# Cornering in loose over hardpack



## jasonp22 (Oct 5, 2016)

I had a light crash today. Descending around 15mph, came into a loose over hardpack corner (common here in front range CO), front tire washed and down I went. 

This front slipping has been recurring for me and I know it's slowing me down. I have the feeling it's a result of me not putting enough weight on the front tire in the corner. When I got back to the dirt lot of the trailhead, I did some practice turns while forcing my weight over the front. Big difference compared to he slipping I get when neutral or weight-back.

This can't be equipment or setup, I'm too new at this so it's definitely me. Is my non-weighted front the correct diagnosis? If so, how should I practice and make this a permanent fix? Do I lean over the front even while descending? How much? Thanks!


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## RAKC Ind (Jan 27, 2017)

First thing is having the right tires for what you ride. That can make a huge difference. Also not running them at max pressure helps with traction.

As for how your to corner, lean more turn less. Should be leaning your bike in corners not just turning the handlebars. This takes practice to get right.

Should also be off the seat.

As for your "weight" no one (doesnt matter any response posted) can give you a direct answer. But one constant truth, descending your weight is already forward partially unless your shifted too far back. 


You have to practice body english. That purely comes in time. Watch youtube videos on technique. And practice.

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## Mr Pig (Jun 25, 2008)

Tyres can make a huge difference, ask other guys who ride where you do what works, but sometimes you just have to slow down. We all want to be like the guys in Youtube videos but sadly for me it will never happen. 

You have to ride within your limits and let your skills develop gradually.


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## J.B. Weld (Aug 13, 2012)

I ride similar conditions in NM and front wheel washouts are a big concern of mine because they can put you on the dirt in a heartbeat, I'm no pro but my technique for avoiding disaster is to error on the side of weighting the rear wheel more than the front. Putting more weight on the front wheel does provide more traction there but if you lose your front wheel in an aggressive "attack" stance it's game over (instant otb) whereas I can feel it going and save it when I keep my weight back a little. 

Practice and gradually increasing speed in corners is probably best, on loose over hardpack trails drifting a bit is inevitable (and fun!) as you approach cornering speed limits and experience will teach you what is controllable and what isn't.


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## l'oiseau (May 5, 2015)

My technique is similar to JB's. It may not be the fastest way, but it's safer... to me, staying up is always quicker than picking myself up off the ground.

I'll add, what I tend to do is lean the bike more whilst keeping the body upright, bias my rear wheel a bit and add as little steering input as I can. As soon as traction can be felt again, I'll add weight back to the front.

A lot of our corners tend to get sandy in the exit. Rain washes the loose stuff down and it gets trapped in these switchbacks. They'll be a bit of a berm on the way in and then flat and loose out. It's quite a tricky combo but what I tend to try is to come in hot, use the berm to try to get my line set then disconnect from the bike (lean it and keep my body upright), shift my weight back, and exit and gently as I can without washing the front end. If done right, I'll usually get a little two wheel drift (both tires slide the same).

Also if you get good and catching your front wheel washes, you'll be able to unweight quickly, bring the wheel straight and recover without going down. I do this at least once a ride when it's dry.


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## jestep (Jul 23, 2004)

What tires and pressure are you running? 

A lot of it is technique and practice as described above, but tire choice can make a huge difference. I wanted to throw my bike away after switching to Maxxis crossmarks a few years ago on the same terrain you're describing.


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## evasive (Feb 18, 2005)

OP, you've already figured it out. Grippier front tires can help (you didn't mention what you have currently), but at the root, it's a technique that you'll learn with experience. Given the way you identified it that easily, I imagine you'll pick it up quickly. 

Your weight distribution is already biased towards the rear because front centers are longer than rear centers (the bottom bracket is closer to the rear hub than to the front hub). 

If you pay attention to it, you'll notice a significant change in traction and cornering if you shift weight on to the front wheel. Obviously you don't want to overdo it, but in situations where you're comfortable and riding within your limits, play a little with your weight distribution to start to recognize the feel.


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## eb1888 (Jan 27, 2012)

Hubs: Specialized Stout Hi Lo, disc 20mm inner width rim
Tires: Specialized Ground Control Sport, 29 x 2.1
You can increase tire contact for more traction by reducing tire pressure. One limiting factor is rim hits. You don't want to go at or below the pressure that causes you to feel the rim hit in the rockiest section of your ride.
But there's a more limiting factor with your rim.
With that skinny rim you risk sidewall foldover in corners if you drop the pressure too much. When that happens you get an instant loss of traction and you're on the ground.

