hitting bigger gap jumps

Brendan Fairclough

“First of all, don’t rush into anything. Instead, spend some time walking around the jump, examining the lip, the run-in and the run-out. If other people are hitting it, play close attention to what they’re doing and how they’re doing it. I call this ‘sciencing it out.’ Look at how they’re managing their speed. Are they tucking or pedalling coming in? Are they being kicked by the lip? Are they having to pull up to clear the gap? The most important thing is speed management. Going too slow can mean casing it, but that’s preferable to overshooting a big gap, in my opinion.

“In the air, try to keep a central, balanced position on the bike and, especially the first time, keep the front wheel higher than normal until you’ve dialled-in how fast to go. Speed equals stability, so on big jumps, don’t worry about the bike doing weird stuff in the air– the speed of the wheels spinning will help to keep you going straight. Just aim to keep the front wheel up and to spot your landing, looking much further ahead than normal. On really big jumps – 60ft-plus – you’ll find you won’t need to pull up much at all because your speed, and the shape of the lip, will do it for you.

“When it comes to setting my bike up for big jumps, like at Red Bull Rampage or the FEST Series, the only changes I’ll make are to stiffen-up my fork and adjust my compression damping. I’ll put an extra 5psi in the fork (90psi in total), wind the high-speed compression fully on and add two clicks of low-speed.”

“in the air, try to keep a central, balanced position on the bike”