The Skill You Didn't Know You Needed

In this video, we're going to learn how to lift and move our front wheel - but more importantly, unweighting the bike is the MTB skill you didn't know you needed. We'll start by talking about the basics of lifting your front wheel, and how your center of gravity plays a bigger role in the movement than your arms.

Most beginner MTB riders use their arms to try to pull the front wheel up, and that's a mistake. You'll learn how to push your weight back, which makes the front wheel come up - your arms are only there to guide the front wheel. After you lock in the front wheel lift, we'll apply that technique to moving the front wheel left and right. Pivoting on the back wheel can help you redirect the bike in either direction, and it's easy to do this by using your knees to rotate the bike.

The skills around unweighting and lifting your front wheel might seem simple, but they are big foundational elements that play a huge role in the next few skills that you'll learn: bunnyhops and riding up and over obstacles. Practice makes progress!