Friday, January 17, 2014

I'm Not Trixie


Meet Trixie.
Or trick-sey.  Tricksy?  I don't do tricks well.  Now, stop that image in your mind right now.  I am talking about bike tricks.  You know…wheelies, bunny-hops, manuals, etc.  I suck at them.  I bet any 12 year old with a bike and a paper route (do they still have those?) can crush me in a wheelie contest.


I have been aware of this for some time…years, really.  And it has not gotten better with age.  I thought of it again the other day during a group ride where I was following a rider down a bit of a techy single track.  He was hopping and bopping over a few of the trail obstacles while I was flowing and going just as fast as he was.  I was a bit jealous, actually.  I wish I could do that, the hippy hoppy bunny trail approach to trail riding.


Some of these things are really practical such as the nose wheelie around tight switchbacks, the manual transitioning to a quick bunny hop for trail obstacles, etc.  I am a pretty good trail rider, actually.  I am even considered 'fast' in the group I ride in, but that is a 'big fish in a smaller pond' reality.  Still, it takes a pretty good rider to gap me on trail.  But if I have to do any trick moves, a skilled 3 year old on a straddle bike could school me.  Little brats.


I am not too sure how to improve this.  I guess I could set up some kind of skills course and work at it, but first I better armor-up and check my medical plan cuz' I think it might require a skin offering to the trail gods.  I do wonder though, since it has been this way from the beginning, if I just lack the gene.  Heck, even when I was a wanker on a BMX bike I was too attached to gravity to jump worth a fig…a flying fig in this case.  It might be too late for this old dog to learn any new tricks.


School is in session.

Still, I think I need to try to get better in this regard.  I think it will make me a better rider and that is something that anyone, no matter how new or experienced, can benefit from.



Turning serious tricks may not be for me, but perhaps I can learn to flirt in the dirt a bit more.  No street corners required.



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