At the Phoenix Supercross, Monster Energy Kawasaki’s Ryan Villopoto was transferring to a seated position in mid-air over the finish-line jump in order to more quickly transition to the flat, left-hand turn that followed. He talked us through when to use this move and how to pull it off properly and safely. First off, you have to make sure that the jump fits the technique. It wouldn’t make sense to do this if there was a big berm following the landing, or more jumps or something like that. But if it’s followed by a flat turn, sitting down and getting your leg out in the air can help speed up your lap as well as save a lot of energy.
Before you try it, though, make sure you know you’re not going to come up short or go too long on the jump, because doing either of those things while sitting down will hurt! At Phoenix, the finish-line jump was followed by a flat left turn, so as I came off the jump face, I would get the bike moving to the left a little bit, and once I knew I was jumping the right distance, I would let my legs loose to bring the bike up to my butt.
I’m not sitting down so much as I’m letting the bike come up to me a little bit. As it’s doing that, I try and get into the right area of the seat and get my leg out so that when I hit the ground, I can be on the gas hard, charging into the turn, without worrying as much about washing out or something, like I would if I were standing.
Phoenix was really slippery, so doing this made a big difference not just with comfort or speed, but consistency, because I could keep traction way better. And because I was doing it in the air when you’re kind of weightless, it didn’t take nearly as much effort as sitting down after I landed would have.
After I landed and gassed it to the corner, I would get on the brakes just a little bit, mostly to set the suspension into the turn, though slowing down was obviously part of it, too.
Once I got off the brakes, I picked my right foot up and put the ball of my right foot on the peg in order to weight the outside of the bike for traction as I got on the gas coming out of the corner and into the next rhythm section, which I would seat-bounce into, and then do the oppositestanding up while in the airwhich I guess would be a whole different lesson.