After getting back from a brilliant week in the Alps, where i rode far more stuff i’d have got off and walked previously, i’m feeling like my ridings stepped up a mark. But, we all know, over confidence is deadly 😆

So, how do you judge the sensible level? I think it important to ride stuff that scares one a bit, in order to keep pushing ones personal limits a bit, it’s just a case of working out what “a bit” actually is……….

Doubles.
I tend to bottle it on larger ones because I never seem to think I’m going to clear them both.
Love smaller ones though.
Practice needed methinks.

It’s all good fun until you run out of skill luck soft things to land on.

So, how do you judge the sensible level?

My employers tolerance level to a very generous sick policy vs career limiting attendance in plaster casts

If I’ve fallen off twice, time to walk it.

I’m now self employed. Time off work == no £££ 😆

Take the biggest tabletop I’ve ever cleared. Make it 2 or 3 times shorter, but now put a gap in there. Suddenly my brain tells my body it can’t be done and I end up stopping before attempting it 🙁

^^ this!

A few weeks ago i was cruising down one of my local trails, and just after a tight, blind (due to a large bushy tree) bermed hairpin, there was a steep, but rollable 8 to 10 foot bank. Well, i come round saidf hairpin, push the nose over the lip, and un-oh, the local stunt monkeys have been at work with their spades, and now it’s a massive, vertical step down with about a 6 horizontal foot gap to the steep landing ramp! Can’t stop, so just time for a last minute panicked huge pump as i was going way too slow, then a “send it” off the edge. Amazingly, it worked perfectly, and i landed it no probs.

The “problem” is that i can’t do it again, cause now i’ve seen it, i’m scared of it! 😆

Sensible? Hmmm…

I do get nervy about high speed stuff – it goes wrong fast and rag doll finishes are not good…

If the penalty for failure is more than a slide down trail or otb on to for…

I’m in a similar situation to you, back from the Alps a coupleof weeks ago, but we were racing. No bloody way would I have hit a 6 ft drop if I’d had a chance to look at it or think about it, that was the line though so over I went, at race pace!

First day out on the MTB since today at llandegla, very strange indeed, hardly touched the brakes, knackered at the bottom of the hills instead of the top and missed one landing by absolutely miles. Cased a double pretty hard though, just to remind me I’m still and idiot.

In answer to your question though, honesty yet to find where I’m unhappy with the risk. The tops of some of the stages had me bricking it but was always alrightonce I got my race face on.

Depends on where I am, who I am with, how I’m riding and what bike I’m riding. Lots more margin for error on the DH bike, a lot less on the trail bike. If I by myself riding stuff that i’m 50/50 on it doesnt get ridden. Otherwise I’m happy to follow my mates down almost anything as, though theyre usually faster than me, technically we’re all about the same level.

Honestly though, I can’t remember the last time I crashed riding something scary, it’s nearly always the easy bit after the hard bit I crash on.

As others have said. Doubles.
Always hated them.
In Andorra riding confidence was building. Clearing big tables quite happily. Did a 3 ft double thinking it will be fine. Cased it. Broke my arm.

It certainly hasn’t helped double confidence!

Wheels on the floor I’m all good. Will generally give anything a go.

I used to ride dh with a bloke who had an almost Senna-like confidence in himself to sort it out no matter what happened. Used to push it all the time until something went wrong then react and respond quick enough to get it back, or at least turn something prety serious into something he could walk away from.

Unfortunatley like Senna his luck/skill ran out one day. He found the limit, passed it and smashed himself up pretty badly. Never rode again.

There’s plenty I won’t ride, mix of confidence and risk really.

I ride less than I’d like and I’ve never been much cop at jumps and drops.

From a natural trails perspective steep and rocky, loose and lumpy, slop and roots I’m happy as larry but put a man made jump or drop in it of any size and chances are I’ll bottle it quicker than a coca cola factory.

I have a family and a job/career that’s important to me to think of and I get loads of pleasure from the riding I do so I guess I’ve plateau’d in terms of gnarliness (or more accurately my progression is slow as i am getting quicker and smoother) and I’m comfortable with that. I vary where I ride, who I ride with and the bikes I ride, which keeps it fresh for me.

That bit in Thrunton with the skill and cross bones always scared me

Pushing ‘a bit’ happens when I’m ‘feeling it’.

If I’m feeling nervous or scared I’ll just ride within myself until I start to to loosen up a bit.

Pushing it for me means steep stuff with catch berms…..they scare me.

garage-dweller – Member
From a natural trails perspective steep and rocky, loose and lumpy, slop and roots I’m happy as larry but put a man made jump or drop in it of any size and chances are I’ll bottle it quicker than a coca cola factory.

+1 many times over.

I’m mostly in it for the views. I’ll walk stuff most people on here would ride.

OP go and see Jedi, he has a fabulous insight into the mental side as well as the facility and technical side of the coaching

On the riding in the Alps you ride all day everyday, I am doing many months worth of descending daily and on more technical terrain. As such you are much more in the grove and can build up to stuff or do it as/when you feel like it. I think you need to keep that in mind when back home and throttle back a bit. I used to make a point of sessioning sections / features even on regular rides. I have to say other than tiny gaps or non rolable drops over a couple of feet I have retired from too much jumping as crash rehab is too long now.

I find getting older, and not bouncing so well also slows me down when jumping.
Everything takes an age to heal too when you’re mid forties.

@chopper 53 – I have a scar on my ankle from a twig scratch 5 years ago when trying to rebuild a trail destroyed by logging 😐

Rock gardens. Especially ones with big sharp rocks.

Nope, nope, nope.

Riding SPDs off road. I’m fine on the road, ish, but anything more than a fire road and it’s no go.

