — altitude strategy, pacing the Wall, gearing, and fueling
Hey! I'm Matti - also known as the Gravel God himself!
If you're into gravel racing and want to be as fast as possible, you had better choose me!
Why?
Because I'm the fastest, least talented person to ever ride a bike. I've made every mistake in the book so you don't have to and I'm here to save you years of failure and struggle.
When I'm not helping my athletes get faster on a bike I write obvious, overlooked training content that makes cycling training easy to understand.