Pro Ride Guides

In November 2011, myself and two friends attended a private course at Hamsterley with Pro Ride Guides. It was Joe Rafferty taking the course - if the name sounds familiar, Joe and his brother Alex are the guys responsible for the MBUK skills pages and a good share of their bike reviews too. It was fair to say we were going to get a lot out of the day, but things turned bad when one of our group had a insignificant-looking that actually resulted in a broken ankle and 8 months off the bike!

Joe kindly offered to finish the course at a later date, and that took place at the end of July 2012. The setting was Stainburn in Yorkshire this time. We rode the trails a few times and did a huge amount of skills training in and around the car park and finally headed back to the trail.

Joe used an iPad to replay various features and show where we could improve and reinforce what we were doing well - very high tech but it worked well.

As someone who enjoys buying gadgets and bike parts, I reluctantly came to the conclusion that no bling or bike will improve your performance more than a private skills course. There really is no better "bang for your buck".

Below are some shots and a video of the day. Anyone who has tried videoing or photographing a mountain bike will know how difficult it is to show the perspective. This rock looked FAR worse from the top than it does here!

All in all, a fantastic day and I would highly recommend the friendly guys at Pro Ride Guide.