First, Lee paid Ray’s daily admission fee for each of us, so that was cool. Second, by not having to ride a trail to get to sections appropriate for teaching, I think Lee was able to pack in more instruction in the same amount of time. And lastly, Ray’s has two pump tracks and many different sizes of table tops; CamRock doesn’t. I definitely needed work on those skills so that was good for me . He’d never been to Ray’s and I think he was pleased with how it turned out. I wouldn’t be surprised to see him offering a series of clinics at Ray’s next season. Continue reading 6 weeks after taking a Lee Likes Bikes clinic, what have I learned?→
I’ll blog about the clinic later this week but in the meantime, see the large slideshow of 117 photos (recommended) or SLOW CLICK this small slideshow.
I pulled the trigger last night on attending a Lee Likes Bikes one-day skills clinic in Wisconsin this weekend. (Sunday is sold out but if you’re reading this on Thursday, there are still a couple of slots open on Friday.)
I blogged a little bit about cornering back in August when I started learning how to pump a flat surface. Practicing pumping flat ground has helped me make some progress in my cornering ability, as you’ll see in the video of me below riding at Lebanon Hills a month ago or so.
Two of the how-to videos I linked to in that post also had segments about cornering technique, and the one called Hip Flexion by MTB coach Simon Lawton (free Fluidride videos here) recommends a slightly different technique for a berm turn vs a flatland or off-camber turn.
I started practicing doing a wheelie drop this summer when I thought it would be the best way to manage a fall off a high skinny. (It might be, but in the meantime, I’m relying on dismounting.)
In the Pump Terrain for Free Speed chapter of Lee McCormack’s book Mastering Mountain Bike Skills, he has a one-pager titled Pump-manualing across two bumps.
He writes:
This is one of the coolest-looking, sweetest-feeling moves in mountain biking.