Jumps / Drops – help / pics

any pointers on jumps/drops or technique in jumping/getting your head around landing?

where i ride mostly it doesnt tend to include many jumps/large drops, more rocky fast descents with the occasional ‘lip’ jumps etc…

however we are now finding more and more jumps/drops off piste that havent been specifically created as such, just sort of there already, ie, walls that have launches on them with 3-5ft drops usually on a flattish surface and sometimes a short landing period (ie suddenly you’ll have to brake before you hit a tree)….

the problem is i look over the edge before riding it to suss it out, on the bike and it seems 10x higher than it actually is, i know i could do it (maybe not bigger 5ft wall drops quite yet) but to be honest ive never really jumped much before so not to sure on technique and more importantly technique to land it properly/safely…

as i said ive been riding years and not a bad rider in general, and ill do pretty much all the techy downhill stuff i come across, but jumps have never been apart of my riding….

btw i mean natural jumps here, the sort of jumps at trail centres im fine with that specifically made to land and roll on etc….

any pics of your local jumps you do or advice would be appreciated, im guessing a skills day would be very helpful indeed to get me properly into though

I can predict the responses you’ll get. Half will have well meaning advice about pulling up / pushing forward / switching to flats, etc. All will be what other people do to ride this stuff, and possibly isn’t actually what they do but what they think they do.

The other half will tell you to get on a skills course, mostly with Jedi but there are others.

IMHO, half of the answers you get should be ignored, and you should act on the other half. You decide which half, I know what I’d do (did)

Yep, you answered your own question: go see Jedi. It’s the same skills set for jumps, drops etc…assuming you’re doing it right in the first place 🙂

theotherjonv speaks wisely.

And if your not in the north/able to get to jedi, other good cycle coaches are about,,, Ben Deacan at the UK bike Park in Dorset, run’s a great one day beginner down hill course covering the stuff you mentioned + the afternoon session inc uplift , well worth £50 or any southerns money

Jedi +1

yep – was saying this last night to a few mates, i reckon a session would do me good, i guess never really doing them is the problem, never practised nor really attempted any…im really quite a confident rider, as i said ill do mostly anything else i come across where others will bail but its just jumps/large drops

there is a smaller drop/jump that ive just nailed which is the same as the 5ft one in terms of build, just not anywhere near as big, same principal though, as you still have to get the landing right as it lands on a sort of dodgy ish bend and get quite a decent amount of air off it with both wheels…its taken me a while to get used to that, so im sure if i work at it and keep sessioning bits like that ill get there on my own eventually….

not only just going to get the knowledge at jedi or whomever, but more importantly, because the jump ive now nailed i love doing, i get a thrill off it and im sure the thrill would be even more if i managed to do these bigger ones

You can build it up, that’s what I did, not that I am an expert, but the big ones are only scarier in your head, the principle is the same, as long as you can launch and land OK you should be fine.

Practice on kerbs, build yourself a 1ft drop, keep doing that, get comfortable, and work your way up.

session is the key Find somewhere with what you would like ride/jump and just practice/session it.

Them when your done come down to the south coast for some big table fun!!: http://www.pinkbike.com/video/238772/ 🙂 🙂 🙂

yep – thats the plan session the bits im confiden on – the jump im confident on is probably about 2ft max, but it goes through a wall and on to bend, originally i used to roll it, but mulled it over one day and realised that the key was the speed going into it to launch myself, after that ive always jumped it and now im confident on it im entering it quicker and getting better air on it…

so ive gone from rolling that one, to now fully fledged confident jumping it…

ive got another one a mate has nailed and i reckon thats the next one i need to work on, although the landing is slighlty shorter on this one and higher jump but as al says above the technique is the same as the one im confident on – its a mental block until you do it once

What did people do before Jedi?

They still did it, just fewer did it well and more ended up in A&E I guess 🙂

At this years Bristol Bike Fest there was a tiny ramp which the crowd were encouraging riders to do. Watching them it was evidend that the majority of riders who did it, did it badly. Most rode it very stiffly and endoed/wobbled narrowly avoided a bad landing. Very few seemed to do it comfortably, correctly and safely.

I reckon thats just real life and thats how people do most things they have not had good training for.

Whilst you’re waiting for your session with Jedi/A.N.Other (I’ve been to a couple of coaching sessions, have my first with Jedi in July – they all help!), read this book over and over again and practice the techniques:

http://www.amazon.co.uk/Mastering-Mountain-Skills-Brian-Lopes/dp/0736083715

And go through all the stuff here on riding jumps and drops whilst you’re waiting for that book to arrive. Tons of great info.

http://www.leelikesbikes.com/

I’m no great jumper/dropper but I couldn’t do it at all a few years ago and I’m not terrible now thanks to learning and practising, little natural talent at all!

