Women's Intermediate XC clinics-July 21; August 19

[BrendaSmith]

Hi Ladies,

On behalf of Cycle-CNY, I'm organizing two intermediate level women's mountain bike skills clinic for Saturday, July 21st and Sunday August 19th.

Each clinic will be an all-day affair, running from 10am to 5pm at Shindagin Hollow.

The instructor will be Kathi Krause, a retired pro XC and downhill mountain bike racer. I took a downhill clinic with Kathi last year at Whiteface, and I was blown away by her talent, not only as a rider, but as an instructor, and her easy-going nature. She will push you to go further than you might think you can go, but she's careful not to try to push you too far outside of your comfort zone. I left Whiteface feeling like I'd definitely gotten my money's worth, and ready to bring my new and improved skills and self-confidence back to central NY.

The cost per person is $99, which will be collected on the day of the clinic. The clinics will be filled in order of the the first 12 women to confirm to me that they want to attend. Please specify the date of the session you want to attend, or whether you have the ability to attend either. You can either PM me here or e-mail me at brenda(dot)smith(at)gmail(dot)com.

The skills worked on at each clinic will be determined by the responses to a questionnaire I'll send out at a later time, but I told her my main goal was to teach us how to ride the everyday stuff we ride at Shindagin and still get hung up on each time, such as Bitch Ditch, many sections of the Rim Trail that cause us to hike-a-bike while our male brethren go whizzing by us seemingly with little effort, Dizzy Dee and it's switchbacks, steeps, and scary roots. But as I said, put your suggestions down on the questionnaire I'll be sending you!

So, to recap:
Saturday, July 21st or August 19, 10am to 5pm (lunch, water, and Clif bars will be provided)
Shindagin Hollow
Total of 6 women
$99/person per clinic

The highlights of Kathi's career include:

World Masters Downhill Champion (1999, 2001, 2002)
World Masters Downhill Silver Medalist (2000)
NORBA Masters National Downhill Champion (1998-2002)
1st place Kamikazi Downhill, Mammoth Mountain (2004) – Pro Women
2nd Overall Gravity East Downhill Series, Pro Women, (2007)
2nd Place – US Open of Mountain Biking, Vernon, NJ (2003)
SouthEast Dual Slalom Champion -1997
Plattekill Extreme Downhill Series Champion (1998, 2001, 2002)
8 Times NY/NJ State Track Champion (1986 – 1993)
NJ State Cyclocross Champion (1998)
1994/1995- #1 ranking, North Atlantic Regional Cross Country Rankings (Vet Women)
1994 NJ and NY State Champion, Cross Country, Senior Women

[BrendaSmith]

The July 21st clinic is now full. The August clinic still has 3 spaces available.

[AmyBrown]

Thanks so much for organizing Brenda! I'm super excited!

[BrendaSmith]

A space opened up for the July 21st clinic. If you would like to attend, please let me know!

[BrendaSmith]

The first clinic taught by Kathi was very successful! I am so happy to finally be having women's mountain bike clinics in my own backyard, rather than having to drive 3-5 hours to attend one. We had 5 girls total, including myself. Three of us took Kathi on a scouting ride on Friday evening to show her the trails that we were having the most difficulties on (Dizzy Dee, Rim, Shortbus). Although we didn't work on those trails specifically during the clinic, it gave Kathi and idea of what we needed to work on during the clinic the next day on less intimidating terrain.

Cornering drills

We started off the clinic by doing a few drills for how to move our bodies over the bikes (fore, aft, side to side) and how to use that to keep ourselves balanced while cornering or riding over obstacles. Even though I took a clinic with her last year, and I recall doing these same drills, the extent to which you are supposed to move forward while climbing steeps or approaching an obstacle had not sunk in until yesterday, and I still need to practice this a lot to get comfortable with it. This is why I like to take a skills clinic each year: we go over so much, that only some of it sinks in, but I have a year to work on whatever I did manage to grasp. Then I come back the next year, and a little more sinks in, wash, rinse, repeat as needed. We also did some drills on compressing & releasing the front shock to help get our front wheels over obstacles. Timing is everything for this. She also demonstrated how to lift the rear wheel, but none of us could really get the hang of that. I guess more practice is needed on our own.

Logovers

Kathi doesn't like to spend too much time on drills, so we only spent about 90 minutes on drills, and then released us onto the trails, where we worked on rooty switchbacks for a while. We stopped for lunch, then resumed by heading over to the Wash Out trail to work on descending and climbing. We learned brake "modulation," which is different than the brake "feathering" technique that I had learned many years ago. I think this new bit of knowledge may help me out quite a bit in overcoming my fear of steep descents (still not over that one!!) by helping me feel more in control of my bike. By the end of this lesson, people were starting to reach information overload, so we just rode the flat, flowy red trails and found some more problem spots, all involving large logs that had been too intimidating for us to try in the past. Kathi showed us how to get over them, and we did! We also worked on jumping, which was super fun. This stuff turns out to be pretty addicting. We returned to the parking lot around 4pm after everyone was thoroughly exhausted. I'm really looking forward to her next trip out here August 18-19. The women's clinic is filled for August 19, but if you are interested in attending, let me know in case there are any cancellations. Also, we may be able to get her back in September or October for another clinic if there's enough interest. And, there's always next year! Guys, she is doing a men's clinic on August 18th, so let The Mechanic (David Weiner) know if you'd like to attend. I think he still has a spot or two open.

Rooty switchbacks

coming over the chair trail log structure