The kid in Karl

Karl first heard about us online and then from riders he met out on the trails. Today was his session and we began with my skills check where I could see a tidy rider underneath some skills errors. He showed me a video of a crash that prompted his visit to me and I knew exactly why he had a drop in confidence. I set up his bike and then corrected his body positioning, followed by footwork and looking. Karl felt different on his bike as soon as I made the changes and it came down to applying the physical and mental skills to techniques that I teach in each section.

 Drops were first and soon he was landing the 3ft drop easier than ever before and the smile on his face said it all. I moved across to the one thing Karl wanted to work on, jumping. We moved to the 6ft tabletop and gap jump and worked on effort and speed and Karl was confidently riding both the tabletop and the gap with ease.

 Next, we worked on cornering and linking corners together and developing speed through them. The change in Karl was huge as he was soon pumping and jumping along the trail, through three berms and styling the jump at the end. I demonstrated everything as always and next was a 7ft foot gap jump and later added a 9ft gap jump sandwiched between two corners. 

Time and again Karl rode them all smoothly and with style . I could see he was tiring but another couple of complete runs of the trail and linking all fifteen sections on the trail together saw Karl call an end to a cracking session. What an end to another brilliant week of coaching.

High5!