My first MTB session - Face still intact.

So today, I tried out mountain biking for the first time...

My bike's name was Tyler

For Tri Alliance's Sunday Funday for the month of April - today was a mountain biking session at Lysterfield Park. As I don't have a mountain bike (many people are very surprised that I actually don't own a MTB) I had to hire one from TrailMix. For $30 (2 hours), I was able to ride a mtb on a pretty good bike. My bike's name was Tyler.

Instead of riding with cleats, I only had runners on. After today's session, having cleats would serve as an advantage as I could distribute weight around the bike better without the feeling that I am going to slip off and cut my legs open on the chainring.

The easy group (which I was part of) did a 14-15km loop around the National Park. We didn't attempt the part of the course which included the Commonwealth Games course as we would be out there forever. The more experienced group did that loop and made it back nearly the same time as the beginners.

Mountain biking skills is something which I don't have. I was the last person in my group as I couldn't descend properly. I put it down to my anxiety, fear, not knowing the terrain and not knowing how to use the bike. I learnt from others to never touch the front brakes as this will cause you to fall flat on your face as you go over the handle bars. I don't know if it was the bike I had or just a general mountain biking thing but my back brakes kept locking and I was skidding whenever I applied them. Before anyone tells me about how sensitive they were, I knew that already, I was only feathering the brakes and my back wheel was sliding from side to side. Going uphills was good and when I got the hang of the gears, I could ride up the track easily. I felt my seat was pretty low and at the same time, I struggled to ride standing up as I only had runners on and I was scared of slipping off.

When descending, it was hard to gauge 'what to do' and at what speeds. I walked my bike down some of the paths as it was the safest thing to do.

To be honest, today was not my best day. I was left behind a lot. I was walking the bike and stopping at sections where people were literally flying down the tracks, I was falling further and further from the group. The group did stop half a dozen times so that people can catch up so we don't get lost in the National Park. It was a good thing as I had no idea where I was going and it was good to know that we would ride as a group as much as possible.

I am going to see if it is possible for me to do the Mountain Biking skills course on the 27th May to learn how to use the bike. We didn't learn any skills today as it was just a ride the bike session. It cost about $180 for the lessons but I think it would be good for me to do this course before I go back to Lysterfield again to ride by myself. It would be good to be able to do a trail run and ride in one day as part of my training. Lets see how the lesson goes first.