Bright Fridays – Better Wetter

Are you a mountain biker suffering from a lack of stoke as your favourite trails go from brown pow to deep slop? Has a wet start to winter seen you spending more time on cleaning your bike than riding it? It’s easy to get ground down by foul weather and crappy ground conditions, but to keep things bright during the winter months, your riding buddies here at Endura have some ideas to keep you sending it right through to spring. 

1. Gear up – you know how we mentioned that we have a reputation for foul weather gear? Our legendary MT500 range has the kit you need for a dry winter, a wet winter, a cold winter or any combination of the muddy flavours of winter. Check out what it has to offer here.
2. Bike down – winter is a great excuse to work the N+1 rule to your advantage. Keep the bling full susser out of harm’s way and reach for the hardtail, singlespeed or gravel bike that can all shrug off grinding paste better than a bike full of bearings, bushings and linkages.
3. If you can’t go long, go short and technical. Head deep into the woods and find a few nadgery “problems” to work on. Like bouldering, but on bikes.
4. Brush up on your navigation – how are your map reading skills? If you like to explore off the beaten track then winter is a great time to take a course or get out and practice the key skills that’ll keep you on the right trail out in the hills.
5. Ride with friends – nothing beats laziness than the scorn of your mates, get a hardy winter crew together on WhatsApp and make sure non-attendance to rides is solidly heckled.
6. Trail maintenance– pack a folding saw in your pack and do a little gardening, join your local trail crew and swing a mattock or do some Wombling and clear up some of that trailside litter – check out the outstanding work our friends at Trash Free Trails do on this front.
7. Diversify – winter MTBing just not floating your boat at all? Keep your mojo in shape and go for a trail run or a hike or maybe it’s time to head indoors and jump on your smart trainer.
8. Make plans – got a trip to a new riding spot in mind? Get plans in place now and you’ll have something to keep your ticking over and motivated to ride.
9. Recharge your stoke – we’ll admit that some days it’s just too crap to head outdoors and sometimes it might not even be safe to do so. Instead, we suggest firing up YouTube and watching your favourite sort of riding vids to remind you what summer looks like. Have you seen our Road to Proving Grounds edit?
10. Purposeful play – find a bit of easy trail or open ground and brush up on your skills when no one is looking – wheelies, manuals and (proper) bunny hops can all be practised with a few props – sticks and stones make for great targets to aim for.