Richard usually rides in Surrey and came to me via recommendation. The rains stopped before we began and I started with my skills check where I corrected his set up and found body positioning, foot and looking skills errors. I began my corrections and moved us onto the drop sections so I could work on both the physical and mental skills involved in riding mtb. It didn't take long before Richard was landing perfectly and after a few goes on all 3 drops, we moved on.
We moved onto the skills trail itself and we worked on basic pumping, flat bermed, off camber and switchback corners. Drops, steps, rock gardens and fly out jumps. I demonstrated everything piece by piece and eventually Richard was riding the entire trail end to end. Each run was faster and smoother than before as his new skills shone through. I worked hard on line choice when linking drops into corners too as it has a dramatic effect on smoothness.
It wasn't long before we moved on. Now we went on to jumping the 6ft tabletop and gap jump. Once again I demonstrated and soon Rich was sailing over them both easily as he used his skill set.
For our final application of the skill set, I moved onto the jump and jump trail so Richard could generate speed through sections to be able to jump others. It took a while, but he got it and our session ended as mental fatigue began to show.
Great session Rich!
High5
Thanks Tony for a fantastic day. I really enjoyed it. The only trouble was I didn't want it to stop!
ReplyDeleteYour way of putting together simple techniques to improve my riding was really easy to understand and effective. And it was great to finally get reliable techniques for drops and jumps after trying all sorts before.
Now can't wait to try these out on the local trails.