Not just Dartmoor...

 

One of my real pleasures in riding, is mastering steep, technical trails. Fortunately for me, the flanks of Dartmoor provide a wealth of such opportunities. Within riding distance of my home, I am spoilt for choice. From the big, all-day epics that take me 70kms or more, to a couple of hours spent riding roots and rocks in the valleys, I really do have my pick of the trails. The only thing we really lack here is elevation. The trails I rode yesterday, for example, whilst technically quite demanding in places, take a maximum of a minute to descend. Compare this to Gawton (a downhill centre near Tavistock), where the runs are three minutes long, or Wales and Scotland, where the choices are almost endless, never mind The Alps! I mustn't complain though, especially right now, when we can't travel and most people are severely limited in their riding options, I really do have quite a blessed life.

One thing I can and do do, to keep my riding interesting, is coach others. It's quite difficult to describe the feeling you get from helping someone overcome an obstacle or barrier to their riding, watching them progress over a period of time. During this lockdown, where we're only allowed to meet one other person for outdoor exercise, I've done a few sessions with one of the volunteers from our Plymouth project. The MTB Collective is a regulated not-for-profit company, which aims to use mountain biking to enhance the lives of people in Plymouth. In particular, we look to help young people, who have their own riding groups that are run by volunteers on weekends. We also look to help anyone from the city, or surrounding area, who might have difficulty accessing regular physical activities. Yesterday, before I went and got a bit tech, I spent a couple of hours coaching one of our volunteers. She's a keen rider and wants to progress her own riding, so that she can better help the young people she leads on rides. It's surprising how trying to teach someone a skill forces you to break it down, into the simplest set of instructions. I think it was Einstein who said that if you can't explain something simply, then you can't understand it, which was something I used to live by when I was teaching and which definitely rings true with mountain biking too.

With all that said, there is one other thing that I love to do on my bike - getting fast and loose! There is no feeling like riding a trail that is fast and flowing, with a few challenges thrown in for good measure. Sadly for me, the amount of time I can spend doing that these days is dwindling, as my legs pay a very hefty penalty for this kind of riding. Kudos then to my Specialized Levo SL, hands down the very best bike I have ever ridden. I can put this bike in Turbo mode, to shuttle me around from A to B, usually the bottom of a trail to the top of the next, then ride it like an almost normal mountain bike back down. It is light, yet having the motor to power me to the top each time means my legs can do more of the downs, which is of course the fun part! I'm still hugely limited in this respect though, just seven trails yesterday, but it's still an awful lot better than the initial estimates that told me I'd never ride again! Indeed I am blessed; between the modern technology and the ancient geography I have, I truly am a very fortunate fellow...