I think Irulan and SadieKate are right -- he swore this was an easy trail but his definition of easy is not the same as mine. He also said the trail was a lot more rutted than he'd remembered. (To be fair to him, he hadn't done any real mountain biking since before he broke his leg in 2003, and he didn't have any fun on that trip either -- he learned the hard way that his new patched-together titanium knee is too inflexible to deal with the cheap old clipless pedals he had on that bike, or at least too inflexible to reliably unclip from a muddy pedal. I got to see him fall almost as often as I fell myself -- he's going to have to get some of those Speedplay pedals you all love so much, I think!)

SadieKate, that is an excellent idea, thank you! We do have an easy to moderate trail near our house where I can practice, but it is not much fun right now because there is starthistle all over the place and it is too hot to wear long pants. I actually looked for some women's clinics when I first got the bike but I could not find anything in Sacramento.

The parts I like are the mud, the easy hills, and the little bounce you get as you land. That's fun. I fear speed, though. Speed is scary.