Mountain Bike Technique
Looks Like a Session
Practice makes permanent Skills on demand and the ability to make the bike dance down the trail are not so much about perfecting things, it's more a matter of embedding subconscious memory (connections in the brain) and muscle memory within ourselves, making a permanent connection so that we can make the correct shapes at the correct times. With the core…
Nothing New Never Normal
So we are back! And boy have we missed sharing our secrets of the trade with you. For obvious reasons we took a wee break but now as the globe gets a grip with the ‘whack a mole’ pain in the butt that is COVID we have rounded up the troops and got the show back on the road. So…
Climbing
Uppers Will Improve your Downers Having been around the scene for over three decades I'm well aware that climbing is not everyone's cuppa tea, but when push comes to shove, we have to face the reality that in order to go down first we must go up. All too often the topic is taboo for the recreational rider, and it…
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All The Necessary Skills
It is true that I questioned to a reasonable degree what I was doing heading North at the crack of dawn, from my house in the Surrey Hills, home of some truly fantastic trails. After a month of 60+ hour weeks, averaging 5 hours sleep a night, the prospect of the two and a half hour drive ahead of me…
Pumping
Intoduction If you find you are being left behind while others are pulling away from you on the trail, you seem to be pedalling way more than others that are seemingly carrying speed with little effort, or find that you are bobbling around at the mercy of the trail surface, the chances are you have forgotten your pump... or never…
Winter Riding
Ask any rider about their favourite mountain biking memory of that year and very few will recall a ride though sloppy conditions in driving rain with a cold wind biting, quads burning, crotch sodden and trails livelier than a bucket full of eels. Despite this the vast majority of us have experienced a ride like that and still we go…
Seasonal Adjustments
For Northern Hemisphere riders, another Summer is fading into memory. On the plus side, the soft light of Autumn makes for some fantastic vistas and epic riding - the days may be shortening, but there is plenty of riding still to be had. The light isn't the only thing to soften up and a change in trail conditions may well…
Speed Control
Before you think ‘Oh, I am OK with my braking technique’ and flick on to the next article, STOP. Speed control is not simply a matter of the ability to apply the brakes and stay on the bike (although this admittedly is an essential technique). The physical element of speed control is a far broader topic than that. As with…
Winter Skills - Part 1
Fancy a line? The works Christmas do is on the horizon (or a distant fuzzy memory for some) and the New Year beckons. The winter solstice sees us heading back to the light in this part of the world but winters firm grip means we will have to endure mud, slop, snow, ice and varying combinations of all the above.…