Trick Tip: The 360

A few tips on how to 360 with Rocky Mountain Bikes rider Jarrett Moore.

Technique

I have seen a few trick tips on this trick in the past. All of them stated that the rider should get comfortable spinning 360's out of a quarter before trying this trick on dirt. I do not believe that is the way to go about this trick. I believe that spinning out a quarter promotes poor habits, which will only cause problems later. It would be good to be able to flatland 180, or 180 out of a flat bank before trying this trick, just so the feeling of spinning is not completely new. That being said, everyone learns different and if you learned to 360 out of a quarter and that helped you, right on. I would suggest trying to learn this trick on a hip. It will teach you better technique for when you try and to do this on a hard packed dirt jump and will be easier because you don't have to rotate as much.

- I role into a jump with the same speed as I would to straight air.
- As I come up the lip I preload and start to twist my head and look in the direction I wish to spin.
- As I come off the lip I twist my shoulders and hips dipping my head, shoulders and body slightly down and into the spin.
- Once I reach 180 I look for my landing and modulate my spin.
- At 180 I also tend to rock to a more over seat position by bending my knees slightly and extending my arms.
- If I am rotating too slow I bring the bike up into me and twist my head more. If I am rotating too fast I push the bike away from my body.
- As I touch down I point my front tire straight down the landing.

The important thing to remember is that your body and bike will follow your head, shoulders and hips! It is important to keep looking with the rotation of your spin!


Problems

Tagging the lip with your back tire.

I still have problems with this when I am riding new jumps or get tired. If you are tagging the lip with your back tire you are spinning too early.

Landing off axis

Landing off axis comes from letting the lip spin you on the axis of it's trajectory. What I mean by this is that instead of staying relatively perpendicular to the ground, you spin perpendicular to the lip. The way that I was able to get over this problem was by not pulling and rotating my head back. I spun with a more forward position on the bike. Instead of trying to pull away and spin from the lip, I let the jump do it's thing and spun into the air of the jump more, instead of the lip.

Losing distance

If you are loosing distance you are carving off the lip too much. A large turn is not need to get rotation, try carving less and turning your hips, shoulders and head more. There is a balance here that can only be learned through time and practice. It can be hard to not carve a lot when the jump is smaller.

Landing Back Tire Heavy

When I land back tire heave it's due to the fact that I am too far forward on my bike for the last half of my spin. The only way to get over this is to get more comfortable with spinning. I find confidence is the key in this one, be confident that you will get your rotation, stay more relaxed and instead of hammering for your rotation spot your landing at 180 and dip into your spin.


Couple Last Pointers

The best way for me to learn this trick was on a hip. Start out by trying to learn this trick on a hip, that will help by allowing you to rotate less. Having the landing slightly softer will also help as crashes are inevitable. By learning on a hip you will also not learn the bad habit of landing back tire heavy.

Hope this helps and remember to have fun!