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It’s easy to think of yourself as a roadie and to keep doing what roadies do to up their fitness and performance on the bike. But there’s a whole other world of off-road riding out there and even the most die-hard road rider can learn a lot from mixing in mountain biking.
Case in point Ineos Grenadiers rider Tom Pidcock, who’s also the current Olympic cross country MTB gold medal holder (and cyclocross world champion) and there are plenty of other examples of top level WorldTour pros who have come from an MTB background or mix the two disciplines.
If nothing else, it’s a change of routine.
So what can you get from owning an MTB as well as a stable of road bikes? We’ve outlined six things a roadie can get from mixing in some mountain biking in this video.
Improve your riding technique
Ability to handle a bike well will help you a lot on the road, so you can negotiate tricky situations better and potentially at faster speed.
That’s something that riding an MTB will teach you in spades. Yes, you can ride along straight, easy trails, but if you point your MTB towards trees, rocks and steep downhills, you’ll need to develop the balance, steering and handling skills to get you through safely.
You’ll also get a much better understanding of the limits of your tyres’ grip, particularly when it’s loose or wet, when you have to traverse roots and rocks or when you have to ride through mud, so you’ll be able to corner faster. Correcting a slipping tyre becomes second nature and an automatic reflex while braking hard without locking up and maintaining control are essential skills off-road that you can transfer to your road riding.
One of the best ways to slip your tyres is to mash your pedals, so experienced mountain bikers are among the smoothest pedallers, able to put the power down consistently through the entire pedal stroke.
The ability to make hops and jumps are also really useful skills off-road that can come in handy to avoid potholes and obstacles when you’re on your road bike.
Get away from traffic
Riding on the road, you always need to be alert to what’s happening around you and to other road users, even if you’ve picked the quietest roads at the quietest time of day. Often road surfaces are far from perfect too, so you need to be able to steer around obstacles and you need to watch your road position and signal your intentions clearly.
Ride off-road and you don’t need to…
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