How to Accelerate on a Mountain Bike

Video Transcript

"Hi! This is Aaron Phillips with Expert Village. Let's talk about beginning mountain bikers and acceleration. As a beginner mountain biker there is not a whole lot of acceleration you are going to be doing. But perhaps you start getting into mountain biking to the point where you think hey, I might want to go out and do a race one time or I really would like to beat my buddy up that heel. Acceleration is something that has to do with shifting, you want to make sure you are in a gear you can accelerate in where you can start by speeding it up and continuing on. The best way to do this really is to show it. Make sure also which I will do in a minute, make sure that your weight is solidly over your rear wheel so that you don't spin out. If you are trying to accelerate up the heel, you may want to move your butt slightly forward on this saddle to make sure that you are really gluing that tire to the dirt. Let me show you just a little bit what this is about. There is certainly a nuance to it as there is to anything involving mountain biking. Okay when you accelerate, make sure again that your butt is right there on that saddle and you are not trying to spin out and it is about keeping that body position where you need to be to get that tire really gripping with the ground and then shift as you accelerate."