So, I see the pics of riders finding seemingly impossible angles as they effortlessly rail another corner, and I see the great big nobly tread on the outside of my tyres that scream, “I will grip until the day I (you) die!”

Yet I remain a remain a complete wuss.

Top tips/tricks?

I would consider a skills coaching day.

Also I thought the videos on here were helpful;

http://www.imbikemag.com/technique.php

No braking, of course you have to be confident enough to know you won’t, amongst a number of other things

A pic of your bike could help if you’ve a slightly odd hindering cockpit setup

You can lay a bike down at all sorts of angles if you are out for a photo shoot. A touch more caution is no bad thing if you are 15 miles from home.

You can tilt the photos and crop it to get some amazing angles or even tilt the camera when taking the shot, so don’t believe every pic.

On a good soft surface it is possible to get the handlebar of a bike to hit the ground before the tyres give way and dump the rider on the floor. Drop your saddle find a wide open area, lean the bike over harder than yourself and go for gold. What’s the worst that’ll happen?

In my humble opinion (stress the humble) it’s all (all) crossover from skiing technique. Read about carving, it’s exactly the same on a bike on open corners. Then the hopping etc. for roots and ruts translates from offpiste.

The best practical advice I can give is to use the littlest features as berms and if there’s really nothing weight your tyres!

Difficult to give specific advice like “lean forward” because the situation is dynamic and you’re making little adjustments all the time. Just get used to being on the edge of your tyres. SPDs helped my cornering because you can feel what the bike is doing better.

bear in mind a lot of pics are taken on Bermed corners.

[quoteWhat’s the worst that’ll happen?][/quote]

Is exactly what I say to myself before each trip to A&E…

Thanks for the tips. I might find an open field and see if I can find the edge.

A few tips for you:

– do your braking before the corner where possible allowing you carry that speed round the corner without the panic braking mid corner making your exit speed faster and as a bonus less energy is required.

– look around the corner for your exit, this head movement is naturally followed by your upper body. Don’t stare straight on or you’ll most likely stall mid corner, brake and then have to crank back up to speed.

– on a loose or flat corner it helps to place the outside foot down a bit, more or less depending how loose, this weights the outside edge of the tyre giving more grip, moving the arse/hips over to the outside about helps too if conditions are really greasy.

– move weight over the front a bit to give more grip to the front tyre for more grip whilst turning, the rear will follow.

– elbows out, chin up.

– most importantly don’t be scared to session different types of corner repeatedly, this allows you to experiment with what works for you body position wise on the different corners you encounter, don’t be scared to pad up and push the corners and find the limits of your tyres.

I’m by no means an expert and please correct me if any of the above is rubbish but these tips have helped me improve my cornering technique. A skills course is also a great investment, Ed Oxley of Great Rock is a great teacher and top bloke if your based in the north.

probably lots of great tips above, I cant be arsed to regurgitate them!

But as a top little practice tip we were told to find a nice turn with a safe run off area and practice hitting it with a “death grip” (no brakes) from further and further up the hill till we drifted or crashed!

As well as a coaching vid, dirt school vid or fundamentals (from the chap who made earthed) are both ace also as a freebie check this out :-
[video]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YGmQRx8xv5k[/video]

the thing I dont think he made a big enough deal of there in that vid is Looking up and out of the corner. It really is the most important thing you can do, if you turn your head to look, this will turn your shoulders, turning your torso and your hips which will put all your weight down over the edges of the tyres. Also get low, the higher you are the more unstable your centre of Gravity. Once you master basic neutral cornering to really rail corners you need to “pump’ through the bend this will generate extra downforce at the moment you pump which in turn will produce more traction. Thats why you see DH’ers riding down the trail looking like they are ‘bouncing’

check this out

Just found this its a bit cheeky but hey :-