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Use the flex of your legs

Use the flex of your legs to absorb most of the impact on the rear wheel and stretch your arms to lower the front wheel as you crouch. The higher the drop, the more stretched you will end up on your bike to absorb the impact.

Damp the impact progressively

Hannes Herrmann flexes before the next drop.

Vincent Hermance damps most of the impact on the rear wheel.

When the front wheel finally touches down, you should have already damped most of the landing impact, the front wheel shouldn't bang on the ground.

In some situations, you will want to land on a narrow spot or you will have to maintain the front wheel up before you move on to the next obstacle.

In that case, concentrate your weight right over the rear hub to maintain your centre of gravity over the appropriate spot as soon as the rear wheel touches down. In mid-air stabilize the bike aligned with your upper body otherwise you're likely to be ejected sideways upon impact with the ground.

Landing into a slope

Giacomo Coustellier will lock the rear wheel to level the bike down.

Karin Moor about to dive into a slope.

If you are going to drop-off into a slope, then regroup over the centre of the bike as you take the plunge. You don't want to be leaning too much over the rear wheel. You can lower the front wheel beyond the horizontal limit and wait until the wheelbase is parallel to the slope before releasing the rear brake, or alternatively, hop into a frank dive and lean forward, well centered over the bike to tilt it down.

If the slope is very steep like on a ramp or like in a half-pipe, use it to your advantage and touch down with both wheels at the same time to damp the impact as you ride down.

Click on any photo and use the scroll-wheel to animate the move.

Landing into a slope

1° If you are going to drop-off into a slope, then regroup over the centre of the bike as you take the plunge.

2° Lower the front wheel beyond the horizontal limit as you take the plunge, leaning forward to stay well centered over the bike.

3° Control the bike to touch down with both wheels at the same time, flexing while staying well centered over the bike.

4° If the slope is very steep like on a ramp or like in a half-pipe, use it to your advantage to damp the impact as you ride down.

Biketrial video Watch this move in slow-motion

Jumping down across gap
The so-called drop gap is a combination of the rear drop-off technique with a firm pedal hop that sends you flying off the edge, across whatever gap there may be, to a lower obstacle. The higher is the drop from take-off to landing, the more distance you will be able to cover across the gap that separates the two obstacles. Check the drop gap page.