I’m looking for a few gym exercises I can add that will help keep me in shape for riding. I don’t want to get to Moab in March and get hurt from sloppy riding from fatigue from back-to-back days of hard riding. I’m committed to working out at my local rec center at least a couple times a week now, because the reality of use-it-or-lose it is sinking in at 48. I didn’t use to have to care about this, I was a carpenter and work was a serious workout. Now I rarely touch tools as a general contractor.
I’m clueless in the gym; my repertoire is limited to bench, curls, triceps, abs and the treadmill. I see well-built dudes in the gym doing weird things with weights and I have no clue what muscles they are working on. What are 2 or 3 critical exercises I can add that will help prepare for long days of technical riding?
Bench press or chest press machine. Machine generally safer.
Dips
Pushups
Pull:
Pull ups. Can use a band for assistance
Seated cable row
Hip hinge:
Deadlift. I prefer trap bar if your gym has one. Find technique videos on YT.
Whatever flavor leg pressing movement machine your gym has. Leg press, hack squat, hip press, etc.
Finish each season with 30min of Zone 2 cardio: pace at which you could still hold a conversation.
Vo2Max:
Google “Norwegian 4x4” and Tabata Intervals. Do some flavor of these 1x/wk.
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Your primary risk factor will be joints, tendons, ligaments as these have less blood flow vs muscles and adapt more slowly.
So with regards to sets and reps, choose a weight that is light enough that you reach failure at about 14-17 reps. Then do sets of 12-15 at this weigh so that you’re finishing with 1-2 reps left in the tank.
Progressive Overload:
Track your sets, weights, etc and try to do a little more each week. For example, in Wk1 you bench 3 x 15reps at 135lb.
Wk2: do 3 x 16 at 135
Wk3: 3 x 15 at 140lb.
I’d suggest also incorporating multi-planar / multidirectional exercises as well. Moto riding exists in all three planes, and functional fitness is at least as important as pure strength. If you have an Instagram account, I have a few kettlebell complexes and a few other hip mobility etc. exercises that are both fun and hurt like hell that I can send you.
For example: lateral lunges or banded crab walks. Also, transverse plane stuff that involves rotational twisting movements like “woodchops” and “lawn mower starts” and “around the worlds” (waist and head) and Turkish getups, with kettlebells. There are a ton of great YT videos for these. Mobility is as important as strength. I need more of both…
As a couple of examples (and you can find videos for each of these see below. Maybe I can get Starla to host a small scale “class” or two in our garage gym. I’ll video it to make sure nobody is looking like Hegseth.
Even body weight circuits like this “Motocross” workout will turn you inside out, it’s a great functional mobility/reflex/core/multi-planar set. This one in particular… I find myself laughing at myself every time I try it. So f’ing hard. (although his burpee form isn’t “accurate”)
I’ll just post a few of the exercises I mentioned above to this thread.
I do most of the things mentioned above but also throw in wrist rollers 2x a week. Do it both forward and backward. Great for grip and avoiding arm pump.
Another excellent workout is bouldering at a gym like the spot or whatever. This year the outdoor crags are climbing, but normally in winter I’ll go to the spot. It’s an excellent full body workout and way more fun than the gym IMO. You don’t get much pushing though so dips, pushups, etc work well for me.
stretches, dips, abs, pull-ups, leg press, hip rotations, bench press, the 3 miles on the treadmill @6mph.
Instead of using heavier free weights I used the Nautilus machines and tried to do three sets each of 10 to 20 reps. That was a workout I could maintain. But 30 minutes on a treadmill is indescribably boring.
I got back into it way too fast last time after many months of not working out. I wrecked my elbows and it really hurts to straighten my arms out. I should have known better! Maybe the lower weight / higher rep approach will help with that.
. More tomorrow
