Mountain Bike Stage Race/Breck Epic 12 Week Training Plan
Author
Anne Linton
All plans by this CoachLength
12 Weeks
Typical Week
2 MTB, 2 Bike, 2 Day Off, 2 Strength
Longest Workout
7:00 hrs
Plan Specs
cycling mountain biking beginner intermediate multi day power based hr based strength
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Summary
This is a 12 week plan to get you ready for the Break Epic or other mountain bike stage race.. It assumes you have ridden your mountain bike for 3-4 hours at least one time and have a solid 1-2 months of base training under your belt. If not please see my Cycling Winter Base programs.
Stats
Sample Day 1
Sample Day 2
This can be done on your road or mountain bike using HR/Power or RPE.
Warm up for 20-30 minutes. Then do the following: Long Tempo 1: 30 minutes at tempo
After finishing, cool down for 15-20 minutes and stretch. Be sure to take in adequate fuel/fluids and electrolytes during these efforts.
Sample Day 3
Sample Day 5
This is just that a long endurance ride on your MTB. Do a warm up and then try to maintain an endurance effort by RPE or HR. On the downhills work on skills/obstacles and don’t worry about HR. For the duration of the ride the goal is to keep the HR or Power in the Endurance zone or less. Realize you may need to go REALLY slow up hills to accomplish this. It is ok if you increase your HR for short periods of time (less than 2 min) but best to work on keeping it low. This is a good time to practice your nutrition and hydration for race day. Do total time on calendar.
Sample Day 6
Unless otherwise noted endurance rides can be done on any bike.(mtb, gravel, road). Warm up for 20-30 minutes and then spend the remainder of the time on the calendar in your Endurance HR/RPE zone. If you have a power meter keep an eye on your power numbers but best to go by HR for this ride. Cool down 10 min. The purpose of this type of ride is to build the physiologic infrastructure (mitochondria, capillaries, transporters that allow you to use lactate for fuel). This will allow you to go longer and to add harder efforts as you progress in your training. Can be replaced with a nordic ski (classic preferable or if skate only do 2/3 of time ), snowshoe, backcountry ski tour at same heart rate zone. Work on nutrition and hydration before, during and after this ride.
Sample Day 8
Sample Day 9
This can be done on your road or mountain bike using HR/Power or RPE.
Warm up for 20-30 minutes. Then do the following: 2 by 20 min tempo with 5 min recovery
After finishing, cool down for 15-20 minutes and stretch. Be sure to take in adequate fuel/fluids and electrolytes during these efforts.