Quote:
Originally Posted by adouglas
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- An understanding of, and ability to communicate, not only what do do but why it works that way. I HATE arbitrary directions. Help me understand how and why things work and I'll listen to you all day long.
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I really like this one. Students should understand WHY what they are doing isn't correct and why they should be doing it a different way instead of just being told what to do. Too often I hear people giving advice to riders like, "you need to just hang off the bike more." but they don't give any reason as to why they want you to do that.
I work with a really fast Canadian kid here named Jake Hayes and the first day I watched him ride I noticed that he was hanging waaaaaay of the bike. When I asked him why he said, "because someone told me to." when I asked him why riders hang off the bike in the first place he couldn't even tell me why. So we went through what hanging off the bike does to the bike (reduced overall lean angle) and I showed him the difference between how he was riding and how he should be riding. Once he understood WHY he was able to make radical changes.
I think good coaches explain WHY things should be done a certain way and they don't just give arbitrary suggestions like "go faster, enter deeper, brake later, hang off more..." they tell you why and also teach you HOW.
What other attributes make a good riding coach?
