SEMASS NEMBA MTB Skills Series

Introducing the Spring/Summer 2009 SEMASS NEMBA MTB Skills Series

This season, SEMASS is sponsoring a series of one day mountain bike skills clinics/rides. We will be starting this spring and continuing through the summer, with 1 clinic per week, from April till October. For those of you who own a mountain bike but would like some instruction or want to brush up on off-road technique, these clinics are for you.

The skills ride series will progress through each month on each Saturday as follows:

1st Sat.--Beginner Clinic with Steve Cobble Quincy Pageant Field 9AM
2nd Sat.--Cross Country Clinic with Bill Boles Wompatuck State Park
3rd Sat.--Techincal Trail Riding Clinic with Rich Higgins (Foxboro State Forest)
4th Sat.--Freeride clinic with Chris Patrick (Borderland State Park)

Ride locations will float, but all rides will be held in the SEMASS area. ALL RIDES will be announced via the SEMASS Email system. If you would like to be a part of the rides, please subscribe to the SEMASS email list to get notifications, weather updates and directions. Rain will cancel.

Each clinic format will include a short introductory discussion and a short session on how to be a good trail steward. Then we will hit the trail to ride and work on the skills as outlined for the day.

Our beginner skills clinic will cover things like basic bike repair, bike set up, and basic safety items like braking, cornering and picking a line. We encourage those that have kids to come join in and have fun.

Our cross country skills clinic will work on trail riding skills to include riding with good body positioning and bike set up, correct gearing choices, climbing hills, decending hills, braking on steep hills, and bike handling skills.

Our techincal skills clinic will include dealing with riding through "rock gardens", climbing and staying on the trail, crossing narrow bridges, climbing steep and rocky loose terrain sections, and riding with control down rocky loose decents.

Our freeride skills clinic will cover more technical riding to include things like manuals, wheelie drops and hucks.

Detailed information for the third technical riding skills clinic:

Hi,

I will be leading the "freeride" riding skills clinic this Saturday 7/25 at 9:00AM at Vietnam (Milford MA). We can work on any Technical or Freeride skills, including reviewing how to do drops and hucks. Plan on about 2-3 hours saddle time. We'll ride all of the fun trails that the Vietnam NEMBA crew have assembled, and try each of the features as group pace and time avails.

This will be a low pressure atmosphere. The goal is to have fun. If you are in intermediate rider, looking to increase your technical and/or freeride skills, come along!

If weather has to cancel, I will send an email to the SEMASS email list. Please check email Saturday AM!

DIRECTIONS: Rt. 495 to exit #20 (Rt 85/Milford). From Rt 495 South, go right at end of ramp onto Rt 85 South. From Rt 495 North, go left at end of ramp onto Rt 85 South. Take Rt 85 south to the Wendy's restaurant, and look for the small parking lot way in back. There are usually other mountain bikers parking there as well.

If you plan on coming, please let me know by Friday evening.

Chris Patrick

SE Mass New England Mountain Bike Association