Saturday 29 May 2010

Ivan and Paul's 2 to 1 session.






This session was Ivan's birthday present and Paul joined him. As always I put them both through the skills health check and saw what they did naturally and what was missing from the skills set.
I then set about correcting the faults and then we applied the skill set to techniques beginning with unweighting and pumping. After a short while both riders were showing a good uptake of both techniques and asked if I could show the drop and jump technique, so this is exactly what we did. Very soon after a couple of demonstrations the guys were flying off the drop and landing perfectly and started to jump too! keep working on the jumping guys, it is there!
I then showed how the skill set applies to technical climbs and Paul got loads further using it rather than his old technique.
I then worked on their cornering and linking sections together and slowly but surely they started flowing down the trail. Ivan's looking into the next really came into its own as he linked each of 6 sections together braking only in the correct places. Paul followed suit and also used his new found trail energy management skill.
Our session ended when the lads declared themselves knackered!
Great day!

Friday 28 May 2010

Paul and Alex move their comfort zones






Paul is a returning client of mine and along with him came Alex. As always the skills check was done and I identified some missing skills and immediately began correcting them. We then worked through the unweighting, pumping and jumping techniques. Slowly things began to really take shape.
We moved onto the 1st coaching trail and worked on cornering and after breaking the trail into segments we linked all the section together using braking zones where necessary.
We then moved onto a trail with gap doubles, larger drop and tighter corners and began linking each section together. Now Paul and Alex began developing their mental skill set as they concentrated and remained mentally relaxed whilst completing each section smoothly.
The gap double at the end was an issue mentally at first but after a speed check run both of them smoothly rode it just like the other sections.
A great day and I look forward to their ongoing contact with me.
High5 guys!

Smoothing out the edges in Dan's riding.



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Dan contacted me for a one to one session and sent me a dvd of clips of his riding so I could build the day to him.
As usual I began with the skills check before moving slowly through apply the skills to the unweighting and pumping techniques before moving onto jumps. Very quickly Dan got the hang of airtime and we moved onto a trail to work on cornering and joining sections in a trail together. It soon became clear that Dan was managing the trails energy very well and all sections were smoothly linked so it was time to challenge him more mentally with lose corners, bigger drop sections and a gap jump. methodically, I worked with Dan on each section, slowly confidence grew along with his commitment and we linked each section one by one. After all the sections were ridden in a line I began removing his pedal points from the trail which resulted in Dan using the trails energy and pumping through each section cleanly including the gap section.
Our final session was on a larger drop and we worked on Dans drop technique further to enable him comfortably to become accustomed to the extra airtime.
A truly awesome session Dan!

Tuesday 25 May 2010

Connecting Aidan With The Trail






Aidan rang me to see if I could help with his dilemma. He said that he cannot keep up with his mates who seem to ride away from him all the time effortlessly, whilst he brakes and stutters down the trail. I explained how I approach each rider on meeting them and that's exactly what i did.
We met as arranged in the car park and proceeded onto the skills health check where I discover what the rider does already automatically and then start to work on what's missing.
After finding the areas that needed working on we moved onto pumping the trail. Aidan really got to grips with this technique and on leaving the trail (as seems to be the theme in the last few sessions) he got top 5 distance without pedaling. Things were already starting to change and look up. I then took him through the drop technique and on 3 different drops we worked on the skills required and identified when they were missing.
After a while we moved onto a trail which I break into 3 segments and we worked on the sections in each segment before linking them all together braking in all the correct places.
It took maybe 30Min's for real changes in Aidan's cornering to appear and he started to flow through each section faster and more importantly controlled and confidently.
After a few runs of that trail we went off for a 30minute ride at the end of our session to a tighter trail that Aidan is used to riding and immediately he could feel the difference in his looking and footwork working for him. section after section were dealt with and the smile really grew.
I took the opportunity to show how Aidan's pumping/un-weighting is too good not to be able to do the disconnected bunny hop technique and in 3 goes he had it sussed.
A great day of progress Aidan!

Monday 24 May 2010

Bryan and friends group session






I met Bryan, Jon and Caroline as arranged and straight away we went through the skills health check where I identify the missing skills in each rider and then begin to install the missing ones.
After unweighting we moved onto pumping and after a while each of them were demonstrating the technique to me so much so that they all went further as a group than any other group I have coached so far and Jon bettered the mark of Andy earlier in the day on my previous session.
We moved onto the drop technique and slowly the riders began building their mental skills and confidence grew.
we then applied the skills to the climbing technique before moving onto a trail and working on among other things, cornering.
I broke the trail into 3 segments, working on each section in that before moving down to the next segment and so on before linking all the sections together.
Caroline took a while to get comfortable linking corners together but soon grew in confidence and began flowing between each and braking in the correct places.
both Bryan and Jon showed good section control too and linked all sections together including the drop at the trails end.
Our day ended after tiredness began to creep in.
Awesome riding :)

