# Mountain Biking Fitness Vs. Road cycling Fitness?



## RightTurnCylde (Nov 21, 2008)

I have a friend I ride both road and MTB with, on the mountain bike I smoke him on the uphills, I mean I waiting at the top of a long 2 mile climb for few minutes, but on the road bike esp. on shorter hills he beats me, just blasts up them, but longer climbs on the road bike I usually and either with him or not too far behind. 

I usually do most of my climbing on the MTB in the middle ring, where he spins on the MTB, on the road bike it's almost the opposite, not sure if that matters or not.

Either way, I'm confused as to why I can climb on the mountain bike and leave him in the dust, but can't do that on the road bike?

My suspicion is that I'm stronger then him and I have good strength endurance, but he has more power and he's 35lbs lighter then me, so he can attack short hills better. I think he has more power and is lighter, so he can lay down more watts for a couple minutes at a time, but once he runs out of gas I'm right behind him on longer hills. So if he gets 50 meters out in front of me on a hill by blasting up the first part on the road, he'll be that same distance from me as we crest the hill most of the time. But you'd think I'd be able to reel him in on longer more sustained climbs because of how far in front of him I get when we climb on the MTB climbing?

It's not so much that I care about beating him, it's more that I find it so curious our differences in performance?


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## tom_h (May 6, 2008)

Not sure I'm following everything you're saying, but it seems you (on MTB) climb 2 mile grades (what % ?) faster than your buddy (on road bike).

I'd say it's some combination of gearing and fitness level.

Typical road bike will have 53-39 chainwheels and 12-25 cassette.

Typical MTB will have 44-32-22 chainwheels and 11-32 cassette, and you're saying you use the middle (32t) chainwheel on a 2 mi grade. Plus, 26" wheels on MTB also effectively make for lower (easier) gearing, than 700C road bike wheels (about 28" diameter).

Your buddy perhaps doesn't yet have the leg strength or aerobic capacity to push relatively high gears up a long grade.

A fit recreational road cyclist can fly up a 6% grade so quickly (12-15 mph), that you wouldn't be able to spin that 32t chainwheel fast enough, to keep up.

This web site let's you play around with power/speed/weight cycling calculations:
http://analyticcycling.com/


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## RightTurnCylde (Nov 21, 2008)

Correct, I beat him climbing on the mountain bike, where he beats me on the road bike?

I leave him in the dust on the MTB, on the road bike he beats me on hills or any short hard effort, flats, downhills, climbs, on longer road efforts we're usually right with each other.

I think it comes down to power? I feel nauseous trying to spin a hard gear, I can spin a moderate gear, or mash a harder gear, but I never feel like I have the right gear on the road. On the mountain bike it's either really easy or really hard, I tend to do fine mashing my way up hills and through mud for hours at a time on the mountain bike. I just wonder why I can't mash around all day on the road bike? And how I can beat most of the people I ride with on the MTB climbing??? It's so bizzare to me.


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## RightTurnCylde (Nov 21, 2008)

I guess I'm asking basically what is the difference in climbing MTB vs. road in terms of fitness requirements?


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## BunnV (Sep 7, 2005)

I have a similar situation with a guy I ride road and mountain with. You may be better technically off road than your friend is. Riding up a technical single track requires different bike handling skills than cranking up a paved road.

In my case, we are about even both on and off road climbing. Going down, he smokes me off road, but I smoke him on road. I think it's just different skills and comfort levels for pain and the potential to crash!


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## tomk96 (Sep 24, 2007)

are the mtn bike climbs technical? just wide open fire roads?


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## RightTurnCylde (Nov 21, 2008)

BunnV said:


> I have a similar situation with a guy I ride road and mountain with. You may be better technically off road than your friend is. Riding up a technical single track requires different bike handling skills than cranking up a paved road.
> 
> In my case, we are about even both on and off road climbing. Going down, he smokes me off road, but I smoke him on road. I think it's just different skills and comfort levels for pain and the potential to crash!


No the 2 mile "MTB" accent I'm referring to is a 4x4 access road so it's a bit rocky but certainly not technical. It's not like he's having to get off his bike to cross boulders and logs or anything like that; basically wide open.

