(or "Is mountain Biking Harder Than Road Cycling?")

To be good at anything you do, you have a clear purpose, therefore training has to have purpose. In mountain biking, that purpose is to improve your ability to power through and recover from the frequent hard efforts required by riding off-road. Training with a power meter will enable you to become stronger, faster, and fitter, which - when combined with superior technical skills, will make you an almost lethal mountain biker. Having a tool to measure, analyze, monitor and manage your training and racing will prepare you for known challenges and even one that are unexpected, like wet sand and mud.

Like they say in the video, every mountain biker wants to get fitter, ride faster, and to make it easier. But the truth is, it´s never going to get easier, but if you follow the four steps listed below, you just get better. 

Measure - Most power meters are designed to calculate power and cadence, which are indicators of your fitness. Many power meters palso measure pedal smoothness and torque efectiveness, which indicate how efficiently you pedal or, put another way, how much energy you are wasting if your pedal stroke isn´t optimized. The data that´s collected by a power meter is then exported to a .fit file, which can be read by a variety of applications specifically intended to crunch sport-performance data*. Or, you can simply email your .fit file to your coach, who can interpret your data to help you reach and hold you accountable to your goals. 

Analyze - Once you´ve measured your performance - or collected data, you can analyze your data to see where your strengths and weaknesses are with respect to you as a rider your bike, and influential circumstances (environmental, physical, technical, tactical, and psychological).

Monitor - You can leverage your data to track - or monitor - your performance, which is subject to training intensity, pacing, stress, nutrition, overtraining, and fatigue. 

Manage – Your accumulated data tells you how to monitor your performance in the moment; now you can set long-term goals and manage your performance to achieve those goals.

“Training with a power meter is like having an onboard coach and test lab that gives you constant diagnostic feedback with which to make adjustments to your biomechanics on the bike, and to prevent injuries,” said Hicham Mar, elite cycling coach at the American Sport Training Center. “Your data is an honest account of your output, no matter if it’s windy, hot, or steep, and of your energy levels – how many calories you are burning and how many you need to consume to maintain your pace. This is especially important in mountain biking because riding terrain varies so dramatically from one area to another, that the only way to control the variables is to know how much power you’re capable of sustaining.”

Perception and “riding by feel” are not accurate indicators of sport performance and, while technical prowess can be a temporary substitute for fitness in mountain biking, improved output is the ultimate advantage to outperforming your rivals but more importantly, yourself. To be a better rider than you were yesterday, or the day before, understanding how you can improve will help you become a smarter cyclist.

*ROTOR has partnered with TrainingPeaks.com, which has provided a 4-week training plan plus 30 days of TrainingPeaks Premium to owners of INpower and 2INpower*