I’m not raggin’ on Jedi (i’ve considered going before to touch up my skills) but there must be other ways of learning to ride a bike……like, by riding it? It seems like the go to answer on here, for any problem at all, is now “go see Jedi”. How did Jedi learn to ride a bike?……mind……blown! Cue the flaming…..

So, anyway, I saw this on Pinkbike the other day, I thought it was quite well done. It covers more natural terrain, like you requested.
clicky

Without posting a huge answer that would be of questionable as I can only use text only, I think some good advice would be to start small and build up, even practising on curbs (don’t laugh) will get you used to the correct timing and movement required to shift your weight back when going off a drop.

There’s a quote I like from Dan Atherton, something like; “If you have to ask how to do it, then you’re not ready to”.

The Fabien Barrel vid linked above this post is a really good one (the whole dvd is good if you can get it) I’d also recommend Fluidride’s ‘Like a Pro’ dvd, it’s very wordy and the guy explaining stuff is a little monotone but the advice is sound.

andeh – nail -> head.

Perhaps riders these days are much more careful – so instead of learning how to jump themselves (and risk injury…. or just can’t be bothered to put the practise in..) – they get someone else to teach them, in a very ‘controlled’ environment…

Perhaps riders these days are much more careful – so instead of learning how to jump themselves (and risk injury…. or just can’t be bothered to put the practise in..) – they get someone else to teach them, in a very ‘controlled’ environment…

I susppose it depends on the consequences, I started jumping doubles on a holliday in Spain, clearly didn’t get one right and woke up in a ditch. 3 months of pain and time off work was a PITA.

Whilst getting someone to show you and teach you might be the easy option, to the average grownup it makes a lot of sense. The reason teenagers are good is a lot of practice and probably a lot of crashes. Most grownups can’t afford to crash, for a start they’ve driven (often a fair way) there so mum isn’t going to pick them up!

I still can’t ride drops for toffee though, which was embaresing at Stainburn when 2 of the guys we were with were relatively new and on skinny XC bikes with 1.8 tyres and riding drops I was skirting round/squashing on the Pitch!

How did Jedi learn to ride a bike?

Darth Grifter?

I wonder how many of STW took up ‘mountain biking’ as a hobby later in life (but could ride a bicycle from an early age like many people), so missed out on the essential ‘wreckless youth’ learning stunts?

I remember setting up planks of wood and digging mounts of dirt to jump over when I was about 10….. and not much has changed 18 years later… 😈

I remember setting up planks of wood and digging mounts of dirt to jump over when I was about 10….. and not much has changed 18 years later…

Aye I made a massive double out of sand. That didn’t end well! My advice would just be to keep doing what you’re doing and build up to it. One day, if you’re like me, you’ll just get the inspiration and decide to hit it and realise it was either really easy or not worth trying again because it was a stupid idea…

I rode bicycles offroad from about the age of 5, there was a little copse opposite the house the local yoofs dug some little rollers and berms into, from there into my teens me and my mates progressed to the local army ranges and old railway tracks and such, bikes ranged from BMX’s to drop barred ‘racers’ to ‘mountain bikes’ (Remember the Raleigh Mustang!). This is the period within which I did my ‘training’.

I seem to remember we would find a lump, or drop, or whatever, and ride at it and see what happened. If you’re scared, get someone else to go first by ‘daring’ them.

HTH

Perhaps riders these days are much more careful

Perhaps “riders” these days arent even riders?

Whatever happened to riding your bike? The more you do this, the more you improve!

The best way to get good at riding is to ride your bike.

Thats the only way I got to where I am today, by putting the graft in.

Thats the only way I got to where I am today, by putting the graft in.

Alas we can only aspire to your level of mediocrity 😛

Saying that you do get good at riding what’s local, I know a few people who’ve live in the Peaks (including me) who can’t or couldn’t corner for toffee, but could ride rock gardens all day long. Moved ‘darn ‘sarf and suddenly there are no rocks, but there are corners so I’m flapping arround like a beginner despite riding bikes off road for 8 years!

Similarly I know somene who moved to Guilford and rode the surrey hills, all of a sudden he came back able to jump/drop anything simply as that’s what’s been built on all the trails.

