Wednesday, December 2, 2009

Thanks

Wow, what an amazing year 2009 has been, I have a lot to be thankful for. I owe a lot of my thanks to you as you make it possible for me to make a living doing what I love, helping other reach their best. Thank you, thank you, thank you.

Entering 2009 I was quite worried about the economy and thought business would be way off. I figured I would use some of the money I have managed to save (do to my frugal lifestyle) to play a little more and go on a surf trip and maybe up to Whistler for some lift assisted mountain biking. Boy, was I wrong! 2009 turned into my busiest year ever and I hardly had a second off to ride for fun, much less travel for fun. In this down economy I was floored by the demand for my coaching and feel very fortunate. I was fired from a job in 2001 right after September 11th and really had trouble finding good jobs for the next two years, I kept plugging away at this business while delivering Dominoes Pizza to make ends meet. So thank you for your support. If you are struggling to make ends meet keep your head up, keep working towards a solution and things will turn around for you if you make it happen.

Two examples of what I am thankful for:

Damn Gene you the man.
 
Now for the good news. I took your clinic in April for The World Police and Fire Games. Thanks to you they were successful. I took the silver in the dual slalom. They used the dual slalom course that was designed for the Crankworks race the following weekend. I can't decide which was more inportant, the riding techniques or the mind techniques I learned from you. In the slalom I started off with babysteps cause this course was way over my ability. Everyone else was trying to race on every practice run and I just took my baby steps to get better control. Toward the end in the metal rounds a guy walked up to me and said "you keep getting faster and faster as the day goes by". I thought that was a true testament to your traning techniques. I also finished 9 in the cross country, 5 in the road sprints and 4 in the team triathlon. All of which I consider a success.
 
Thanks again,
 
Chip MacLaren

Gene-

Your camp gave me the confidence to go out and try a few races this summer.  My first race was in the beginner 40 to 45 age class in the “Point to Point” cross country race in Winter Park.  While I certainly did not break any records – I at least had a respectable finish and more importantly had a total blast.  My second race was a Super D (much more my style in that there is MUCH less uphill cranking) at Winter Park where I got a second place finish in my age group.  3rd race was a Mountain States Cup Super D race in Copper where I came in tenth.  Again no records but still having a total blast.  My friends the same age as me think I am crazy doing this stuff but I think they are crazy to be sitting on their arses.  Again, thank you for giving me the confidence to go out there and try some racing and hopefully in the near future I will be in another one of your camps!

Say hello to Andy for me.

Sincerely,

Will Edgington

The best pro in the sport taught me wrong!

The best pro in the sport taught me wrong!

Often the best athletes in a sport don't make the best coaches. I was reading the book Blink the other day and it talked about Andre Aggassi's advice on how he puts so much top spin on the ball. When explaining it to his coach and other coaches he stated that by turning his wrist over as he hit the ball it gave him the top spin. Well the coaches believed this (after all Andre was one of the best players in the world) and started teaching their students this. Well, an interesting thing happened, there was a huge ride in wrist injuries amoung young tennis players. After careful motion analysis the coaches saw that Andre's wrist never moved, the "top the ball motion" was actually generated at his shoulder not his wrist.

Reading this reminded me of all the movements in riding that I now explain quite differently than I did 5-10 years ago. The skill hasn't changed but after years of study I realized that I was often explaining the outcome of doing it correctly but not the actual fundamental skill. Effective coaching involves breaking skills down and being able to explain them to a diverse group of people. One of the best aspects of my job is after 20 years of coaching I am still learning how to explain skills better. The learning of skills continues too, after 11 years of coaching mountain biking I am still learning a lot of little details on how to do skills better/easier/with less effort.

The moral of the story, don't believe everything you hear, even it comes from an "expert".

Tuesday, December 1, 2009

I Love My Job

A recent email that made my day:

Dear Gene,

I hope this message finds you doing well and on your way to a speedy
and complete recovery. I am thankful you were willing to continue with our class despite the challenge of your broken foot.

It has been nearly a month since I finished your camp in Fruita, Colo.
You were absolutely right when you said if we practiced your drills
off the trail, we would notice the difference on the trail. I have
spent the last couple of weeks practicing the drills here on the
streets in my neighborhood. The drills returned my best dividend today when my mountain bike camp classmate, Jerry and I went for a two hour ride on the trails here in Sedona. I was amazed at the difference in my riding ability. Today's ride was the best ride I have ever had since I first bought my mountain bike two years ago. Your superb instruction in teaching how a bike turns made the ride fun and exhilarating. I rode faster, smoother, relaxed, in control, and had fun.

The confidence in my ability to handle the trail and its features was
the highest I have ever experienced to date.   I successfully climbed
several hills that I had previously failed to climb, I could almost
hear your assistant coach Andy's voice in my ear repeating all of the
tips and techniques needed for the successful climbs. I remembered
Andy telling us. "To look to victory," as I rode through the trails
technical features that I had never cleared before. It was great fun
to enjoy steeps and drops that had previously intimidated me into the
hike-a-bike mode. I am absolutely thrilled with the new found
confidence in my riding ability. The best thing about all this is that
I have even more room for improvement. You have made a believer out of me with all you taught us. Am I perfect in my riding? Absolutely not. Can I become a better rider? You bet, thanks to you, your coaches, and the superb course.

As you can tell, I am very grateful for all your class did for me. I wish I would have taken the course before I even thought about taking a bike on the trail, but it is never too late to do the right thing. A classmate struck up a conversation with me last week while we were attending IMBA's trail building class. She said she had moved to Sedona recently and was having a difficult time riding our trails compared to where she had come from. I immediately referred her to BetterRide.

Joe Vernier, Nov. 27th, 2009