-The beginner's guide to jumping.
If you think you're ready for it, you're confident on your bike,
and you're thinking about standing in the air,
hopefully, this video is going to help you out
and give you some of the fundamentals for making sure,
hopefully, it doesn't go wrong.
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Hopefully, this video is going to give you a bit
of a step-by-step guide on the skills you need to look
at to make sure you're doing it right.
To make sure that most importantly you're influencing the bike
in the air.
You're not just hitting the take-off or a ramp and the bike is just doing
whatever that jump is doing to it, because sometimes jumps aren't built
perfectly.
We don't hit them at the perfect speed,
and therefore you need to do something
to control your bike in the air.
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Let's start with looking at probably the most simple jump,
which is what I call a fly-off.
This is a jump where all you have is a take-off.
This could be a grass bank, a curb, anything that you're just
getting into the air off.
I've got a good example just over here.
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Well, actually that is quite a big fly-off
so I got to see if those eyebrows just stood.
It's quite a big bomb hole and you drop down and in
but it is super simple.
Somebody else built a take-off, but all it is is some logs
and a bit of dirt and you just jump out of it.
It's a bit of a step up as well which is nice, super safe,
and you should land flat on top.
With this style of jump, you don't have to do much,
but it's a great way of getting comfortable
with going into the air.
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Definitely a great style of jump to learn on and really easy
to make if you've got a nice big bomb hole this,
super easy just to carve out a take-off.
You really don't need much to do this.
Like I said, it's great to bomb in and get that feeling
of lifting into the air.
If you feel they're a nice shape, nice and mellow,
no steep transitions in it, then hopefully it'll send you
into the air in a nice controlled manner.
The only thing to look into is if you make them too sharp
and too low.
We see that quite a lot if people make
their homemade wooden kickers.
They make them too steep and too short, so it's really kicky.
What that does is it slows your bike down a bit as well,
so you can really feel like your weight's going forward.
For more tips on building jumps, Blake has just recently done
that video on how to build a double.
Definitely a bit more advanced than a fly-off or a tabletop,
which I'll talk about next, but it will give you
definitely some things you need to know
about how to build a proper jump.
You might have seen in that video that I went quite fast that time.
It's super safe but I did land quite heavy.
That is the one disadvantage of fly-off jumps.
You're going to take off, and because there's no landing
to land into, you're landing on the flat,
it can be quite a landing, so a bit heavy on the bike.
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You can learn to jump on any bike.
The Hardtail's great.
In fact, sometimes they're even better for jumping
because you don't have to work against your suspension.
What I would say is just make sure your bike's in good condition
because learning to jump, you can be quite heavy on it,
so doing some heavy landings.
You want to make sure things like your wheels
are nicely tensioned up on the spokes,
everything is nice and tight.
Especially the back wheel, you could end up battering
that a little bit.
Definitely give your bike a good check over before you do this.
You can jump on any bike.
However, I'd say bikes with shorter stems and wider bars
are just more comfortable.
If you're on a cross-country bike with a big old stem
and narrow bars,
it's definitely not going to be as confidence-inspiring.
Most bikes are fine.
A good Hardtail is a great bike to start jumping on.
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When it comes to learning jumps it's just the same as trying
to learn anything, basically.
Repetition is key here.
There's lots of young riders, myself included.
Back in the day they would just go out and ride these places
day in day out,
and it's that repetition that gets you good at jumping bikes.
With a fly-off, you really don't need to do much.
We're not talking really about influencing the front
and the back wheel yet.
You're not really worried so much about landing two wheels
at the same time, you're just jumping out of it.
The thing that can go wrong here,
and I'm sure people who have jumped have had this feeling,
is when the bike starts going sideways in the air.
Rather than up or down, it's the front wheel starts drifting
away from you.
The bigger the jump is, the worse that can get
until your landing is so sideways you just fall off the bike.
You've basically lost your balance.
The key to that is really using your weight to lift the bike
into the air and not using your muscles.
You can often trace this back to people's manual technique.
If they're trying to pull the front wheel up using their arms,
they then use a similar technique on a jump.
Basically, you don't get that pull perfectly.
You don't judge it perfectly and the bike can get away from you.