I’m not entirely sold on this seemingly MTB magazine-fuelled maxim of ‘pushing one’s limits’ as the endless ideal for mountain bikers. I know what my limits are. I’d like to stay well away from them, thanks.

When MTBing goes bad, body parts get broken, facial scars appear and a close call is often made with something that could’ve been much worse. I’ve done all that thanks. Not again.

I’m happy with just riding my bike fast, but well within limits, and having fun.

Quite happy to walk stuff that I’m only 90% sure of, probably something to do with riding 100% alone too..

I think you have to be able to have a realistic idea of what your limits actually are. I ride with a mate whose mantra is ‘just let the bike do it’. That is a good way to relax, but the fact is he doesn’t really understand technique. I think you have to some basic knowledge of how to do what you are doing. Just pointing the bike at it and hoping will eventually end badly. So if I don’t understand how to do a feature, I’ll walk it

As such you are much more in the grove

As soon as he leaves terra-firma significantly then he’s toast 🙂

Gravity-slave I had just about forgotten that tripe from my childhood. Thanks not a lot for dredging the memories back up. 😛

jambalaya
OP go and see Jedi,

I’m already a more than happy customer of Tony’s 😆

no_eyed_deer – Member

Quite happy to walk stuff that I’m only 90% sure of, probably something to do with riding 100% alone too..

The fact of being alone makes a huge difference to me, especially when I’m out in big mountains miles from help. Besides, if you do clean some really difficult line but no-one is there to see it where’s the kudos?

It’s a bit like the tree falling in a forest and nobody there to hear it……

I’m the same as no_eyed-deer, unfortunately these days I have a modicum of responsibilities and so can’t injure myself.

I’m normally riding alone so cautious or racing so aware that it’s not the time to try new things, on the rare occasions I am riding in a group I’m more inclined to try things but generally only if nice and dry and grippy.

Gaps are the thing that gets me lost of the time. I’m fine on smaller ones but as they get bigger, my bottle / confidence fades very quickly even when I’m clearing bigger tables. I’m a bit funny on really high speed jumps too, I’ve put that down to too many years a yoof mucking about on steeper jumps with proper lips etc.

Some stuff on the DH bike I can’t get my head round either like one section on the double black at Antur; the corner where someone has written never clip in on the rock. Just can’t get through it.

I can talk myself out of riding just about anything. Normally the only way of getting me down something at my limit is if I don’t know it’s coming.

Perversely, I’m enjoying the ups more than the downs this season, particularly clearing technical climbs I’ve never managed before.

I’m not entirely sold on this seemingly MTB magazine-fuelled maxim of ‘pushing one’s limits’ as the endless ideal for mountain bikers. I know what my limits are. I’d like to stay well away from them, thanks.

My limits have moved, changed, danced around and gone somewhere over the last 10 years. Pushing them has meant I now have a much bigger comfort zone, for instance I went back to slower riding and hitting drops not much above walking pace to show some other lads how the landing was, the little reset in technique has changed my approach when I’m faster or out of line so more stuff comes back into play. I will still stop/walk or go round a few things – one today just didn’t feel right on the run in but I’ll hit it fine next week.

When I used to climb a lot I spent a couple of years doing a lot of bouldering, not only did my technique improve but my ability to understand what I could and couldn’t hold. So a blind reach and missing the big hold on an easy route suddenly didn’t become stressful anymore and the entire process was more enjoyable.

Built stuff (within reason) not an issue, my brain says “this was built to be jumped” so I’ve no issue with it.

Where I struggle when you hit the alps are those really techy steep 180deg hairpins. My Achilles heel is right hand downhill ones, I’ve got to concentrate really hard to get my feet (I have to swap lead pedal) and body weight in the right place, and it mostly goes to shit 😆

their opposite (turning left) I can do all day with no issue… 🙄

It’s big gaps for me. I’m fine on some (like the end of transfer line at woburn) but that’s because I’ve ridden it so many times and know exactly what kind of speed I can get away with for clearing it. New ones that I’ve never ridden scare me.

Why would I want to ride anything that scares me? This is my hobby, not some dick measuring contest. Why would I want to spend my leisure time being scared ?

Mind you, I’ve never understood why people choose to watch horror films either. “Here is a film that will scare the crap out of you”. “No thanks”. Maybe there is some correlation.

Actually I did believe that it was necessary to keep challenging myself to ride stuff that scared me in order to improve once. Then I broke both arms in separate crashes and decided to take a different approach. Now I only ride stuff that I feel confident on. The funny thing is that I’m riding much faster over much more technical terrain that I was before those crashes, so clearly it wasn’t necessary to keep scaring the crap out of myself in order to improve after all.

Completely agree

I avoid stuff that I might find scary. Hitting stuff that scared me used to be because I was in a rush for improvement. It never worked and I just ended up riding out of control

The funny thing is that I’m riding much faster over much more technical terrain that I was before those crashes, so clearly it wasn’t necessary to keep scaring the crap out of myself in order to improve after all.

and this is probably the point, if you scaring yourself your not pushing your limits etc. your outside of them and probably not learning why/how.

if you scaring yourself your not pushing your limits etc. your outside of them and probably not learning why/how.

This is what I came to realise. When I ride scared I tense up and am not really riding (or learning), just hanging on and hoping for the best. Just a pity it took me two broken arms to learn this 🙂

I don’t ride it if I don’t think it’s going to work, basically. That sounds restrictive but if you’ve got a good knowledge of your riding and a database in your head of “stuff that’s a bit like this” you know pretty well what you’ve done, what you probably can do, and what’s a stretch, and what’s a risk.