Whiskey Off Road 25

Racing
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Hi Forum… I signed up for the Whiskey off road 25 proof. As I know it does not have the rigour and pain of the 50, I am not quit sure what pacing strategy to use. I read this article

And it talks about Negative split. I think this would be a perfect strategy for the 50 Proof which has 2 significant climbs, but for the 25 proof it is really just the first climb at the beginning with couple of punchy climbs later. I also heard that passing on the single track is pretty difficult and I have seen videos of long lines of people not letting faster dh riders go. anyways. With this in mind, for this particular race, would a ‘positive’ slplit be recommended? going harder in the climb then just ride the DH. I am just an average joe, but in all the XC races I do, I always get dropped on the climbs, but I pass most of the people that drop me on the climbs when the tires point down hill. Just wondering if this Positive split strategy would work better for me in this particular race.

Thanks

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I’ve done the Whiskey a couple times and I’m not a particularly fast or light rider (to be fair I’m not the best at descending or cornering either :rofl:) but I think the best thing you can do for this is have a power meter on your bike and have a max power to stick to, probably right about threshold and just make sure you don’t go over that. If you do that (and eat some sugar) you should t blow up and have a great time on the rest of it!

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Thanks for the insight. I have a PM on my bike so you are right. Keeping it right under threshold should get me to the top. Planning on good fueling and hydration.
Thanks again

1 Like
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Mountain bike race pacing is always complicated. If you are the type that gets stuck in DH traffic, then you have to choose between going extra hard at the start to try and stay ahead of as many of those people as possible, and risk fading later, or just settle with being stuck behind those people.

There is no right answer, it’s mostly going to be based on how “durable” you are, in how much you can recover from those hard efforts.

If you are racing to race, then you are probably better off hammering hard, and suffering the consequences later. If you are racing to finish, then just hold back and save the energy for later.