Loosefest 2016, First Hits - Video

 Not sure. Doesn't sound like it though.

 It's still sort of up in the air.

 You know you are going huge when a moto can session your jumps and it doesn't look out of place.

 I guess everyone missed andreu and aggy in the place... These series are the best thing ever happened in mtb since the NWDs.

 @pepper8: Andreu just arrived!

 @pepper8: For sure. NWD, WTTE, FEST

 Massive till you see the motorbike, then they look normal!

 @TheFEST: let the savagery begin!!!

 @TheFEST: things gonna get rad now!

 Your request for advice on jumping comes in reference to footage observed in a Fest Series video. For that reason, advice from a mere mortal will likely disappoint.

 Commitment... If you are scared coming off a big lip you will often stiffen up and bad things happen, just stay confident when coming into jumps and commit to SHREDDIN THAT GNAR BRAH.

 loosen up and pin it

 Heavy feet pump up the lip, arms control the amount you want to lift the front tire, launch in neutral attack position. when air born, stay relaxed and low to the bike so you have more control if need to land weird. then repeat this over and over and over for every single jump, cause they're all different in some way. after years and years, it will come fairly natural...or it wont...not everyone can bunny hop...not everyone wants to bunny hop. Learning to control drop offs at speed by staying low and slightly back (manual style) is more practical to technical riding then learning to jump. Oh, and all this goes out the window when you approach a lip too fast when you tire pressure is much lower than you thought is was, rolling the front tire under the
rim and launching off sideways into an endo....P.S.:90% of fails of the month are from failed jump attempts. P.P.S: Im not a good jumper...be safe out there

 @Jack-McLovin: You nailed it. Stay relaxed, pop off the lip a bit if you don't like the way it kicks you (lean back a bit at the least), and just have fun in the air. Swing the back end around, do a little mini-table, and basically just have a d@mn good time. You do that and jumping will come easily.

 Adding to this thread here... I lose all my confidence on steep lips. It tends to buck me forward into an endo and I dont know how to counter it. Especially steep short jumps. Whats the trick? too much rebound? Body position? It seems the harder I try to prevent this the more it happens too!! haha. Thats where small jumps come in... Its much harder to endo!

 I don't jump very well, but I always hear the same "if you are scared when you hit the jump you will fall, you have to be relaxed" but how I am supposed to be relaxed to hit something that I am not confident? My guess is that you have to build your way up, I have no problem hitting small jumps, so build confidence on small jumps and then step by step till you hit what you wanna hit, I wouldn't advise hitting roadgaps before hitting at least a few times smaller jumps

 @bmar: gotta pump it a bit harder in short steep ones to prevent endo. Also ensure that your body position is, eh, "good" - kinda neutral - and the front tire is unweighed AFTER the pump of course.

 just ride like me: hit the jump half-ass at half-speed and case the living shit out of everything, especially when you have confident experienced riders following closely behind you at speed...

 a little bit of Brake, and lots of Brap

 Fall. Get up. Go bigger.

 @geerumm: Ive fallen plenty. Just havent gotten it right yet! Ive even hit smaller road gaps (read: big jumps to me) but I just cant seem to conquer the steeper lips. Ill have give a try using what @pacojj mentioned and pump harder.

 @bmar: Remember too, the steeper the lip is, the more you have to lean forward on takeoff! Floaty senders you can hit in a neutral position, steeper lips you have to almost get over the front wheel. (please note, this advice is coming from a DH hack)

 @Zimmer68: Thats possibly my problem. It seems intuitive to want to lean back on a steep jump to avoid the endo but I guess thats what causes it?? I just need to get out and try it. I think ill go right now...

 Learn on a dirt jumper to figure out how to ride steeper lips. You will have way more feeling of the jump with no rear suspension and can also start to feel more comfortable in the air on some well build dirt jumps. This all translates very well into the big bike features.

 Keep in mind a lot of smaller jumps with steep lips tend to be built terribly in my experience. If your getting bucked your body position is wrong, or your too stiff, or your suspension is set up wrong. Or all three. Ride with some people that know how to jump and you'll get it dialed

 @bmar: Also, like someone else said.. doing things like bar turns, little tweaks, tiny whips, etc.. really help with airtime.

