Bike
Fitness Training
Get fit for downhill mountain biking with Brook Macdonald
To be the best, you have to work hard and work smart off the bike as well as on it. Pro racer Brook Macdonald and elite coach Alan Milway share their downhill mountain bike training tips.
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Downhill is the Formula One of mountain biking. Every millisecond counts, and riders strive for every advantage they can find on their bike and in their bodies to beat their competitors down rough, fast and physical tracks.
Elite mountain biker Brook ‘The Bulldog’ Macdonald knows what work goes into getting those winning times. He’s shared the regime he uses to build the strength, stability and lightning fast reactions needed to race to an elite level.
Racers like Macdonald always have the help of professional coaches, who bring expert knowledge and years of experience to the mix. Alan Milway is a hugely experienced coach who has trained the likes of Rachel Atherton and Brendan Fairclough, helping them reach peak performance, and adds his expertise to the mix below. So if you want to take your training up a notch, try his recommended exercises once you’ve mastered Macdonald’s base workout.
Alan with Rachel Atherton
© Alan Milway
1. Strength exercises
Strength training is important in developing a stronger body, which in turn will allow you to put more power onto the pedals, resist injuries better and essentially ride faster.
Brook Macdonald’s base workout:
1 min
Strength
Brook Macdonald Red Bull Fit 2019 fitness video: strength exercises.
- Front squat (3x sets, 6x reps)
- Barbell row (3x sets 6x reps)
- Band press-ups (3 sets 6x reps)
- Burpees (3x sets 6x reps)
- Medicine ball slams (3x sets 6x reps)
Front squat – squat hold
© Brad Hanson
Band press up – finish position
© Brad Hanson
Barbell row
© Brad Hanson
Level up with Milway’s recommended strength exercises
Plyo press-ups. Plyometric or plyo exercises are all about combining strength with explosive power, and are essential for the kind of hard, dynamic work the body does while racing downhill. The plyo press-up involves pushing up explosively from the low position.
“This generates a lot of power,” explains Milway “and this high rate of force generation is what's demanded during a race. The landing phase of this exercise is also important, as controlling the body under landing is like a simulation of hitting the track on steep runs. Holding your body in a strong position is key.”
Ball throws and catches. A variation on the ball slam, these combine explosive strength training with a mental workout and a test of reaction and response. “Experiment with ball throws onto the wall and up into the air,” Milway recommends. “Add more fun and control by doing this exercise with your back on the floor and have a partner catch the ball from above and drop back down onto you. Fire it back up as high as you can and then prepare for the next catch.”
Laurie Greenland uses a TRX as part of his strength training
© Trail Creatives / Red Bull Content Pool
TRX straps. “These straps build instability in your exercises, and help spice up planks, press ups and rows to challenge the trunk as you go,” Milway explains. They’re also portable and relatively inexpensive so are something you can have at home. “Maintain a strong position throughout any movements as you can quickly be pulled out of a solid foundation into a sore back position if you don’t focus on form.”
2. Mobility exercises
Training the body to withstand crashes is important, as is improving mobility in areas such as the shoulders, strength at the end-range of movements and general flexibility.
Brook Macdonald’s base workout:
1 min
Mobility
Brook Macdonald Red Bull Fit 2019 fitness video: mobility exercises.
- Sumo squat (2x sets 6x reps)
- Single leg glute bridge (2x sets 6x reps)
- Goblet squat (2x sets 6x reps)
- Press up to open (2x sets 6x reps)
Sumo squat
© Brad Hanson
Press up to open
© Brad Hanson
Press up to open alternate arms
© Brad Hanson
Goblet squat
© Brad Hanson
Level up with Milway’s recommended mobility exercises
Pistol squats to box. “I use these during rehab, but they are also a great way to build fatigue and the ‘burn’ in the legs” suggests Milway. The exercise consists of doing a single leg squat until you touch a box at mid-thigh height. It doesn’t look like much, but it’s surprisingly effective. “Five feel fine but turn these to 35 reps and you'll be shaking! Compare left and right legs to see if the weakness is one leg more than the other.
Pistol squats combine strength and flexibility
© Thomas Wernhart
Hanging leg raises. “Riding bikes can often lead to tight and weak hip flexors. These can then affect your lower back, making it sore and tight.” In addition to flexibility and mobility exercises and stretching, training specific but often overlooked muscles is critical. These moves are done while hanging from an overhead bar. “Hanging leg raises are ideal to build hip flexor strength as well as work the abdominals. For advanced athletes, straight leg raises with a pause at the top, or to start with build up from legs with knees bent up to 90 degrees.”
3. Core exercises
It's important to have good core stability, as the uneven terrain in downhill places extra stress on the body when you have to continuously change and adapt your body position.
Brook Macdonald’s base workout:
1 min
Core
Brook Macdonald Red Bull Fit 2019 fitness video: core exercises.
- Plank (60 seconds)
- Hanging knee raise (2x sets 10x reps)
- Side plank single leg raise (10x each side)
Knees to chest
© Brad Hanson
Prone holds
© Brad Hanson
Side hold with knee flexion
© Brad Hanson
Level up with Milway’s recommended core exercises
Side plank hold. Planks are an incredible workout for the core, and by varying them you can target specific core muscle groups. “This move takes you into the frontal plane (the plane which divides your stomach from your back) and builds robustness here which is where you often end up on a mountain bike, because tracks never point straight down, and away from the sagittal plane (almost like your halfway point in the body) where we often do most of our core training,” explains Milway. “Lie on a bench with your hips at the edge in a side plank position with a friend holding your feet. Hold a nice, flat, horizontal position for 10 seconds before resting for 10 seconds, then repeat.”
Side hold with knee flexion
© Brad Hanson
4. Power exercises
You need to be able to power through your pedals. It's also important to get off to a good start and explode out of the starting gate to get that early advantage.
Brook Macdonald’s base workout:
1 min
Power
Brook Macdonald Red Bull Fit 2019 fitness video: power exercises.
- Extreme isometric squat (1x set 2x reps)
- Single leg eccentric skater squat (3x sets 3x reps)
- Box jumps (3x sets 6x reps)
- Single arm dumbbell press (3x reps 6x reps)
- Single arm single leg row (3x sets 6x reps)
Hang snatch
© Brad Hanson
Hang snatch variation
© Brad Hanson
Box jump
© Brad Hanson
Box jump landing
© Brad Hanson
Level up with Milway’s recommended power exercises
Wrestlers. “These are a great way to replicate the arm pump felt during long downhill runs. I took this name for the exercise, as we saw a team of Olympic wrestlers doing this because they didn’t have a rope in the gym and realised it was ideal for mountain bikers,” says Milway, explaining the unusual name of this exercise which otherwise has nothing to do wrestling.
“Hold dumbbells in a bent-over row position, reach them forward and row them in an anticlockwise direction, forming large circles as you do. Stay bent over with a flat back and pull back towards the armpits each time. This will really challenge the grip and forearm strength when done for times approaching a minute.”
Front squat – squat hold
© Brad Hanson
Weighted squat jumps. “This is a variation of the common gym movement of squatting with a bar weight. Jumping high with a weight across your shoulders will help reach peak velocity and power outputs, not only helping you to drive the pedals at speed but also control the landing on your bike,” both of which are key elements of downhill racing.
They’re also great for helping recuperating athletes return to form. “This is an area that anyone returning from an injury will have noticed is very weak which causes poor technical form, or more crashing, as they struggle to land from drops in a strong body position.”
To do this, complete a squat to jump movement with a weighted barbell, no more than 30 percent of your maximum regular squat weight.
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