November 5, 2015

About the Author: Steven Moniz is the Founder and Con­di­tion­ing Coach at Mon­vi­da Sports Inc. After train­ing and coach­ing indi­vid­u­als for sev­en years, Steven has learned that peo­ple need goals—something to dri­ve them —to get them to push hard­er, faster, and remain com­mit­ted. Mon­vi­da push­es ath­letes to exceed their goals through pri­vate train­ing ses­sions, class­es, online pro­grams and sports ther­a­py for all ath­letes. Steven has fused the things he loves in life: train­ing, help­ing peo­ple, and adven­ture sports.

You’re ped­al­ing up a moun­tain, legs scream­ing dur­ing the climb, you reach the sum­mit, but now you have to weave your way through shrubs and trees at the top. Just when you thought it would be a breeze after all that, you’re faced with the steep slope of the down­hill. You grip your han­dle­bars and head down, absorb­ing the impact of any log or rock gar­den in your way. It takes strength in your upper body, core and legs to keep going. Whether you are going for an after­noon ride or a mul­ti-day trip — it’s best to be phys­i­cal­ly pre­pared than super sore on the next day!

Here are four exercises that will build the strength needed to conquer those mountains and make them seem more like molehiles!

The routine

Start off by doing 2 sets of 10 rep­e­ti­tions for each exer­cise, rest­ing for 30 sec­onds in between.  If that’s too easy, do all the exer­cis­es in a row and rest between each circuit.

After a week or two, if you can do 2 sets of 15 rep­e­ti­tions, add one more set of exer­cis­es to the mix — so you end up doing 3 sets of 15 rep­e­ti­tions per work­out. Once you imple­ment these four exer­cis­es into your train­ing rou­tine, you will find your­self shred­ding those trails in no time!

1. single leg deadlifts

Sin­gle leg dead­lifts empha­size the pos­te­ri­or side of your body by work­ing your glutes, ham­strings and quads. Start off by bal­anc­ing on one leg, then lean for­ward, mak­ing sure to keep your core tight and spine neu­tral. Stop once your upper body is par­al­lel to the floor. Squeeze your glutes and ham­strings on the work­ing leg to return to the start­ing position.

2. squats

Squats work your glutes, ham­strings and quads. Start with your feet shoul­der-width apart, your core tight and spine neu­tral. As you come down, bend at your hips and knees, mak­ing sure your knees don’t pass your toes, and stop when you’re par­al­lel to the floor. On your way up, empha­size press­ing through your heels.

3. bent over rows

This is a great exer­cise to bal­ance the body and pre­vent it from becom­ing too chest dom­i­nant from rid­ing a bike all day. Bent over rows work your back and arms. Start with your feet in a stag­gered posi­tion and your body bent over and par­al­lel to the ground. You will then row the weight­ed object up, mak­ing sure that you keep your core tight and spine neu­tral. Slow­ly low­er the weight and repeat.

4. push-ups

Push-ups are an upper body exer­cise that improve upper body strength by work­ing your chest, arms and shoul­ders. Place your hands shoul­der-width apart and bring your chest as close to the floor as you can with­out touch­ing it. As you return to the start­ing posi­tion don’t lock out your elbows. Also, make sure to look at some­thing a foot in front of you to pre­vent bob­bing your head and strain­ing your neck.