How much more difficult is mountain biking than road riding?

TheGeneralist

I'm trying to push myself a bit more on the bike this year. Up till January I'd never done more than 65 miles in a day. Since then I've done the Cheshire Cat and Etape Du Dales. I also did 105km of trail at CyB a few years ago which took around 10 hours.

I was thinking of trying to finish the Kielder 100 this September but after the EdD am seriously rethinking it. Ok the weather was awful and I had 3 bad nights sleep beforehand... but I'd always thought that proper singletrack was at least twice as difficult as road riding, if not more.


Which would suggest the Kielder 100 would be like doinig two EdD in one day, which I couldn't manage.


Any opinions on what factor you'd apply to a MTB ride to get the road effort equivalent?

njee20

About the most reasonable comparison I've heard is that MTB KMs = Road miles, so 100k on an MTB is like 100 miles on the road. There are too many variables to actually be able to compare though.

The Kielder isn't particularly technical from what I've haerd, there are some very fast fireroad sections.

Just give it a go, you've got ages to train yet!

stubs

20 miles on the road = feel fresh as a daisy next morning

20 miles off road = feel about a 100 next morning

I reckon its better to compare riding time 3 hours off road feels the same to me as 3 hours on road.

MadGuern

Have to agree with everyone here, started road racing at start of year and recently started XC racing for a change. XC is far more demanding and tiring as you have to think more on the trail then on the road. However enjoy both and so have to spend twice as much now on bike stuff.

Just need to get my head in the zone for downhill now :-)

MickTup

Try this for training http://www.purplemountain.co.uk/on-one- ... -marathon/

streako

XC is harder than road, but you still have to pedal either way. As Stubs says, its more realistic to compare ride times and then you will probably use a similar amount of energy.

Road is usually more of a gradual build up of steady power, whereas XC is more explosive and power on/power off.

I have found the recent winds have made my usual road rides much harder and left me feeling drained.

rock_hopper

I reckon it depends on the intensity, it's difficult to do a steady mtb ride. Unless you ride around on flat fireroads for a few hours but wheres the fun in that!

I would say that MTB beats your body up more and uses more mental energy for concentrating on trail obstacles etc. But a hilly 70-80 mile 2nd cat road race is going to be tough, there won't be much 'sitting in' and you will have to ride anaerobic at some point to chase a break or not get dropped. But I would say generally MTB is harder.

boneyjoe

From what I could see the top EdD riders finished in about 6:20, whereas the top Kielder riders finished in about 8hrs last year. You said the weather was horrid, while I understand it was pretty good for Kielder, so perhaps take 20mins off the EdD time to compensate. That makes Kielder about 1/3rd "longer" than EdD, though it will probably feel harder due to the added strains on the body from riding offroad. Hope that helps!

Thewaylander

Think it also depends ont he bike you ride off road, I mean comparing my 160mmm 36pound bike to a road bike is a big difference.

Mojo_666

How does road riding effect the arms/chest/shoulders?

I find long hard rides drain my upper body as much as my legs, although I do not know but I cannot imagine road riding to do this? So maybe that should be another consideration when comparing the 2?

MrChuck

It's harder to keep your rhythm and stay in your sweet spot for MTBing as the terrain dictates the effort you need to put in more than it does on the road. Or rather the terrain doesn't let you settle down the way you can on the road- obviously the terrain largely dictates the effort whenever you're on a bike!