Stay loose, and don't dead sailor! Move around, shift things up.

 @bmar: the buck comes (from among other things) because the front end has already rebounded as the rear is leaving the lip and you get that kick. First, you might want to slow down the rebound if you're hitting much bigger jumps than normal and firm up the bottom stroke of the compression, but if you're just progressing this is probably not necessary.
Make sure you have a good neutral position and press into the lip with your handlebars to preload the fork. This will give you a more even pop and limit the buck. This will also stop you from being compressed into the face of the jump which throws out your balanced body position. As you leave the jump the bike will come up - don't fight it completely, you want keep a neutral position where you can stretch out or squat (in the air) to control the bike. If you dead sailor you can't exert any control if you start to rotate forward or back.

One final tip - to help with "relaxing" and prevent that tensing up - even on the little jumps move the bike around a little, twist the bars even a bit or kick the back end around or mini table, it will help prevent you from sailing through the air like a solid projectile.

 @Zimmer68: not so much leaning forward though I agree with you you need to be in a more aggressive position over your front wheel. Preloading the fork is what gives you that nice balanced pop, especially on steep dirt jumps

 @bmar: I'm in my mid 30's and mostly rode xc before. I picked up a dirt jumper last year and rode it at the skate park a lot, now the dirt jumps at mammoth don't seem steep at all.

Also it seems counterintuitive to compress your suspension to prevent that f-ing tail kick, but it really does work, also smaller jumps can be harder to learn on!

 Find a trail that has a jump on it with a gap or table your comfortable hitting, ride it over and over again. Then take note of the speed your traveling, the height of the lip and the distance to make the landing sweet-spot . This way you can apply this "formula" to similar hits. Once you get the speed dialed work on spotting your landing and placing your bike where you want to land.
The worst thing that can happen to me is overshooting into a dead-sailor or endo into the landing, this happens mostly on kickers when you lean to far back and over load your shocks rebound capability. So start with more cheese wedge shaped or natural hits until you lean how to recover when shit goes wrong. Just learn what your capable of and build on it, even if you have to dig your own jumps.

 @irideyourtrail: *You're (downvoters, come at me)

 @Joebro1995: 4got ur full stop joe my bro .

 What helped me a lot was helping my more experienced friends build new jumps or rebuild better ones. At first while you are building it, you are like "Damn this is kinda big and scary", but after it is done and you spent so much time working on it, you see your better friends jump it and how easy it looked. That usually gives me the motivation and confidence that it will work out.

Everyone else is correct though, need to be center/neutral on the bike, stay loose, and it really helps to tweak the bike or the front wheel in the air to prevent doing a dead sailor crash over the bars. Remember: bones heal, pain is temporary, motion is the lotion.

 @bmar: In order the nail short steep take offs you need to temporarly pretend you are riding a dirt jump bike or bmx, you must pull your front wheel up intill your back wheel has left the ramp then push down into the landing! These kinds of take offs can be tricky especially on long travelled bikes as your forks will treat the ramp like a small bump (soaking it up) causing your back wheel to slam into to lip which will chuck all your weight forward resulting in a super scary nose dive!

 jump on the jump

 So stoked on Damon getting into fest! Bro is killin it!

 Very solid whip from Diwanaga.

 Come to knoxville will have good learner lines

 @eastonkooka: lol didn't mean I wanted to learn to jump, but just go hit some jumps.

can't imagine i'd ever work up to fest level shit though, as few of us will

 Why not just ride a MX if thats the problem you are trying to solve. I feel like these guys ride DH bikes instead of MX bikes because of the inherent sketchiness that comes with having no motor, engine, etc...

 @supatramp: I agree, its more of a pipe dream than anything. I personally hate nose dives on jumps, and don't want or have money for motos. I bet you every guy in that video already rides motos as well. I don't expect it to happen, but it would be cool

 The title is mentioned in the video

 And Metal.