Moved to Guisborough and it’s all new again, the local trail pixies have a hard on for building straight down the hill, if you think you can ride steep stuff come up and ask a local to show you the nomad trail, even the qualifier is sphincter clenchingly tight with no transition at the bottom to the fireroad (if anything there’s a slight ditch to get out of), there’s even a qualifier tot he qualifier that looks abit like a bigger version of the weer wolf drop at cannock! So unless you’re confident turning corners on a near vertical bank yer fecked. The first time I went down Stripes/the abys i cacked myself, now it’s 2nd nature, similarly there are quite a few flat turns on steep banks, the first time I tried taking one I just went straight on, not just running out of trail mid corner, litteraly I couldn’t figure out how to make the bike do what the guy in front of me just did and even turn into the corner! Again now it’s 2nd nature, off the brakes, turn in, and wait for the back end to come past ‘vertical’ (this is where I went wrong, I was trying to ride it like a switchback with theback brake dragging trying to tighten it up, but the more I dragged it the less it turned) before looking almost over your shoulder to keep the bike as far up the slope as possible to get any speed on the exit.

So I suspect people who can’t ride jumps also don’t ride trails very often with jumps in.

. If you’re scared, get someone else to go first by ‘daring’ them.

LoL , I like your way of thinking Klumpy.

tinas – nail – head!

i ride the peak, and id say i was pretty decent rider for around these parts, ill do all of the techy stuff all day long, but there are not a huge amount of jumps around where i ride, stuff we are finding only recently and it becomes clear that alot of the jumps are natural bits of peak district countryside/forest ala old walls made into drop offs, and general mounds of earth packed up that a few locals have turned into jumps/drops with very little space for error on the run off, mostly all flat landings and often into ruts and slosh (so no continuous flow) and the fact they have been maintained i would assume by downhillers on bigger bikes (and obviosuly jumps are there thing)….

im in the camp of loving all day long xc rides with super techy fast bits in and theres tonnes of that round by me, but jumps are not…

im only young(ish) and not a middle aged fat IT bod, so i know oh so well about building things a teen etc, but as you grow older and dont do the same things, its hard to suddenly bring it all back, and as some body else says you have a way less fear factor as a kid/teen….

so why i started the thread was to get some ideas on how to get me up to speed with it, whether it be speed, vision, how to land, positioning etc etc etc… i will ride these eventually i know it, i can envisage the jump on a few of them ive not done, and i will keep riding the smaller ones and gain some more landing techniques and confidence…whether i go to a skills day or not im 100% positive by the end of the year ill be doing them, as i ride around here all the time and so do my mates we never really get the chance to see others jumping, so other than videos/pics i have nothing to go off other than my own confidence/skill

You don’t need ‘trails’ [in the sculpted jump sense] to learn how to jump properly. Poor excuse LOL

Build yourself a small ramp that you can build confidence with. Move it to gain a bigger drop. Practice, practice, practice.

xiphon – i think your missing my point really…

i can jump and get air on any trail centre and things im used to even in the natural peak district…im referring to big drop offs that are not part of your normal everyday riding, the sort of stuff that you and your mates stand around watching each other have a go at….theres plenty of places on the routes we do to get nice bits of air and im fine with that, its just taking it to the next step and going on to much bigger things!

interestingly that video linked above, the drop in video version, at 0.25 seconds thats the sort of drop im on about, but with a flat level landing!

I’ve noticed that if I can picture and feel the jump/drop in my head and run through it accurately in real time in my imagination, then I can ride it. If I can’t then I try to find something smaller/easier (a lot is about the approach and landing) which I can imagine and can practice on.

You don’t need ‘trails’ [in the sculpted jump sense] to learn how to jump properly. Poor excuse LOL

Well you can practice bunnyhopping properly in a car park and that teaches you to jump, and despite people saying that it’s just the same, being faced by a 10ft gap on the trail just isn’t.

So unless your trails are littered with natural or man made jumps ofvarying sizes it’s difficult to really prgress.

The best way is to go for shorter rides and session parts of the track you’re not confident on. There’s no point riding the same track top to bottom 10 times if you can ride 95% of it but there’s one corner, jump, drop or other feature that’s bugging you. You’d be better off riding that feature 20 times then going back for a complete run.

thisisnotaspoon – Member
There’s no point riding the same track top to bottom 10 times if you can ride 95% of it but there’s one corner, jump, drop or other feature that’s bugging you. You’d be better off riding that feature 20 times then going back for a complete run.

Ok – sounds like 20x the drop/roll-in on Evian for me then!!! I love that run with the exception of getting the willies over the drop…and its no big deal.