Overcoming Andy's Fears






Andy contacted me saying he struggles to flow down trails where his friends just seem to be effortless. After the skills check I discovered why. Andy looked down all the time whilst riding and had no footwork, so I set out to remedy this.
We worked on unweighting the front end then onto pumping the undulations in the trail . Andy really got the hang of this and on leaving that section of trail he went 2nd farthest of all my clients without pedaling.
I then showed him the skills application to the jump and drop techniques. Once again he got to grips with the techniques and soon his confidence and commitment grew and grew.
We then moved onto a trail and worked on his cornering. During the skills check I found that Andy struggled with corners but now the skill set was flourishing he really began railing the corners. Slowly we worked our way down the trail , linking each section to the next and identifying braking zones.
The flow that Andy so wanted to feel began to happen and the smile on his face grew and grew.
We ended our session as Andy began to tire and had a leisurely ride back to the car park in the sunshine.
Great session Andy!

Saturday 22 May 2010

Removing Adam's Blindfold.






Adam contacted me wanting to progress his riding to another level and as I always ask, he sent me pictures of him riding at Aston Hill etc..
His main glitch in his riding was his looking down all the time and this gave me a starting point.
Adam already knew how to unweight the front end by pushing as he had been previously coached by Ian Warby so I took up from there.
I started with the base technique of pumping and slowly but surely Adam got to grips with using the trails humps and bumps for his own gain. We left that area and moved straight to the coaching trail where I split the trail into workable thirds. We began on cornering. Adams footwork was already good so we worked on body positioning and looking into the next section.
Gradually Adam managed his speed and the trails only braking in the correct zones and started to really build speed. I then moved down to the next third and we worked on linking sections together that are present in the top two thirds of the trail before finally working on the drop technique.
Things we really looking up and after linking all the sections on the whole trail together it came clear that Adam was the fastest rider on that trail I have coached.
I then moved onto another trail to work on Adams mental skills . I split this trail into two and we worked hard on maintaining speed and control through loose corners and the drop section on the trail, gradually removing pedal points and replacing it with pumping. We then worked on the end sections of the trail which is drop to corner to drop to gap double. As usual, I demonstrated riding the trail with no pedaling and so began working on Adams speed management more.
Adam is not fond of gaps and had confidence issues but soon the double became just another section as we worked each pedal point out of the run . run after run became more fluid as speed was gained more from pumping the trail than by pedalling and Adam rode the whole trail pedal free.
We ended our session when Adam declared being mentally drained but smiling like a Cheshire cat!
Awesome session!!

Friday 21 May 2010

Rob, Nick and Ian's from Bristol






We met in the car park as arranged and I gave them an outline for the session. We then proceeded to the skills check and I discovered that all three had good footwork in corners but missed other vital skills so I began working on those. I demonstrated un weighting and pumping and the guys got to grips easily. We moved onto the disconnected bunny hop and in a short while the guys were showing an understanding of what is required in the technique and Ian for the 1st time bunny hopped cleanly over the fallen tree.
I then moved out of the area towards the jump and drop area and all three pumped the ground and showed an understanding of using the trails energy.
now the guys un weighting of the front wheel was too good for them not to grasp the drop and jump techniques and that became evident as they were showing perfect landings on the drop and all jumped the table top cleanly in less than 4 attempts!
We then started working on cornering and linking sections together and identifying braking zones.
The guys physical and mental skill set was booming and each of them flowed down the singletrack using the trails energy and perfectly over coming each section.
Great session lads!

Thursday 20 May 2010

Farah's return



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I first coached Farah back in October last year and I was excited at the prospect of seeing her improvements. During the skills check I could see that the last sessions coaching had embedded well so I began pushing her mental skills. After pumping and un weighting we moved onto the drop technique and slowly Farah became comfortable with the section and her confidence shone through. After a few runs at various speeds we moved onto the jump technique where I isolated the skills once more and built from there to the required result.
I then took Farah to the coached trail and began working on more advanced cornering than last time and Farah felt more controlled as she made use of more edge grip by using her body more on the bike. we worked on over lapping sections and also linking sections together. each was lapped up, as were the drop sections at the end of the trail. After a few complete runs we moved to another trail and worked on tighter, more loose corners . Soon after Farah became very tired and we ended the session at the right point.
Awesome progress Farah and I can't wait to see the next few months advances.

Stumo's day





Stu met me in the car park as arranged and we went straight to the skills check. I found that Stu had good footwork and pretty OK looking on corners but None on other sections. So I set about correcting this first before moving on. We worked on body position on unweighting before going to the pumping trail. This didn't take Stu long to grasp and by the end he went further than any other client by 30 meters!
I then demonstrated the drop and jump techniques and after quite a few adjustments and suggestion Stu got the moved dialled.
We then moved to a trail and broke it down into three segments. I worked on Stu's body position on corners and he really began to fly down the trail. We linked sections together and the drop sections were ate up at the trails end too.
Great session Stu!