We had someone die on one of our trails yesterday

[indysteel]

You're welcome Trust me - I get anxious too, so I GET IT. But I still love it, and I still go out and push myself to do even better every time I ride. My anxiety about all of the rocks at Nationals actually helped me to ride some rocky sections of a race course BETTER yesterday than I might have previously. I still dabbed in places where I was nervous, but I had a terrific race, and LOVED being out there. That's what it is about.

Indy - do you have an MTB group local to you? Are there any women local who ride A LOT and would be willing to take yo out with them for a ride? I do that often here - I love to teach and share my passion for riding in the woods with others. I've also been on the receiving end of some great tips from other women. It's a great way to get out there!

SheFly

The irony is that every time I ride, I actually do pretty well. My husband just shakes his head at me because my perception of how I'm riding and the reality of how I ride are vastly different. I sort of did the same thing when I started road biking. After I got strong enough to ride the worst of our hills and/or ride long distances, I would still put myself down when it came to my abilities.

But to answer your question, we do have a relatively local "club," but I'm not terribly tapped into it, and I've sort of sensed that it operates more as an advocacy group (especially as it relates to trail building, maintenance and local MTB promotion) than as a club through which riders can meet and ride together. To best of my knowledge, there are no club sponsored rides other than the "big" event rides and local races.

I've reached out a time or two to the husband and wife who put on our local women's skills clinic for the name of someone local who might be interested in private lessons. I heard nothing from the wife and was vaguely directed elsewhere by the husband (who is somebody I know reasonably well as he was my fitter for my road bike and he helped me design and build my Moots roadie). I don't want to malign them because I mostly assumed at the time that they were pretty busy, but I will admit that I was a bit surprised that they weren't more eager to hook me up with someone. The husband has since left the shop where he worked, but I don't know whether he's in a better position now to instruct me himself. I haven't seen or talked to him in some time.

Beyond that, there's a Meetup.com women's group. From what I can tell, a small group of beginning/intermediate riders get together at the park where I ride. Admittedly, I'm torn about this. I feel sort of self-conscious saying this because I'm otherwise pretty independent from my husband and he from me, but riding is one of the things we mostly do together. We go mtbing infrequently enough as it is that I'd rather ride with him when I do go out. While we have a few mutual mtb friends, it's usually just the two of us. So, I haven't done a particularly good job of reaching out to other riders. But I will acknowledge that I'm likely hampering my own development as a mtber because of it. Maybe it's time to rethink that.

Thanks for giving me some food for thought.