I reckon I found the 100km Meridas harder than the 115 mile Dragon Ride, and they weren't even really 100km.

john_smith

i don't think hour for hour is a perfect comparison. lots of people can ride 6 hours on a road bike for a sportive but not many could take 6 hours of punishing riding on a mountain bike unless the terrain was solely fire roads. road bike only really takes it out of the legs. mtb going to take up burn all over the body and leave you with knackered legs/back/arms if the route got a lot of hard terrain in. sometimes mountain bikers seem to rider at a lower intensity though and have more stop/start/chat but still i think a good rider of both would find 6 hours at 140bpm on mtb tougher than 6 hours at 140bpm on road bike.

prb007

john_smith wrote:

i don't think hour for hour is a perfect comparison. lots of people can ride 6 hours on a road bike for a sportive but not many could take 6 hours of punishing riding on a mountain bike unless the terrain was solely fire roads. road bike only really takes it out of the legs. mtb going to take up burn all over the body and leave you with knackered legs/back/arms if the route got a lot of hard terrain in. sometimes mountain bikers seem to rider at a lower intensity though and have more stop/start/chat but still i think a good rider of both would find 6 hours at 140bpm on mtb tougher than 6 hours at 140bpm on road bike.

+1 - what he said..

Don't agree with the km=miles conversion factor, tbh.
Did JOGLE a month back (120/140 miles per day),
but could NEVER do 120/140k per day on MTB for 8 days
- I'd be in a box, ffs!
My road bike is exactly half the weight of my MTB, btw!

gs3

I generally use a ratio of about 1:3 where 1 mile OFF-road = 3 miles ON-road

This is based on cycling a complete circuit (start and finish at the same point on a route) and assumes that you are riding an XC/ trail type bike when off-road and a standard road type bike when on-road.

It's not scientific by any means but pretty much pinpoints how I physically feel after each type of ride.

.

saprkzz

In my experience these are two differnt types of exercise and even to the point using different muscles, however they seem to wipe you out just as much.

I have just bought a road bike 4 weeks ago, never riden one before, and find road cycling very tough. I think its due to when your on a Mounatin bike its very stop/start when riding with your mates.

I completed the BORS 105km ride a few weeks back in 5 hours, and felt knackered. It was constant and the last 10 miles was a real struggle. On Sunday morning I did 46 miles on the road bike in 2hrs 15 minutes, and pretty much felt the same sort of tiredness, so really i think its all down to how hard you push yourself.

MTB's i think is more demanding maybe, and In an endurance ride is tougher.

supersonic

Just 5 miles over severe rocky terrain can absolutely bugger you up.

springtide9

The biggest difference between the two.. especially for the longer events... is the impact MTBing has on other parts of your body.. not just the legs.

Think MTBing can be a bit more sociable... and hence people will stop and chat generally more. But that's not always the case... as I have been out with a few roadies who always seem to want to pop into a cafe for half and hour or so.

It is dependent on effort. And it s also dependent on terrain, both on the road and off.

Personally think MTB is much tougher... simple because it's the terrain that determines your level of effort on occasions (rather than yourself); also, the concentration level is just so much more intense. On the road... you get tired and you can just back off the pace and recover. Off road, it really doesn't take that much of lack of concentration and I find myself in the bushes.

Anonymous

supersonic wrote:

Just 5 miles over severe rocky terrain can absolutely bugger you up.

Quite. I often fin that riding up the mountains on the natural trails here, and going to Llandegla or Penmachno can lull me into a false sense of security.
I start thinking "ah, my fitness is pretty good again", so I head to Coed y Brenin, and always get hammered much more than I expect!

MTB riding can vary dramatically from one ride to the other, so I can't see how there's a set way to compare the two

However, Endomondo has some admittedly rough estimations for calories burnt per unit of exercise, and for road riding, it reckons around 57.9 calories per mile, and for MTBing, it reckons around 78.5 per mile.
These are of course, rough estimations, since it doesn't take elevation, heart rate etc into account, BUT, they presumably got those base figures from somewhere (ie, they didn;t just pluck them from thin air, hopefully), which probably did some kind of research into it.

ddraver

I think we settled on a cast iron, definite ratio of approximately about 6:3:1 for Road:MTB:Running when we had this discussion last.....

Eskimo427

so are MTB's fitter than roadies?

springtide9

Eskimo427 wrote:

so are MTB's fitter than roadies?

I don't think it works like that. It's like asking if runners are fitter than rowers lol