THE POSITION
Your Neutral Riding Position (aka. the Attack Position), is going to play a huge part in this. It’s the same shape that you see every top rider from Katy Winton to Loic Bruni making. Elbows out, back fairly flat, legs straight, heels down. It should be your go-to position and the starting point for all movement. As soon as you see anything from a corner to a drop coming towards you on the trail, you need to go from this shape and get lower – head over the stem, hips over the butt, but closer to your bike. This will give you the range of motion to be able to either fill gaps on the trail as they appear, or drive your body weight back against smoother features with a slow straightening of your legs. Once you’ve done your push you should be back to the same Neutral Riding Position that you started off in – legs now straight again from pushing.