Road man. Today I sit down with Mads Wartz Schmidt of P Racing. This is a really interesting conversation. Mads transition from a successful world tour career into gravel. He won tracker last season for Unbound this year. The focus of this conversation is stuff that he wish he knew about gravel cycling when he was starting out his gravel journey. If any of you are embarking on gravel cycling now, or if you're beginner, intermediate, or even if you're advanced and not a pro rider at Mads, you're going to gain a lot from this. He talks to me about tire pressure, traction, how much time he spends off-road versus onroad, types of sessions he does, fueling requirements, and one supplement that has totally changed his training. It's a really interesting conversation. I think you're going to love it. Please welcome to the podcast, Mads Wartz Schmidt. Mads, welcome to the podcast. Thank you. Thank you for having me. Mads, I think you're uniquely positioned in that you've achieved a lot of success on the road and then you're coming into the gravel world. But today, I'm curious as to the lessons as to what you know now about gravel cycling that you wish you knew when you were making the change over because I think a lot of our audience are they're still skinny tire dudes and they're seeing so much debate about gravel. They're seeing Unbound Tracka, the romance of gravel that's building, or as you maybe call it, the spirit of gravel that's building, but they're unsure where to get started because there's so many moving pieces in this. So, I want to kind of build a foundation of knowledge for those people. And we can go as deep as you like on some of the geeky stuff like, you know, tires, pressure, drivetrain efficiency. I know you've got some sort of next level nutrition advice that not a lot of people are using as well. so eager to dive in and see what you know now that you didn't know at the start. Well, it's like um sometimes I think back to when I started where I didn't know anything and I kind of wish that I had that beginner's mind- because over the year I've, you know, I learned a lot about tires, tire pressure, tire size, uh um which is the main thing in gravel is what everybody's talking about before races. What tires are you going to run? And my first race was I hadn't got my bike from Specialized before the first race. So I had a lone bike from Specialized which it was a Crox Pro um handlebar too wide stem too short uh didn't have a proper fit on it. And the only tires that was available was 42 mm Pathfinders from last year. Um, and everybody was talking about it was for Santaval here in Girona. Yeah. And and I had four days of training on gravel before that race. Nice. And and everybody was talking, oh, you need 50 mm here in Torona. It's rough and it's uh it's chunky. And I was like, I was training on my 42s and I was like, this is fine. Like what is everybody talking about? Um cuz my reference was doing couple classics in Belgium and Perry Rup on 28 and 30 mm tires where you're just bumping around and like this was actually kind of comfy. So like 42s are fine. Um and the race was was went rather okay. Like the first stage I was fourth. Um was this the was this LA this year's one or last year's one? Cuz they had the hill climb last year but they excluded it from Santa Val this year. Yeah, it was this year. Uh this year we didn't have the the hill climb. Um second stage I had to DNF because long story short, I had a knee injury over the winter for it took about a month to to get rid of. And and on the second stage I was uh I started to feel the knee a little bit, but I was also like done. Like I came into the race with three weeks of like base training. Um, so, so to get fourth on the first day was way above my expectations and then the next day I uh, yeah, I I blew completely and then I started to feel my knee. But So, do you think there's too much do you think there's too much hype around the tires? Because I noticed this yesterday. We have a road man WhatsApp group chat for the cycling club and one of the guys is looking to buy a gravel bike and he put in a gravel bike for sale. nice bike, but it only had clearance for 45 mil tires. And everyone's coming back to him going, "No, no, no. You need more than that. Like that. Don't buy that bike. Don't buy that bike." I was just like, "Bro, 45s are going to be fine for almost every single ride you do." I think a lot of guys, they overthink it. Like, um, going mountain bike tires and all of this. And maybe it's just the road cyclist in me who's speaking now, but if you're riding in Europe, 45s will get you like through everything without problems.
Uh honestly, uh not to not to brag. And are you riding gravel daily, weekly? Like where's most of the training getting done for you? I'd say 90% of my training is on the road. Yeah, that's what I was thinking. I think a lot of gravel guys, they make a mistake by training too much on the gravel bike. Um cuz when you're on the road, you have a different speed, you have higher cadence. Uh and you get the speed in the legs and you get those small accelerations. Um, like if you're doing a bike race on the road, like all of those micro accelerations that you also need in gravel to get over. If you're doing a climb and there's a little bump, you need to, you know, do two pedal strokes to get over it. And I think the speed and the legs is is key for for gravel racing as well. Uh, cuz also the speeds are going higher and higher. Um, I only go on the gravel bike if I want to do a fun ride or if I need to train my technique. Like because when you're going uphill, like here in Jerona, for example, a lot of the climbs, they're also technical when you go uphill. like you need to find the right position on the bike, get the right uh tension in your body when you're riding uphill, sit the right place on the saddle, and and find the right spot like in general to to go over the climbs fast. It's not about like some guys they for sure they do more power than me on the climbs. But it's not about who does the most power, it's about who gets the highest speed, who can go fastest. um where I think technical skills uphill is also quite a thing. And then of course I I train on on the descent and and get into the flow and and learn the descent. But there's a real lesson in that. I think that's important for especially young kids listening to the podcast. There's a difference between speed and power. Speed wins races, not power. People forget that. Yeah. It's not about pushing the most power. It's about going fastest. Yeah. But the demands of off-road, if you take climbing for example, they are slightly different physiologically than the demands of a road climb. Like it's typically a lower cadence, higher torque effort. So do you build that? Like I'm thinking about the I didn't race Santal this year. I raced it the previous year and like the backside of L's is just it's steep, it's technical, it's low cadence. Are you building specific strength strength type sessions into your training in the buildup to this? Actually, no. Um, I've always been really good at torque stuff. Um, coming from my TT days when I was younger. Uh, I always rode a big gear. Um, and and I think it's it's something I just have in my body. Like I do a lot of strength work um to, you know, be strong. Um, but I don't really work any specific on on the on the cadence, stuff like that. It's it's uh I just make sure I'm fit and then when you're fit, you know, you can you can do everything. When you say strength work, do you mean off the bike or on the bike strength work? Off the bike. So, what's that look like? Uh I have my session I do at home every single day before training like activation session but there is also some weight weights added to that um like core uh glutes hamstring uh quads uh and then I have once a week I go to the gym to uh to do you know lifting um but I don't do it like all out like I just go get the stimul ually on on the legs and and you know push some weights, but that's it. Like it takes 20 minutes for me in the gym, then I'm done. Um and uh that's basically it. And your pre-ride activation, what what exercises are you going through in that and how long's it taken you? Uh it takes me about 20 minutes. Um, first I do some mobility stuff uh just to open up the the lower back and and the hips and and uh then I have what's we call kele exercises uh activate the glutes uh few different exercises then I do some core work uh and uh then I have a specific exercise to uh get the glutes glute media firing like I'm I'm lying on my side and I have to push up with my leg and then I do some Bulgarian squats with a 15 kilo kettle bell. Uh and then I do stretching and I do trigger point on my TFL cuz that's always super tight on me and and if it gets too tight then I don't activate my glutes properly. Um, so so that's basically it. And and this is I've been working on this like since the start of the year or last year actually for more than a year now. Um cuz when I was a road rider I have for two and a half years I had three herniated discs and um that problem was from not using my glutes when I was riding.