There are tire and rim combos that would give you a lot more traction. Generally a wider rim, say 30mm inner and a rounded profile wider tire at a lower pressure. The wider rim gives support to the tire sidewall so it doesn't foldover. It just crinkles with the tread still giving a good contact patch. Traction loss is slower with time for recovery in many cases.


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## ghoti (Mar 23, 2011)

We have lots of loose over hardpack here too and a lot of off camber corners. I've found that weighting your front a little more does help. Your rear tire will probably give out first but that's easier to recover from IMO. Of course the easiest solution is just to go slower but where's the fun in that?


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## Harold (Dec 23, 2003)

Majority technique (lean the bike, rotate your whole body to look through the exit of the corner, and put pressure on the front to maintain traction). Tires suited to the conditions can help, along with finding the right pressure for you.

I've been working on weighting the front more deliberately in corners and it does make a difference. While you're learning, the key is going to be making small adjustments to find the right amount of pressure to put on the front tire. OTB is bad, of course, but there's a lot you can do before that becomes a problem. What's been happening to me is that I'll feel my tires begin to break loose pretty close to the same time, but only a little bit so I can make small corrections to stop it. The tires I currently have installed on my bike don't corner particularly well at speed, so I have to adjust my riding to that compared to the other tires I might use, which have much better cornering grip. That adjustment means more speed control and ensuring that any movements I make on the bike are very smooth while cornering. Since things are pretty predictable when the tires do break loose, I'm slowly getting more comfortable with letting the tires do that a little bit in smoother corners.


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## jasonp22 (Oct 5, 2016)

This is great info, thanks for the many responses. Riding on 29" 2.35 Schwalbe Hans Dampf 18psi front, Nobby Nick 20psi rear, 30mm ID rims. Been playing around with tire pressures and that's what I was running that day. 

The already rear-bias weighting makes sense meaning deliberately moving more up front. I'm keen on just slowing down, learning the right technique, then speeding back up with increasing confidence.


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## Harold (Dec 23, 2003)

jasonp22 said:


> I'm keen on just slowing down, learning the right technique, then speeding back up with increasing confidence.


Definitely the way to go. After you cover the basics on your cornering technique, do some low-risk experimentation and get a solid feel for how the bike responds. Understanding that really helps my confidence level when things get sketchy or when I'm presented with something new.


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## Gorilla_Ninja (Jul 6, 2017)

great thread. Been riding for 2 mos and play testing myself.


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## jeffj (Jan 13, 2004)

jasonp22 said:


> This is great info, thanks for the many responses. Riding on 29" 2.35 Schwalbe Hans Dampf 18psi front, Nobby Nick 20psi rear, 30mm ID rims. Been playing around with tire pressures and that's what I was running that day.
> 
> The already rear-bias weighting makes sense meaning deliberately moving more up front. I'm keen on just slowing down, learning the right technique, then speeding back up with increasing confidence.


Random thoughts:

Loose over hardpack with a Hans Dampf and Nobby Nic on 29" wheels could very well be overkill on the knobbage. 29ers are different from smaller wheels, and do not need such prolific knobbies. Those are great for looser, loamy conditions, but not true loose over hardpack on 29" wheels. A Purgatory on the front, and Ground Control on the rear is as knobby as I would go under such conditions. Any more than that, and those big side knobs just squirm on the hardpack when cornering.

If you are pretty light, those pressure you quote might be OK. Originally, I was concerned that you might be running in the pressure range suggested on the tires, which is usually 35 psi minimum. . . LOL. I never run more than 30 psi with a 29er MTB tire, but it sounds more like you are flirting with the lower end of the spectrum. Correct tire pressure is important, and there is such a thing as running too little as well as too much. The harder you push things, the more critical it becomes.

Also, I would be curious to see a pic of your bike from the side. When riders are not experienced with 29ers, they might not realize how tall the front end is. It's important that you keep the bars low enough that you can easily get your weight up and over the front of the bike to weight the tire when cornering. Sometimes even a single 5 mm spacer's difference can be noticeable on the trail.

Also important to lean the bike, not the rider so much on flatter corners. You have to anticipate the turn earlier to lean the bike sooner rather than later as it is harder to lean the bike once you have entered the corner. Maybe think of it as keeping your weight perpendicular to the trail surface with the line drawn from your mass, down through the tread of the tire. I try to keep my head somewhere right above the grip on the side of the handlebar that is on the outside.

You might also revisit your fork settings. Make sure you're running sufficient sag, and unless you're jumping and hucking, I would tend to run the rebound fairly fast so it reacts quickly to the trail surface. Control brake dive by adjusting your front/rear weight bias as needed as you're riding.

