Questions, comments and criticisms

Pumping flat ground in the real world

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Hey Lee,
I’ve been following your career for awhile now, and am always impressed by your pump track advocacy and advice. I have the book you wrote with Lopes on my kindle. I’ve built my own stuff on private land.

Here’s my question: tons of people talk about good cornering technique, and then I saw your video about pumping on flat ground. It’s awesome! I’ve been practicing it the past couple of days, as I’ve always been nervous in corners, and I’ve found that I can go from a track-stand to around 10mph uphill and down. Now my question is this: How practical is this drill for trail riding? It seems super practical, easy and fun to me, but I’ve never seen it before and not many people seem into it. Is it because the same rules don’t apply as much at higher speeds?

Thanks for taking time to read this!

Philip

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PUTB or P2PI for a SoCal ripper?

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Lee,

I was looking at your fitness books: Pump up the Base and Prepare to Pin It. It appears that one should start with Pump Up the Base during the off-season. Then, move to Prepare to Pin It. What about those of us that live in Southern California? We do not have an off-season. Is it still worthwhile to use the Pump up the base program considering that I am not going to stop my regular mountain bike rides, or should I go straight to the Prepare to Pin It program?

Ron

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Tuning a Specialized Brain for braaap

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Lee,

How will i find the sweet spot for an Epic EVO Brain for pump or trail?

Peter

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A gentlemanly pump track riding critique

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When I moved to the East San Francisco Bay area in 1993, Gregory was the first person to befriend me and take me riding. Let’s see if I can return the favor.

These tips will apply for most pump track riders.

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Skill tips for shorter people?

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First of all, thank you for all your work on books and website – it’s eye-opening regardless of skills level.

I have a question about body position and riding techniques for short people. Being 170 cm (5’7”) I feel that some of the normal “tricks” are harder to perform, especially those requiring more movement around a bike, like correct turning (leaning the bike heavily, but not the body) or manualling. It’s just impossible or very difficult to move the weight far enough over the rear wheel to lift the front end, or in case of turning – to move the bike between your legs and stretch the inside shoulder enough to lean the bike without leaning yourself too much.

Maybe you have some experience from coaching shorter people? Are there any smart ways of overcoming these limitations?

Michal

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What’s with these round bladed shovels?

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Hi Lee

Thanks for sending the ebook Welcome to Pump Track Nation. Its got me thinking!

Now I have a question, what’s with these round bladed shovels? We don’t really see them that often here in the UK. Do they make that much difference?

Regards, Ian

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I need help pinning the high rpm

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Hey Lee

I need help pinning it. I don’t use a watt meter, just cadence. Can’t get above 200. Is it my bike set up, my position or what? My husband can get to 215 on my bike. What to do? I’m in week 10 of Pump up the Base, which I love by the way. It’s still snowing here, so hopefully I will be ready to rock.

Julie

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Angle of your head in berms

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Dear Lee,

I’ve noticed two styles of keeping one’s head while cornering. Let’s see two examples on Pinkbike:

Brian Lopes – with his head more or less in-line with the body

Jared Graves – with his head almost always perpendicular to the ground:

Is it just a matter of style and habits, or is there an advantage in keeping your head vertical in turns? Should I focus on it while training?

Cheers,
Jakub

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Light hands while seated pedaling?

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Hi Lee,

My question is regarding balance while pedaling from the saddle.

Should I keep my hands light while pedaling from the saddle?

When pedaling out of the saddle keeping light hands is easy as all the weight can be on my feet. But, when sitting and pedaling the weight is distributed between the handlebars, saddle and pedals, depending on how hard I’m pedaling. So if my hands are light that means my feet AND saddle are weighted which means I’m balanced backwards. Am I getting something wrong here?

Thanks,
Amit

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Hopping frontsides

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Hey Lee — just read the post Are you pumping too hard?. Great post. It brought up a question for me too.

I just got BMX Skills and read the pump chapter and it got me thinking about trying to hop frontsides altogether since I hadn’t really thought about doing that before. Instead I’ve been trying to absorb them in most/all situations and stay in as much control as possible, which is tough at high speeds.

So I’ve given it a little practice on a couple different pump tracks and haven’t been very successful. On both of these tracks the rollers are fairly close together and it feels like there’s not enough space/time to hop the frontside and like my fork is already compressing into the next roller when I’m trying to hop. Am I just not going fast enough? Is it something where pulling the bike towards me on frontsides will eventually turn into hopping them naturally? Or is this technique better suited for tracks that are a little more wideopen or on the trail when there’s space to set up? Or do I just need to practice more, haha.

One last question: is it always faster to hop the frontside if you can (excluding the suspension issue)?

Sorry for all the questions. Any more detail on this technique in general would be awesome!!

Ps. Got the MTB book for my cousin for Xmas. He has recently got into riding and I know this will get him Riding and hooked…now i’ll have a partner in crime on holidays 🙂

Allen

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Pump Up the Base for a BMXer?

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Lee,

I was browsing your site and saw the book and training program Pump Up the Base. It looks like it is predominantly geared towards MTB but I was wondering if it might be something that I could use for my winter BMX training? From the outline that I’ve read and some of the example pages and the comments it may be useful for some basic skills work on just about any type of riding. I do not ride MTB and I’m a novice in BMX so I also wanted to make sure that it would be something that I could apply to my sport as well.

Thank you,
John V

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Jumping straight

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Lee,

When I am jumping my bmx bike I have a tendency to get off balance in the air if I try and push the face of the jump. If I do not push the face of the jump and just let my momentum carry me off the lip I fly straight as an arrow, but I would like to continue to build speed off the lip and also go a little further to clear some of the larger jumps. I am not not sure if I am to tight on take off, or if I am pushing to late on the jump face, etc. Any suggestions on what I might be doing wrong?

If I can get this together I may see you at Colorado Indoor BMX this year. Thanks.

Greg

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