It's just so strange that I'd walk away from him on the MTB climb, but not do the same thing on the road bike. One thing I notice though is that he spins a really easy gear on the MTB, which is strange as he's a more of a masher on the road? I tend to spin most of the time 95-100RPM on the road and longer wide open MTB climbs like this one. In short technical hills I'm usually just in my middle ring mashing, where he's spinning in his little gear, kind of the opposite of our road riding.

My guess is that something is wrong with his MTB climbing technique, position, gearing, or he needs to practice riding at a higher RPM more esp. on the road. I think he'd mash up the up hill in the MTB if he could but perhaps he doesn't have the strength, or because he's 180lbs and I'm 220lbs and relative to him, the bike weighs less to me, so as % of total body weight a mountain bike isn't that heavy to me, also getting the wheels momentum in the big 29er wheels going up the hills is easier because of my size?


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## bauerb (Jan 18, 2006)

i do all my training/racing on the road. but when I do go mtb, I ride my SS. I generally smoke my mtb friends who are riding geared bikes. there is 1 reason: conditioning. i love the freedom of not having any gears to shift. I find that I focus much more on riding and going fast. it also means that on tough uphills I have to push a too-big gear sometimes at painfully slow rpm's. unlike a geared bike, in SS you change your cadence to match the terrain. with gears, you change your gear to keep your cadence. bottom line, I think your buddy is riding his MTB with poor technique


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## Zipp0 (Aug 19, 2008)

It sounds like you are better with long aerobic efforts, but he has better anaerobic threshold power. He mashes hard up the shorter hills using power and momentum, whereas you spin more and rely on your superior aerobic fitness.

He would do well in crits but you would beat him in MTB races with lots of climbing.


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## RightTurnCylde (Nov 21, 2008)

bauerb said:


> i do all my training/racing on the road. but when I do go mtb, I ride my SS. I generally smoke my mtb friends who are riding geared bikes. there is 1 reason: conditioning. i love the freedom of not having any gears to shift. I find that I focus much more on riding and going fast. it also means that on tough uphills I have to push a too-big gear sometimes at painfully slow rpm's. unlike a geared bike, in SS you change your cadence to match the terrain. with gears, you change your gear to keep your cadence. bottom line, I think your buddy is riding his MTB with poor technique


I think you're right, it makes more sense that he's got something wrong with his MTB climbing, then I'm just that much better on the MTB, esp. because if anything he should be smoking me on the MTB.

He mashes on the road bike and spins like he's going no where on the MTB, half the time, I'm riding away from on the MTB climbs and 10 minutes into it I'll look down as I'm starting to get tired and notice I was in my middle ring the whole time where I thought I was in the small ring. I'll be waiting at the top for a few minutes and he'll be coming up the long 2 mile with his legs buzzing like a humming bird all out of breath.

I asked him before why he rides around all slow on the MTB, he's always in the granny gear, he says he thinks he couldn't do the whole ride in the middle gear. I think next time we ride I'm going to get him to try to start doing more in the middle ring and having it be less cardiovascular and more muscular as that seems to work great for him on the road.


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## RightTurnCylde (Nov 21, 2008)

Zipp0 said:


> It sounds like you are better with long aerobic efforts, but he has better anaerobic threshold power. He mashes hard up the shorter hills using power and momentum, whereas you spin more and rely on your superior aerobic fitness.
> 
> He would do well in crits but you would beat him in MTB races with lots of climbing.


Yeah, he thinks it's his cardio that holds him back from spinning up the hills, so you could be right, I'm going to have him start experimenting with climbing with gear that puts more focus on his leg muscles then his heart and see if that helps him.

It's kind of funny to see someone mash and be pretty fast on the road bike then spin like a humming bird on the mountain bike and be slow. It messes him up too I notice on the technical sections as he's not carrying enough momentum to clear obstacles easily, where I am almost always in my middle gear and just give a couple good hard turns on the cranks and I'm up to speed and just have to pull up my bars and let momentum float me over obstacles.

I notice too that most of the people I ride with also ride easy gears and don't seem to have the torque. And I'll do 3-4hr rides like this mashing my way through it.


