ADAPTING MID-RACE: WET, LOOSE AND BLOWN OUT
13 min · Full library · written lesson, video in production
After this lesson you can read how a track has changed since practice and rewrite your run on the spot, with specific technique for wet roots and rock, blown out braking bumps and deep ruts, and a disciplined way to make tyre and pressure calls.
The Technique
- Every track has a degradation curve, and it differs by surface. Loam gets faster for the first runs as the loose top layer is swept aside and a line forms, then it blows through to whatever lies underneath and turns slower and rougher. Wet clay does the opposite: it holds for a while, then goes to grease, and once it is polished it stays that way until it dries. Rock polishes with traffic and gets slicker, particularly where riders brake on it. Dust builds first in the fall line and in the sun. Learn the curve for the dirt you are on and practice stops being a rehearsal and starts being data, because you can predict from your morning runs what you will actually be racing on.
- Wet roots and wet rock are two different problems and deserve different answers. A wet root offers almost nothing, so your own inputs are the hazard rather than the root itself. Cross it as square as the track allows, unweight the bike over it, put in no braking and no steering while a tyre is touching it, and look well past it to where you want to end up. A little more speed genuinely helps, because it shortens the time you spend on the slick part. Wet rock is a different animal: textured, unpolished rock still gives you real grip and will take some braking and steering, while polished rock, painted rock and anything carrying lichen or algae behaves like ice. Timber features are worse than either. Work in crossing angles and timing, not in bravery.
- The plan you wrote in practice has an expiry date. Between your last practice run and your race run the surface has moved. A rut has cut deeper than your pedal clearance. A berm has a hole punched in the middle of it. A section that was tacky is now dust over hardpack, or it has rained and the whole hill has changed character. Most riders lose time in changed conditions not through lack of skill but because they ride the memory instead of the track, arriving at a corner expecting grip that has gone or braking for a rut that has smoothed out. The thing that separates the front of the field on a bad day is how fast they accept the new track and rewrite the plan.
- Braking bump lines, rut commitment, the tyre pressure cut off rule, and rewriting the plan mid run
- 5 more technique steps
- The 4 mistakes that undo it, with fixes
- The drill that builds the reflex
- The safety non-negotiables
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