It works for me, if I baulk at something on a group ride I’ll go back the next day and figure it out on my own, usualy with enough visualisation (i.e. think though what needs doing so that when you do it you can concentrate dealing with any suprises) then I can ride it as long as it’s not so far beyond my skillset that it’s likely to go horribly wrong, so a 1-2ft drop with an iffy landing that’s been putting me off might be OK, but I’d just keep ignoring a 4ft+ drop.

A bit like when I used to do a lot of sailing, some of the pro’s would be getting towed upwid to practice going downwind. Despite 75% of the races always being upwind, and tacticaly that’s oftern where they’re won. The speed going downwind means less time to actualy practice it. So if there’s only a few jumps/drops localy you need to repeat them to get better otherwise you’re jusr riding what you’re already good at. But just bear in mind that someone somewhere can probably ride 20ft gaps, but might struggle on cavedale (hopefully, otherwise there’s no hope!).

Im sure Jedi is great and all but half the “Jedi” effect is just thats your mind and body will be set up to improve skills/jumping that day.

I reckon if people just set in their mind they were going to do a days skills (not a MTB ride) with their mates (with a mobile phone) they could get much the same effect.

I know I used to be better/more comfortable with jumps. Half the reason I’m less good now is the guys I go MTBing with are really into the fitness side of things.

Even if I just got a minor injury ie bad bruise or sprain 5 miles into a 30 mile off road ride it would put a real downer on the day and I probably would not get to ride to the next weekend.

I’ve been “getting by” on drops and rolling over jumps for the last couple of years so a couple of weeks ago I went on the “Jumps and Drops” course at Cannock DH trails with Adam Halling of The Bike School.

There were 6 of us and it was superb, can’t recommend it highly enough – and a bargain at £35 each for 3 hours.

We started with the basics of manuals and bunny-hops, then moved onto drops (starting off with about a foot and ending up with about 3 feet), then table-top jumps, then doubles and finally a play on a (sort of) pump track run which had a sequence of jumps and doubles.

My riding in the Peaks is now so much quicker, smoother and in control.

Cue flaming as I’ve recommended someone other than Jedi 😆

We started with the basics of manuals and bunny-hops, then moved onto drops (starting off with about a foot and ending up with about 3 feet), then table-top jumps, then doubles and finally a play on a (sort of) pump track run which had a sequence of jumps and doubles.

Back in the day I used to practise a bit of trials. Also being young I was keen on trying a bit of jumping.

I had all the above nailed, cant say I’d be able to do anything other than the simplest doubles now.

Alot of it is mental in my opinion and unless Im on the “right” bike in the “right” mood Im a total XC jey boy.

I’d be keen to hear how long the the skills day effect lasts for with out a regular practise area.

scu98rkr

I’d be keen to hear how long the the skills day effect lasts for with out a regular practise area.

I thought that as well – that’s why I spent 30 mins practising manuals and bunny-hops down a fire road in Macc Forest (that I would normally blast down as part of my regular “lap”), then went to the local BMX track to practise the jumps and then last night went into the local woods to practise drops.

As with most things, use it or lose it!!

Every time I go out riding, I look to improve my skills somehow – it’s part of the enjoyment I get from tootling along on two wheels…

…And by ‘riding’ I mean : BMX racing/dirt jumping, all-day XC rides, DH racing/uplift days, commuting on a road bike, afternoon thrashing around the woods, etc.

I also used to ride (in my youth) – trials (both 20″ & 26″) and BMX skateparks too…

@ Oscillate Wildly

Gradually progress up to the ‘big stuff’ – don’t leap from 1ft drops to 10ft drops… that’s asking for trouble.

You will fall off, you will make mistakes, and you will injure yourself – but that comes with pushing your own limits.

Next time you’re out riding, try and find something (a drop, a gap, etc) 10% ‘bigger’ than what you’re currently comfortable with. The only way you will progress up to 20% ‘bigger’ is knocking this obstacle on the head first.

I would recommend “practicing” with someone watching, they can tell you stuff your not going to notice. Then swop round to assist them.

I had feedback from TSY while at Chicksands a while ago that helped me. Its hard to know what your position is in the air or how your landing is sometimes. Also having someone else along to gauge things like speed, angle etc all helps.

I did a Jedi course and found his video helpfull. Seeing yourself is a real help.

Still fall off a lot though.

Grab yourself a copy of ‘Mastering Mountain Bike Skills’ – much useful, and well illustrated information.