How To Manual Your Mountain Bike | MTB Skills

Manuals are an important skill to learn for all mountain bike disciplines. Not only does it look cool, the manual will help improve your ability to ride drops, better your bunny hops and even help with a little bit of trials! Rich Payne gives coaching a go by trying to teach Anna how to manual.

⏱ Timestamps ⏱
00:00 - Intro
01:08 - Manual Before Coaching
01:49 - Initiating The Manual
04:23 - Using The Rear Brake
08:52 - Finding The Balance Point
10:41 - Taking It To The Trail

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How far was your longest manual? Let us know if it improves after this video! 👇

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🎵 Music - licensed by Epidemic Sound 🎵
Emerald Sky - West & Zander
Sword of Light - Krisu

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[julianwearne]

Its good to see videos like this, with riders genuinely learning new skills. Much more relatable and helpful than videos of riders who have already mastered skills "showing the basics" but without the struggle!

[AdventureRich]

One tip that's been helping me is to practice looping out. It helps get the fear of looping out away, and then you can start with the brake as you feel that loop-out point, which keeps you on the bike and brings the front end back down. Almost reverse engineering the manual. I did something like 10 loop-outs in a row, and then went for a manual. I held the front end a lot higher as a result! I'm still working on it, but I'm getting it better and better now, with way less fear of falling on my arse.

[ashpunting]

I liked how Anna was smiling all the way through learning a new skill can be hard work and rewarding ❤

[Journey-toJesus]

No way I would clip in to learn how to manual! That would be terrifying. Props to Anna!

[JeepingNet]

If Anna is up for it, it would be great to see a followup on this in 6-12 months from now. Great job and good tips. I lost my manual skills somewhere over the time and change in bike geo.

[blakekennard]

I’m learning on manuals too. Something that has helped me is thinking about pushing the rear wheel forward from underneath me after the compression portion. Thanks for the vids

[billhewes]

I love the way Rich teaches. He brakes it down. Plus the use of film.

[Jonofthejungle]

There’s an important point that never gets mentioned in these videos.
You have to engage your core and keep your chest up.
No one can hold the front wheel up with their chest facing down at 45*
Preload, hips back and down and lock your upper body to that same motion in your hips.

[Jacobbunt]

this is super helpful. ive been trying to learn a manual for a few weeks now and i felt like i was missing a piece and now i can see that im using too much arms and not getting far enough over the back wheel.

[weebryan]

i have always found manual difficult with shorter legs the same as anna, a longer lower cockpit also helped me pick up front wheel

[Kelvallontan]

Pretty funny how I've started to train on manual yesterdays (as a 44 y/o newbie), and am at the same point as Anna at the start.
Thanks for the video, definitely going to help.

[illyadmark]

This is EXCELLENT, I've struggled with manuals for the longest time! Thank you Anna!

[TCK]

If it's good enough for GMBN presenter Anna to it's good enough for me.

[winklertribe]

I LOVED this episode! I can totally relate to Anna, and she’s inspired me to work on my manual skill too! Thanks Rich & Anna!

[KevinT]

A great team-up, and Anna you were a beast! Drilling that over and over could not have been easy. A freezing rain day over here in Canada though, so I'll have to hold on to this inspiration for another day. Thanks GMBN!

[chrissugg]

This makes me feel good - I've been trying to learn to manual and I'm about at the stage Anna was by the end of this video. I'm only short and have been having a real hard time getting my weight far enough back to keep the wheel up for longer than a second. This makes me realise I'm heading in the right direction.

[christianmccall]

Just started the hobby a few months ago, so it's really cool to see a video with a beginner struggling with the same things I am.

[denperrydidit]

What a great teacher Rich comes across as.

[christopherwiebke]

Just did my first manual. I squatted and pushed my legs back pretty hard. Kinda freaked me out cause I thought I was going to loop out, but I didn't. The instruction was very helpful. Thanks!

[alanmartinezrodriguez]

I literally learned the manual technique with some of Neil's old videos here in GMBN. Now I can loop out and pull the lever just in time not to fall. If I can give Anna a piece of advice, and this was the key for me (besides beating the fear of falling), it would be to work the preload better. She needs to go a bit harder in the push down of the handlebar with her upper body, and then the bike will rebound nicely for her not to have to pull her body back so much. Lets call it a shorter L 😅

Love the concept guys. Keep teaching some skills to Anna because we all learn with her.