Jumping - offroad - on street tires

Please help a dirt-virgin out here a little.

I need some technical advice to get my off-road game into gear a bit.

Scenario: about 12-16 inches high with a steep face, then a flat, then a steep face dropping off the other side. (small table top)

dirt approach obviously.

So there's not much time for self-correction once you commit. You're gonna hit this thing and land in a very short period of time.


Here's my question: How do you take this jump and have the bike (along with rider) come back to earth so that both wheels hit the ground at roughly the same time?

Body position as you approach? Throttle?

From what I've heard the two wost things to do are chop throttle or hammer throttle when hitting jump.
But I have no clue where I should be in terms of my body. I don't want to come back to earth with the front to high, and even worse I don't want to come back to earth with the front hitting first.

Any tips or pointers would be appreciated. Thanks.

You would def be better off with a decent about of gas. You def do NOT want to let off the throttle at the last second. You want to give it a nice blip right as your leaving the jump. It doesn't sound like a real big jump so you shouldn't have a whole lot to worry about. There are other "in air" corrections you can make but you need some hang time to really worry about them.

Go back to your BMX days, when you hit the lip make motorcycles sounds...... BRAAAAP!!


Run up to it in about the middle of 2nd gear,standing on the pegs a little weight to the back. As your front tire gets to the lip, gas it.
Start small and work your way up, going a little faster each time. Don't worry about clearing the table yet get comfortable with the approach,and take off.

Quote :

How do you take this jump and have the bike (along with rider) come back to earth so that both wheels hit the ground at roughly the same time?

As I have been learning there is nothing wrong with landing on one wheel first. That actually makes it easier for the suspension to soak up the hit. When you are learning it def feels odd to land on one wheel but as long as you don't overdo it there is nothing wrong with that.

The jump you described would be a kicker at any quick speed because the face is shorter than your bike. At a fast clip, it's going to kick the butt of the bike up.

As far as practicing jumping, the best practice jump would be one with a long face and a flat landing, preferably a plateau style. Imagine half of a creek bed, you ride up the side and jump out onto a landing area higher than you started... this makes landings softer and you can get a feel for how you can manipulate the bike with throttle and body positioning. That jump you describe, 12-16 inches tall, is really more of a big bump. I'd first suggest finding a jump with a face as long as your bike.

There are techniques used in motocross to control the pitch of the bike in the air. You can tap a front brake to bring the front end down if it's high, or screw on the throttle to bring the rear down. Gassing the bike off the face will drop the rear and could loop you out. Chopping the throttle off on a sharp lip could kick the rear high. You'll have to learn the terrain to learn when to use and not use throttle. Basically, as explained to me by Steve Wise (google him and motorcycles) the bike has three gyroscopes: the front and rear wheel, and the crankshaft. By manipulating these three things you control the bike. Turning the front wheel in the air does have an effect, as does throttle and braking because of the gyroscopic principals...

That may go a bit too far for this cause.

Start slow on the right jump and just keep making circles until you get the feel of it. My first jump was a large pile of cowpies I hit on my Yamaha Mini Enduro. I was hooked from there... and my boots covered in poop... anyway. There is no ONE way of doing it because there is no ONE jump. Like life, you gather what info you can and improvise. Practice makes info.

Any successful landing is a good landing. CDN above there is right. Flat, two wheeled landing are the most desirable because it balances the suspension load, but any smooth landing with the throttle on is good.