Motocross Training Blog

Off Season Cardio

I’ve kind of had a reoccurring theme this week.  If you haven’t guessed, it has been the off season training.  Even amateurs can benefit from getting into the habit seasonal training.  Even if you aren’t a serious racer (i.e. weekend warrior), this type of training can help you can ride longer and you won’t as sore on Monday for work.  I really wanted to cover cardio today because that is something that can be somewhat tough to work.

I work part time at a gym here in Tampa.  I see plenty of people come in and hit the treadmills and stationary bikes for at least an hour and a half; and they come in 5 or 6 times a week to do the same thing.  They kill themselves and I can tell their legs are on fire.  This got me thinking…is this really an effective way to build up your cardio?  It just doesn’t seem logical to come in and kill yourself like this.  This is where heart rate training comes into play.

If you know your maximum heart rate, you can calculate the percentage you need to be in.  For fat burning, you usually want to be in around 50 – 60% of your max heart rate (HR).  To get the body burning the fat, it takes about 20 – 30 minutes for the body to begin this process.  However, if you want to get that cardio up, 70 – 80% of your max HR gets you into that MX training zone.

If you are just starting out training, a good place to start (as far as length of the cardio session), is a little more than the time of your average race.  If your race is about 15 minutes, do your cardio for 20 minutes.  From what I have read, the best way to be prepared for your event is to train 3 to 4 times longer than your event.  So for a 15 minute race, 45 to 60 minutes would be needed to train.  Now, remember, this is for a steady pace of 70 – 80% of your max HR.  Trying to do that with interval sessions would murder you.

This whole concept of this cardio is for getting your base down and expanding out from there.  Doing this about 3 days a week is a pretty solid time for recovery.  You don’t need to kill yourself in the gym every time.  Training efficiently is more effective and you will see the results on the track much sooner; plus you won’t risk the possibility of over training.

Alcohol and MX

The Holidays are here.  That means lots of food and drinks.  Yea, alcoholic drinks. This time of year is hard enough to get through with a healthy diet for racing, but alcohol just throws in an extra curve ball.  With anything in training, moderation is pretty important.  The more you try to avoid it, the more you will “splurge” drink when you finally get it.

Here are a few things to remember when the bottoms go up:

-          In one of my previous articles about the importance of sleep, I showed the importance of sleep for athletes.  At first, alcohol can put you to sleep, but the deep sleep needed is interrupted by the alcohol.  Not only this, but alcohol can reduce your immune system’s power and if you are injured, it can actually take longer for you to heal up with alcohol in your body.

-          Cancels out your workouts.  Over a long period of time, it can diminish long term protein synthesis and deter muscle growth.

-          Waking up hung over means you are dehydrated and this is often associated with headaches, nausea, and weakness.  This dehydration can go back to recovery from your workouts.  The dehydration impairs the body’s ability to heal itself.  Not only is the body depleted of water, but nutrients are pushed out too.

-          One New Zealand study actually found that reaction time was reduced even after 60 hours of heavy drinking.

Now, this is pretty negative.  However, IF YOU ARE OF AGE AND ABOVE 21, then a few drinks during the Holidays is not going to kill your training.  Like I said, moderation is important.  As long as you aren’t getting drunk before a race, you should be okay.  To offset the dehydration, drink plenty of water throughout the night.  Be smart about it and you’ll make it through the Holiday season healthier than you think.

Vision

Yesterday I did an article on off season training.  If you didn’t read, it is a good idea to skim over at least so you get an idea as to what this is post is going to refer to.  In summary, the off season is a chance to look back and figure out the mistakes made on and off the track.  I focused a lot on the training part, but riding technique can also be improved at this time.  Like off the bike training, you want to break down your program to the fundamentals.  For riding, this means vision.

As you get faster and faster, it is crucial you look further and further ahead.  Beginners make a bad habit of looking right in front of their fender.  Not only does this not give you a chance to set up for the following section, but your reaction time is cut down drastically because you are staring right in front of you.  It is like driving a car; if you are constantly staring at the front of your hood, you are at a greater risk for getting into a fender-bender.  You want to look ahead at the cars in front of you so you can anticipate what is coming.

Looking at least a few bike lengths ahead has always worked well for me.  This works really well for jump faces and fast sections.  If you are looking well ahead, you can make adjustments so you don’t slow yourself down or end up on the ground.  For corners, as a rider approaches the apex, looking at the end of the corner actually helps you and your bike go where you are looking.  For ruts, looking at the end while you are at the beginning of it helps you keep your balance and focus on getting through it cleanly.

