BetterRide Students Articles

Mountain Bike Cornering, Part 1

I received a great question from a BetterRide mountain bike camp student today: “Since braking IN a corner is BAD, is it better to err on the side of braking TOO MUCH prior to entering the corner or err on the side of possibly having to brake during the corner? … The short answer …

Wow, I didn’t even know about this until it came up in my news feed! BetterRide Mountain Bike School On TV, Again! Not as in depth or as far reaching as our Discovery Channel special in 2004 but cool never the less!

In the last 25 years one topic that has come up multiple times is how foot placement affects mountain bike handling and cornering, especially going into a corner or switchback. I have heard always have the outside foot forward so you can start to pedal earlier on the exit of a corner and I have experimented with that and the opposite, having the outside foot trailing as you go into a corner.

Turns out, having your outside foot back while cornering is faster, but not for you!

Wow, I seemed to ruffle a few feathers with my Mountain Bike Cornering Foot Position Part 1 post. I was simply asked a question from a student and I answered it. I was not intending to offend anyone and certainly it was nothing personal. A couple people said that I had “harsh criticism for Shaums March” which is interesting to me as I didn’t mention his name, and I simply stated my opinion (and Greg Minnaar’s) on cornering. Shaums is a friend of mine who have great respect for and some of what I know about cornering is from getting friendly arguments with Shaums and then testing his theories verses my theories.