Ride Smoother and Faster on Downhills with this MTB Race Training Session - Pacing Practice

Mountain biking is hard. And that's why we like it. As a sport, it's a beautiful mixture of physical ability, skill, and risk.

But here's the thing: these components cannot stand alone. It's this blend that makes it interesting to ride and train for, and further why we see different racers excel on different trails.

However, one huge question remains: how do we approach a race run to ride our fastest?

Up hills, down hills and over features - what's the fastest in MTB? PC New Zealand Mountain BikingThe Myth of 'Pedal to the Metal' (Is Smooth Really Fast in MTB?)We've all seen those race videos where riders unleash an all-out pedal assault from the starting line. Pedaling at every chance to squeeze out every extra watt. It all sounds good in theory, right? But does it work in practice?

How many times have you smashed a pedal section only to find yourself cross-eyed and fumbling through the rough stuff? This approach seems to contradict the timeless adage we've all heard and repeated: "Smooth is fast."

If you can't focus you can't ride smoothThe Reality of Pacing in MTB - All-Out is Not Always FastCan you be smooth and fastwhen you're seeing stars? Can you maintain a perfect flow with a maxed-out heart rate? Probably not. But this is often our typical race strategy.

The result of this strategy is usually sloppy riding and overbraking. This is why many top riders race at 90% effort - they can carry more speed when they’re fully in control than when they are totally gassed.

In this age of data, we can do better than relying on feelings alone and come up with our own perfect strategy for every MTB track.

Tech tools can help us be better mountain bikers. PC New Zealand Mountain BikingAssessing Your Pacing Strategy - Tech to Help You on DownhillsWhen it comes to perfecting your pacing strategy, the key lies in data-driven insights. Several crucial metrics play a pivotal role in assessing and optimizing your approach. Here are some of them:

Power Output: Monitoring your power output provides a clear picture of your physical effort during the race. It helps you gauge whether you're pushing too hard or not hard enough at different points on the course, and you can see where these places are.

Heart Rate: Your heart rate serves as an indicator of your effort. Push too hard and your HR will go up and never come down until long after your run is over. Ride within yourself and your HR will respond after a hard effort and come back down when you’re coasting.

Braking: The way you brake is a result of the demands of the trail and your physical capacity to ride with control. By identifying braking patterns and understanding how these change, you can maintain better control, ride with more flow, and have more gas for when it counts!

Lap Times: You’re most likely going for the shortest time, so record that too! Use this to find the right mix of physical effort and flow.

You don't have to guess how you're riding An Enduro Pacing ExperimentCheck here for a full rundown of a pacing experiment alongside a published scientific article on pacing in MTB.

Some real MTB science along with some bro science belowAlongside the real scientific experiment, there are also some interesting experiments you could run on yourself, such as this below.

TL;DR: Holding back on some parts of the track helped this rider get a faster downhill time.