[Loosenut]

Have you ever sat down and thought about the skills you use while riding. I do and more than I would like to admit. I do find that it helps me if I analyze where I excel and where I am deficient.

I excel on downhills. The harder the better and we have plenty available here in Northern California. Part of the reason I am good at downhills stems from a ride I did up in the Shasta Trinity forest. I broke the right side foot peg mount early into the ride. Rather than sit the ride out, I clamped a full size set of Vice Grips to the frame and continued the ride, but from the rear of the pack. The Vice grips worked OK, but they presented 2 problems. #1. They stuck out twice as far as the peg. #2. The stopped the brake pedal from moving down, thus no rear brake. They has plenty of steep downhills and I learned how to maximize my braking and moved right back to the front of the pack. The forced non-use of the rear brake taught me to seek out places where my efforts were maximized.