One weird thing that I have noticed before is that if you stare at something (like a rock), you somewhat gravitate towards it.  That’s why it is important to notice obstacles and find a clean way through them, don’t concentrate on it.  Just get around it.  This is a very basic technique, but it is something everyone should work one.  Even the pros practice the basic stuff because that is the foundation of your riding.  Like the off season training, if you have a wide base, your riding “pyramid” can be built up higher.

Sorry

Hey guys, I am sorry I didn’t update the site at all last week.  I had exams all week and on top of that work…so it was a pretty crazy week.  However, I plan to make it up to you guys and I have started working on something.  It should be done around New Years.  So it will be my holiday present for you.  Stay tuned for more info!

Off Season Training

For most of you in the Northern states, you have put the bike away for a while.  There is snow on the ground and even in the Southern states; there really isn’t a lot of big races.  This is the perfect time to look back at the spring, summer and fall and see how you did over the last season.  Now, I am sure most of you are thinking, “Seasons are only for the pros.”  This is not true and you can actually benefit from training seasonally.

I know you are probably annoyed about logs and how much I talk about them, but they make a HUGE difference in training and your results.  If you have been keeping a log, you can look back and see what kind of training you were doing and how that translated to the track.  Going off memory alone won’t be much help.  A rider can look back and see what type of training benefitted him/her the most.

This is also a time to look back on your weaknesses.  I always had trouble with cradio, so I used to run 2 miles, 3 times a week.  Over the following weeks, I could see the difference in my motos and lap times.  What if you had trouble with swapping out or headshake?  You might need to work on lower body and core strength to keep your legs from getting tired.  This is the time you also need to work on the base of your fitness.

The main focus of off training is to build that base up so you can be better prepared for next year.  Longer, moderate cardio sessions are needed in order to get that basic aerobic base built up.  This prepares the body for the interval training used in the pre-race and race season.  I do preach about the interval sessions quite a bit, but the winter months require you to change your program up to help you for the next season.

As you already know, I am a firm believer in strength training.  It helps protect you from injury, you keep better form throughout your moto, and it looks good for the ladies!  The off season, like the aerobics, can be used to increase that anaerobic threshold of yours.  Combining the two, you can get yourself ahead of everyone else who is still in that race training mode.  Those people don’t give their bodies rest to recover from the season and get burnt out.  So have a look back at your last season, evaluate your results and work on your weaknesses.

Finding Some Extra Speed: Sprints

First of all, sorry I have not been writing much.  Thanksgiving threw me off and now I’ve got exams coming up, so it’s been pretty hectic.  Anyway, I was watching a few videos on RacerX and they are all Supercross testing.  A1 is coming up quickly and teams are trying to get things together for the West Coast.  The riders, however, have been training more on the bike, trying to get ready for the heats, possibly the LCQ and the main.  This got me thinking about that set up and how to prepare for that.

Unlike professional Outdoor races, amateur races are usually pretty short; maybe half the time of pro races.  The short races require you to get a good start and throw down quick, consistent laps.  Think about it.  A 450 heat race is 8 laps and you have 20 people on the gate and they only take the top 9.  With lap times under a minute, you are only on the track for less than 10 minutes.  Those laps need to count!

Starts help tremendously.  However, you need to practice the length of your race and race the clock.  Davi Millsaps, Ricky Carmichael and James Stewart all race the clock.  Mrs. Carmichael is stopwatch “Nazi”.  Racing against time also helps get you into that “race mode” and find some extra speed.  Speed isn’t everything though.  You need to stay consistent at your fastest.  Making small mistakes add up a lot more over a shorter race and when you have someone right behind you, that mistake is amplified.  Having a friend or parent take down your lap times can also show how consistent you really are.

This idea of doing sprints does not mean for you to ride over your head.  You have to remember your braking points and try to hold the gas a little longer or find a new line.  Be creative.  In short races, you need to be able to get out of the gate and ride your fastest.  Chad Reed broke down Jeremy McGrath’s reason for dominance and said that “McGrath would sprint out of the gate and ride as fast as he could.  By the half way point, even if he was a little tired, he was so far ahead it didn’t matter.”

One way to look at it is to run away and hide.