It goes back to practicing your manuals,
which we'll do in a second.
The other thing people get wrong is they let the jump throw them,
and not them and the bite.
What happens then is people can start hovering off their pedals.
It feels like your weight's coming up, off the bike,
and off the pedals.
That's dangerous because--
I've definitely this one back, and that is where you hover
a bit and then you land and your foot steps off and whack.
You whack your shin.
It's definitely trying to keep the bike below you
and not let the jump kick you off the bike.
First, let's go and look at now getting
that manual technique to influence the bike
into the air in the correct way.
Try to get your hips back and low.
Your arms go straight and then the bars come back with you,
and the front wheel is in the air.
That is a manual.
With your arms straight you're less likely to get
the front wheel sideways and lose your balance.
Then you can progress that into a bunny hop.
If your hips are low just stand up and towards the bars.
Timing is key to get the pop.
A common mistake is to try and muscle the bike up into the air.
Whilst it can work, it isn't going to help you get
the right timing on a jump as both wheels
almost come up together,
or you just can't get much lift because you're bringing
the bike up to you.
Once you've got super comfortable with your fly off,
you're getting into the air and you're keeping it straight,
it's time to move it onto a tabletop jump.
This has got a take-off, a flat section across the top,
tabletop, and then slope.
This is key for getting bigger air because you've got something
to land into, and that's going to be much smoother
if you get it right than just jumping off fly-off
and landing onto flat.
This is where you do now start to bring in some technique
to influence what the bike is doing in the air
because you basically want the bike to follow the shape of this jump.
Front wheel up and into the air, then back wheel,
and then nice arc up and over, and into that downslope.
Almost imagine if this was a big pile of dirt
and someone's cut the top off, you just follow
that same shape of the dirt.
Important thing with this is again to keep it nice and straight,
but also now you're landing into a downward slope
you need to land front wheel then back wheel.
Same as a take-off, you don't want to take two wheels off same time.
You go front and then as the bike will get a stop you,
go up and over, same when you land.
Front-wheel then back wheel.
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Like I said before, if you hit a perfectly built jump,
it's a perfect shape, nice and smooth,
at a perfect speed, you're not going to have to do
too much to the bike to get it over and land perfectly.
However, most jumps aren't like that, and actually the best way to learn
is to think about starting to slow it down a little bit.
It's going to be safer, but also with less speed
you're going to have to start making some height to clear it.
That's something you're really going to need
when it comes to doing bigger jumps,
so slow it down and think about bringing something
into this technique to take off.
That technique is what I've already talked about.
It's trying to bring that bunny hop motion in.
Now, you're not always going to need this,
it's more of an exaggeration like I've said already,
to give you a bit more height.
The key to a good bunny hop is first to pump the bike.
That is a case of doing that in this transition
from flat to up.
Think about trying to squash the bike into the ground.
You're trying to make it heavy.
If you squash the bike in exactly at this right time,
get the timing right, it will feel right.
It's a great thing about this.
If you get the timing wrong it should feel a bit weird.
Get it right, it would feel nice and smooth,
and then you drive in the front wheel up
and into the air.
Not a manual, you're just getting behind the bike
a little bit,
getting your weight slightly back, and that's going to get
that front wheel nice and up and into the air.
Only when your back wheel gets the top of the jump
is when you stand up and finish that bunny hop motion off.
That should give you a nice arc up and into the air.
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There you go.
There's a few tips to help you out if you're just starting
to get into the air,
or at least you're thinking about starting to jump.
I absolutely love it.
It's one of my favorite things to do on a bike,
is properly do some good big jumps.
Again, it's all about repetition.
You'll never learn this really, really quickly.
Get outside. I'm sure there's some jumps around.
If not, try and dig some in a spot that you're allowed to
and just get to it.
Once you've got that skill of making the bike go up
into the air and you get better at it,
you can really progress and do bigger and bigger jumps
with the same skill.
If you are struggling with any of those skills,
make sure you check out our playlist.
We've got loads of how-to videos.
Particularly the manual and the bunny hop hopefully
will help you out.
I hope you're enjoying the GetRiding Week.
Plenty more to come.