Dave's confidence building session.

Dave contacted me saying he needed a confidence boost as he just couldn't ride down trails as quick as he is up them. We arranged a date and on meeting I discovered what was missing from the skill set and began installing them.
Dave had read me talking about the push to unweight the front end of the bike and this took some time to get. I changed his cockpit set up and explained and showed why I had done so.
That had the desired effect as his front wheel rose up easily.
Time for drops!
To Dave's surprise the first technique we applied the skills set to was drops. I matched his push to a speed and Dave began landing perfectly. I then began working on his mental skill set too and Dave rolled down to the middle drop (larger than any he had tried before our session) and easily landed both wheels together and the smile on his face said it all. After a few more runs at the drops we moved onto the skills trail.
I always segregate the trail into four parts and work on the sections contained in each before adding them to the previous one as we work our way down the trail.
We worked on pumping, drops, up slopes and down slopes, steps, rock gardens, flat bermed and switchback corners as well as adverse camber. I showed how to identify the braking areas before and after each section and we worked our way down the trail.
I took Dave to an isolated berm to work on carrying speed into and out of corners and identified a protective mechanism he which we worked out of him before moving back to the trail and riding the whole trail in it's entirety.
By the sessions end, Dave was 25% quicker down the trail than he was at the beginning.
We ended our session as I saw mental fatigue appear so not to put the rider at risk of a crash.
Awesome session Dave!