Tips for Braking on Steep Terrain when Mountain Biking

Video Transcript

"All right, so I just rode through a fairly difficult section of trail that requires fairly complex braking. I don't know if you guys could hear it, but I could certainly hear and feel it when I was riding. There were several times where I nearly locked up my front brake. One time was slowing down right before this first roller--I was on the brake hard, really slowing down because it's a sharp turn, fall away, all that sort of stuff--then after the next roller, on the smooth spot, I really slowed it down again. And then I got through, and obviously after I landed that last drop, slowed down a lot, almost all using my front brake. Every time I touched my rear brake, my bike lost traction. It didn't go straight anymore; it moved. And, that's what I had to do. That's why I touched the back brake, because I wanted to lose traction, not because I wanted to slow down."