Etiquette and Basic Skills (Mountain Bikes 101)

welcome back to Berm Peak i'm Seth and today we're  going to be doing something a little different   but kind of the same because we're continuing our  mountain biking 101 series last time I answered   the questions that many of you were too afraid to  ask so we mainly went over terminology things that   are said in these videos over and over again and  for many of you who don't mountain bike this gave   you a base level of understanding sufficient to  enjoy these videos today we're going to take it   a step further and go into the things that I  think are next on the list of importance and   that is very basic mountain biking techniques and  how to not piss people off let's start with that   let's start with bike park etiquette now at a  bike park the cardinal rule the one thing that   you need to know is that you can't block the trail  don't stand on the trail even if your bike brakes   even if you fall get off the trail if you have  to stop next to the trail get as far to the side   as you can because people are not expecting  to see somebody on the trail at a bike park   they're expecting to ride very fast so if they  come around a corner and you're standing there   at best they're gonna get very angry at  you at worst you're gonna cause a crash   i'm sorry man my bad dude that was a dick moving  me now we've all heard it said that if somebody   gets injured it's best not to move them I  would say the exception to that would be on   an active path at a bike park if your friend  is laying there injured around a blind turn   things are going to go from bad to worse if you  let them get run over by another mountain bike   so if you're out of the way of active trail  corridors you are way ahead of the game at a   bike park bike parks are designed for mountain  bikers so there's not a whole lot you can do   to piss people off as long as you're using  basic courtesies that you would anywhere else   you're going to be a good citizen of a bike park  but a lot of times you're going to be going to   a bike park with your friends now especially  if you're with more experienced people they're   probably going to be prepared they're going to  arrive there with their bike in working order   with all their gear on and they're going to  want to get out of the car and start riding   don't be that guy that has to  make a repair to their bike   or has to put on all their gear after they  arrive 10 minutes late this is gonna make   your friends hate you and it's gonna make  them not want to come to a bike park with you   another fine point at bike parks comes down  to skidding skidding is the one trick that   everybody knows how to do somebody gets a bicycle  they lock up the rear brake they skid it's fun   but it's also the thing that destroys trails  most a properly built trail won't even really   get damaged by water but skidding is going to  dig your tire knobs into the tread and tear it   up then that loose dirt is going to get muddy and  those holes are going to get deeper and deeper and   somebody's going to have to come fix it so when  you skid you kind of ruin things for everyone   at bike parks you will find areas where  people congregate and wait to drop into trails   and sometimes it might seem like they're in  line like they're waiting their turn to drop in   they're not you can drop in whenever you want  as long as there's space to do so you can   just scoot past the crowd and drop in those  people congregating or just taking a break   one thing I would say about dropping in  is for your own sake if you're a beginner   wait for other more experienced riders to  drop in before you if you drop in before   them chances are they're going to catch up to  you and then you're going to have to experience   the anxiety of them creeping up on your tail if  you give them space let them go in before you   then you're not going to have to deal with any of  that and you can have the trail all to yourself   multi-use trail systems come with their own set of  additional considerations because there are other   trail users on them multi-use trails like this  one allow hikers and horseback riders in both   directions unfortunately for us mountain bikers  we have to yield to everyone you have to yield to   hikers you have to yield to horseback riders and  you have to yield to other mountain bikers who   are going uphill but the main thing is you don't  want to create problems for other mountain bikers   some trails in this area have actually been closed  down to mountain bikers because they just became   too much of a problem even if you don't care  about being rude to people it reflects badly on   all of us and so when you are out on the trails  on a mountain bike you have to represent us all   so the type of riding that you do on multi-use  trails is going to be a little bit different than   what you do at a bike park a bike park is for  partying and a multi-use trail is for exploring   whether you're on multi-use trails or a bike  park you should mine the trail conditions   and by that I mean is the trail really wet is  it really dusty what is the condition the actual   surface now you can find this out through local  facebook groups talk to people who ride there   or go into a bike shop buy an energy bar and tap  into their knowledge the reason this is important   is because if the conditions are bad you might  actually be destroying the trail by riding it   another place you can check on trail conditions is  trail forks trail forks is a mapping app that has   pretty much every mountain bike trail in it and  it makes it really easy to find your way around   sometimes you can look there and on  the actual trailer you want to ride   it'll give you an update on the conditions it'll  say updated two days ago four days ago a week ago   that can give you an idea of what's going on  also common sense if it rained like four inches   yesterday chances are today is not a good time to  go for a ride now occasionally you'll find a day   like today where trail conditions are otherwise  perfect but as you make your way into the trails   you find one or two trouble spots the question  is what do you do the answer ride right through   the mud puddle right in the center if you  do that you're destroying something that   was already destroyed now if you try to go  around it you're going to widen the trail by   encroaching on habitat that wasn't trail  before you're going to widen the trail and   you're going to make the repair efforts much more  difficult so ride through the puddle not around it so now that you know how to not piss people  off and just be a good citizen of the trails   we can talk about techniques actually riding your  bike now we're not going to talk