Mental Skills Articles

The bike world is abuzz with talk of Greg Minnaar’s big mistake in the last World Cup! He did something I and most riders have done but you wouldn’t expect it from one of the best MTB racers of all time!

His crash wasn’t his mistake, it was the cause of the crash that was his mistake! To bring you up to date, if you weren’t glued to your live feed on Saturday, Greg crashed and seriously hurt his chance of winning the World Cup Overall.

Ever “choke” while riding? Despite all the mtb skills you have developed sometimes, often when fear or nerves take over you can’t rely on those skills. It’s like you suddenly lost your mountain biking skills. My goal is to get you mountain biking at your best in all situations and this article will help you do that.

I received this email from a student:

MTB, The Odds are Against You (which is good!) this is my second piece this year on how fear is good.

When you were young were taught to seek a sensible, well paying career? Did you grow up hearing that thousands of hopeful actors go to Hollywood and never make it? Told that these actors end up waiting tables or heading home with their tail between their legs? This is the SADDEST advice! Everything worth doing in life the odds are against you! It’s called challenge ….

Fear is a powerful and often misunderstood emotion that has some effect on every mountain bike ride we do. The fear we ALL experience while mountain biking varies greatly in intensity from rider to rider and from trail to trail. Most riders think of pro downhill racers as fearless but in my 17 years of coaching them and 20 years of being one I have found that even the fastest pro downhill racers experience fear, on beginner trails! So the idea of “No Fear” is comical at best, we all experience fear and it isn’t always a bad thing, fear can save us from injury and keep us from doing things we aren’t skilled enough to do. On the other hand, fear that is