JMHO.



jestep said:


> What tires and pressure are you running?
> 
> A lot of it is technique and practice as described above, but tire choice can make a huge difference. I wanted to throw my bike away after switching to Maxxis crossmarks a few years ago on the same terrain you're describing.


The best thing you can do with those Crossmarks is to get rid of them LOL. They are what I call a 'friends don't let friends' tire. But, if you insist on riding with them, at least cut the round side knobs off, but leave the rectangular ones. The stock Crossmarks just have too much rubber on the sides to let them dig in for traction. It takes a while to cut them off as there are so damn many of them, but it's worth it, especially as a front tire. . . . . *shudder*


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## eb1888 (Jan 27, 2012)

jasonp22 said:


> This is great info, thanks for the many responses. Riding on 29" 2.35 Schwalbe Hans Dampf 18psi front, Nobby Nick 20psi rear, 30mm ID rims. Been playing around with tire pressures and that's what I was running that day.
> 
> The already rear-bias weighting makes sense meaning deliberately moving more up front. I'm keen on just slowing down, learning the right technique, then speeding back up with increasing confidence.


With that rim size up front you could try 16 psi but the HD wasn't really designed with the rounded profile and flexy sidewall to get the most out of wide rims and low pressure. A 120tpi sidewall tire with lots of small knobs and a rounded profile could help The one I know- a Bontrager XR2 2.35 Team is out of stock until the end of August. If you can find a 2.6 Nobby Nic that could be good.
Schwalbe Nobby Nic Plus MTB Tyre - SnakeSkin | Chain Reaction Cycles


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## MSU Alum (Aug 8, 2009)

jasonp22 said:


> When I got back to the dirt lot of the trailhead, I did some practice turns while forcing my weight over the front. Big difference compared to he slipping I get when neutral or weight-back.
> 
> Is my non-weighted front the correct diagnosis? If so, how should I practice and make this a permanent fix? Do I lean over the front even while descending? How much? Thanks!


Looks like you've pretty much figured it out. The body position required to weight the front will vary with conditions such as how steep the section is. Think of a plumb line hanging from your center of mass. Without changing position, the steeper it is, the more weight will be forward. Just experiment around, you'll figure out what works for you. 
One of the things I noticed when I put a dropper post on was that dropping the seat put my weight back so I had to compensate by getting my weight forward more.
I have started bringing my outside elbow a bit up and forward in the turns. This, for me, has made a dramatic difference. It rotates my body into the turn, puts more weight forward over the front tire, helps me turn my torso into the turn and gets the handlebars rotating into the turn. It's subtle. At first I was overturning but now that I'm used to it, it has improved my cornering considerably.

Notice Fabien's outside elbow position.


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## FJSnoozer (Mar 3, 2015)

You already have plenty of tire. 

1. Nothing hooks in loose over hard like you want it to. 
2. sometimes it requires a prayer or checking some speed.
3. My position has thighs and butt back and torso forward enough so you can stab those side knobs down. (like a military pushup) 
4. there are corners that I know will slide that I Know I want to roll faster than I should. I may intestinally keep the bike a little more up right on the last 2 rows of knobs and cut the apex hard and let it slide to the edge as you come out of the turn.
5. the key is still that balance of pressure on the front tire, and prayer if your entry speed is too high


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## J.B. Weld (Aug 13, 2012)

FJSnoozer said:


> 1. Nothing hooks in loose over hard like you want it to.
> 2. sometimes it requires a prayer or checking some speed.


Double truth right there^


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## jasonp22 (Oct 5, 2016)

Thanks for all the great advice, such a helpful community! I'm going to make this a point to practice moving forward. For those asking, here is the bike setup. 5mm spacer left under the stem and even after this photo was taken, I rotated the bars down for less rise. I might even go to a straight bar.


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## Mr Pig (Jun 25, 2008)

I tend not to push it on loose corners. I'm happy to go slower than a pro because, unless you're a MTB god, if your front wheel starts to slide you're going down. Maybe I don't feel as cool as I'd like to but I still feel cooler than I do when I fall off my bike!


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## RAKC Ind (Jan 27, 2017)

If thats your entire trail surface your running too much tire. Those knobs are actually screwing up your cornering speed. Those conditions you want more smaller knobs so you have more contact getting through the dust

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## fishwrinkle (Jul 11, 2012)

FJSnoozer said:


> I may intestinally keep the bike a little more up right....


damn you for making beer spew from my nostrils


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## Harold (Dec 23, 2003)

fishwrinkle said:


> damn you for making beer spew from my nostrils


maybe opie rides one of these:


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## FJSnoozer (Mar 3, 2015)

fishwrinkle said:


> damn you for making beer spew from my nostrils


One way of mentioning pucker factor.