about hitting   jumps or doing tricks we're going to talk about  the very most basic things about mountain biking   starting with saddle height now you probably  already know that to pedal a bike you should   have the seat up so that your leg is more or less  straight you don't want to pedal with your seat   down because it's really bad for your knees and  it's really inefficient but what you might not   know is that if you're going downhill for a long  period of time you should probably have your seat   down also you should be standing up  this is called an attack position   in an attack position you're going to  have your body weight centered over the   bike you're going to have your arms bent and  you're going to be ready to absorb impacts so you may have seen more advanced riders  riding on their back wheel with their   front wheel in the air you may think this is a  wheelie but oftentimes it's actually a manual   a manual is when you bring your weight back and go  up on your rear wheel without pedaling you're just   balancing there and you're not using the pedals to  keep yourself up now whether we're talking about   wheelies or manuals this is not that important  as a basic mountain bike technique however   it is important for you to be able to unweight  your front wheel and get it up in the air a little   bit now sometimes where this might be important  or if you're going into a whole bunch of chunk and   you don't want your front wheel to plow head first  into it for instance if I were to go off of one of   these wooden drops I should pull back before I go  off the drop so that my nose is up in the air and   my bike lands flat were I not to unweight my front  wheel the front of my bike would dip down as soon   as it went off the end and I would not have a good  time that's not fun so the key to unweighting your   front wheel is to first of all move your weight  backwards as far as possible you want to make the   front of your bike very light so it's easy to pull  up so what you want to do is before you go back   push down and snap your whole body back now this  can feel a little bit unsettling at first you're   afraid you're going to go off the back of the bike  or flip over so try it on a flat surface first and   get comfortable with it so when you encounter some  kind of a drop on the trail you know what to do so one of the most important techniques you need  to learn to keep your bike in control is proper   braking now you have a brake lever on the right  side of your bike and the left and depending on   what part of the world you're in these are going  to control either the front or rear brakes pretty   much always you're going to want to use both of  them at the same time now if your brakes are set   up properly you can do what's called feathering  your brakes that is only applying them a little   bit if you lock them up you're going to lock up  your front wheel and go over the handlebars or   you're going to skid your back wheel when your  wheels are not spinning you can't keep your   bike under control and so you want to feather your  brakes so that they continue to spin but also slow   down the bike now if you were to inspect the brake  pads of an experienced mountain biker you would   notice that the front brake is worn down more than  the rear that's because when you're slowing down   your weight is being shifted towards the front  of the bike and more of the weight is on the   front wheel so your front wheel should actually be  taking up more of the braking than your back wheel   beginners often just use their back wheel because  they're afraid to squeeze the front too hard and   go over the handlebars if you learn how to feather  your brakes and learn how to control them properly   that won't be a problem if you've been riding your  new bike around you probably realize by now that   it has gears in one direction the bike goes faster  and in the other direction it has more torque and   is easier to pedal but you also might realize that  sometimes your gears make terrible clanging noises a lot of the time this is  caused by shifting under load   shifting under load happens when you are climbing  a hill or putting down power on the pedals   and then you realize you have to be in a lower  gear and so you start shifting while you're   putting tons of stress on the drivetrain at best  you're going to hear loud terrible clanging noises   and at worst you're actually going to damage  your drivetrain so the solution is don't shift   under load try to plan ahead always look in  front of you and if you see you're going to   have to be downshifting soon do it while you're  soft pedaling instead of when you get to the hill   and need to get into a low gear in an emergency  you know you're soft pedaling when you're really   not putting that much pressure on the pedals at  all in a perfect world that's always going to be   how you're going to shift now speaking of looking  ahead that's a really important technique a lot   of new mountain bikers look down at their tire  and when you look down at your tire you just   see what's right in front of you and it passes  really quickly when you look out ahead you're   essentially slowing everything down you can see  more of the trail try it if you look about let's   say 10 yards ahead of you you're going to be able  to ride everything much better just imagine if you   were driving your car and looking at just the  line right in front of you somebody would come   out into the middle of the road and you would hit  into them so don't do the same thing on your bike   so that concludes the second episode of mountain  biking 101 just like the first episode we went   over basic concepts so that you could take  the next step from just learning terminology   now you know your way around your bike just a  little bit and you can go out to a trail system   or bike park without pissing people off as always  I didn't even come close to going over everything   and so there will be future episodes of this  series and a place down in the comments for   you to ask questions there's no such thing as a  stupid question probably more stupid to not ask   now that you know how to be a good citizen of  the trails look like one get yourself a Berm Peak   jersey they're comfortable they wick moisture well  they're lightweight and you're going to want to   wear them every day we have these new retro colors  with the sunset pattern and they're available on   cognativemtb.com in the link below thanks for  riding with me today and i'll see you next time

Channel: Berm Peak Express

Views: 716,404

Keywords: do it yourself, diy, tools, home, backyard, mountain biking, cycling, outdoors

Id: bvvNjMN0VgI

Length: 12min 0sec (720 seconds)

Published: Sun Aug 15 2021