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## ZoSoSwiM (Mar 7, 2008)

IMO... road fitness helps your recover quicker between hard sections while mountain biking. However on the trail you don't stay at steady paces and you fluctuate so much it's different. Last summer I was in pretty decent shape on my road bike.. got on the trail and was still in rough shape. I was still faster than my friends but only because I recovered between sections more quickly.


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## Wookiebiker (Sep 5, 2005)

RightTurnCylde said:


> My suspicion is that I'm stronger then him and I have good strength endurance, but he has more power and he's 35lbs lighter then me, so he can attack short hills better.


My guess is it comes down to weight.

Your friend is 35 pounds lighter than you and may be pushing an equal or heavier bike up hills when it comes to your MTB's as they can vary quite a bit. If you are pushing the same weight bike but he's giving up 35 pounds to you off road...that's a fair amount to give up.

Also, figure more rolling resistance off road, tires, wheels etc. can make a big difference when it comes to climbing as well as technique (even on fire road climbs). 

Also position on the bike can make a big difference. On the road your buddy may have a great position for road riding, on his MTB it may be more laid back giving him slower climbing.

Road climbing tends to be more cardio than MTB, where MTB climbing tends to be more interval oriented...so you may recover quicker after hard efforts where your buddy has better aerobic performance and lighter weight helps when it comes to road climbing.

Basically multiple factor make a difference between road and MTB climbing/riding.


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## carlosflanders (Nov 23, 2008)

I go for the fasttwitch/slowtwitch anaerobic/aerobic thing. I'm an ok climber but still get smoked on hills by the crit riders in the midwest because they can muscle over any hill up to 90 secs or so.

Climbs longer than 1 km or so is when a climber or diesel engine type starts to do well.

The (jn)famous Snake Alley crit is usually won by some musclebound powerhouse, rarely by a skinnyass climber.


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## harprider (Jul 16, 2008)

I can't figure it out for me but I race both road and mtb and I race against some of the same guys and on the Mountain Bike (which I race a lot more) I kill them but on the road bike I have a hard time keeping up.


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## RightTurnCylde (Nov 21, 2008)

harprider said:


> I can't figure it out for me but I race both road and mtb and I race against some of the same guys and on the Mountain Bike (which I race a lot more) I kill them but on the road bike I have a hard time keeping up.


I wonder why that is in your case? What's your best guess?
Are you masher or spinner on the MTB? 
How much do you weight? 
Are you more slow twitch or fast twitch?

I wonder if upper body strength and endurance play a part in this, because I often notice esp. on steeper sections having to pull more with my arms and back on the MTB vs. the road bike? I'm built more like a swimmer then a biker I think, I notice sometimes my upper body getting pretty involved in the climbing esp. as it gets steeper.


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## Zipp0 (Aug 19, 2008)

A road race with rolling hills or a crit course with very small hills or flat is going to be very different than a mountain bike race. Power to weight really only come into play on sustained climbs as in a mtb race or a road race with actual mountains, not hills. When you can stay in the pack on the road and draft over a hill or rise, that isn't climbing. On the mountain bike, especially over loose terrain, you can't always stand up and power through, as you would lose traction and momentum, and you're done. Instead, you have to stay seated and spin, and there is no draft to help you, and in all likelyhood the climb will take longer than 90 seconds.

Each discipline requires specific training and experience. I just did a couple crits and it took until my third race to finish with the pack. They are both cycling, but they are also very different.


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## bauerb (Jan 18, 2006)

MTB races that I tend to do are comprised of anarobic bursts, then threshold recover, rinse and repeat. when I race MTB lung busting climbs are the norm. the only time in road races I ever feel this way is the last 1km if: 1) i don't have a wheel and need to come out of the draft early to gain positions 2) the finishing sprint regardless of what happened prior. mtb is simply a more anorobic sport. prob like CX, although I never raced CX


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## kngpengwin (Aug 15, 2008)

I'd guess it's technique. 

Your friend doesn't seem to be able to put power down on the MTB the way he does on the road bike. He probably needs to work on mashing bigger gears on dirt, which could be specific skills like body positioning or could just be comfort level. 

Or, he could figure out how to spin more effectively so he could use his current MTB technique but go faster. 

I race MTB and road and climb much better on the road bike. I enjoy it more, and I think that affects how I handle the bike.


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