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## jasonp22 (Oct 5, 2016)

RAKC Ind said:


> If thats your entire trail surface your running too much tire. Those knobs are actually screwing up your cornering speed. Those conditions you want more smaller knobs so you have more contact getting through the dust
> 
> Sent from my SM-G950U using Tapatalk


Picture is from a different trail. The one I described is very dry, pebbles over hard dirt.


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## RAKC Ind (Jan 27, 2017)

Ah OK, then ya right tire choice. Technique and tire pressure is what's left. And there is just limits of how fast you can take corners, some faster than others. 

The advise of going in high so your already about straight coming out of the corner in the pebbles is probably the best advise beyond proper body English I've read. Various reasons on a trail to get used to cornerning like that.

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## Miker J (Nov 4, 2003)

Weight front

More pressure on bar from outside hand

No front brake

If front starts to slip out, tap rear brake to induce a rear slip to override the front slip


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## Grassington (Jun 24, 2017)

J.B. Weld said:


> I ride similar conditions in NM and front wheel washouts are a big concern of mine because they can put you on the dirt in a heartbeat, I'm no pro but my technique for avoiding disaster is to error on the side of weighting the rear wheel more than the front. Putting more weight on the front wheel does provide more traction there but if you lose your front wheel in an aggressive "attack" stance it's game over (instant otb) whereas I can feel it going and save it when I keep my weight back a little.





l'oiseau said:


> My technique is similar to JB's. It may not be the fastest way, but it's safer... to me, staying up is always quicker than picking myself up off the ground.
> 
> I'll add, what I tend to do is lean the bike more whilst keeping the body upright, bias my rear wheel a bit and add as little steering input as I can. As soon as traction can be felt again, I'll add weight back to the front.


That's very interesting, and the exact opposite of the front/rear weight bias I'd normally put into a corner. It seems to work well for you guys though, and I can see how more front weight bias would raise the loss-of-grip threshold but make that loss of grip much more sudden and harder to control. I get to ride on marbles a lot, so I'm going to have to have a little play around with that technique.

That aside, my firm preference is for oversteer as I find it much easier to control than understeer and it helps turn the bike a bit sharper. If I'm feeling a bit mischievous I'll go for neutral bias and try and get both tyres drifting at the same time, but it's a bit of a knife-edge and it doesn't take much to lose the delicate weight balance and spin/wash out.

While marbles over hardpack are invariably treacherous, I can highly recommend experimenting with finding the limits of grip on deeper gravel or shingle - the speed at which grip is lost is much lower, so much less chance of injury, and when the grip does let go it's much smoother and much more controllable. Also it's loads of fun carving along and pretending to be a skier.


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## l'oiseau (May 5, 2015)

Grassington said:


> That's very interesting, and the exact opposite of the front/rear weight bias I'd normally put into a corner. It seems to work well for you guys though, and I can see how more front weight bias would raise the loss-of-grip threshold but make that loss of grip much more sudden and harder to control. I get to ride on marbles a lot, so I'm going to have to have a little play around with that technique.
> 
> That aside, my firm preference is for oversteer as I find it much easier to control than understeer and it helps turn the bike a bit sharper. If I'm feeling a bit mischievous I'll go for neutral bias and try and get both tyres drifting at the same time, but it's a bit of a knife-edge and it doesn't take much to lose the delicate weight balance and spin/wash out.
> 
> While marbles over hardpack are invariably treacherous, I can highly recommend experimenting with finding the limits of grip on deeper gravel or shingle - the speed at which grip is lost is much lower, so much less chance of injury, and when the grip does let go it's much smoother and much more controllable. Also it's loads of fun carving along and pretending to be a skier.


I was specifically referencing the sandy spots I deal with. Pressuring the front into them does NOT work, for me. There is hard stuff underneath it, because it's just wash from rain, but you'll be damned if you are going to push down to it without stopping your tire and sliding...

Loose over hard is too vague. Way too many types. We have marbles that are not really marbles, but rather loose, broken up shale (flat rock, not round), to the south of me and that stuff is treacherous to ride on. It does grip, but you have to trust it. Kind of ease into it and then once it sets you can hammer it.

I doubt I really have anything in upstate NY that is similar to Colorado dust over hardpack.

My point was, just pushing into isn't always the answer. If there's grip to be had, yes, but sometimes you'll just overpower the tire and initiate a slide i.e. think powersliding in the rear.


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## faceplant72 (Oct 25, 2009)

The "foot out flat out" may be a more intuitive way to get weight on the front for some. It seems to work for Sam Hill. 


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