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Much of this is in the words of the creator of biketrials.com, Stephen Meader, because I dont even know how to do some of this stuff :-)

"HOW TO" MANUAL FOR TRIALS

PRACTICE: You'll probally see this at any trials (or any sport for that matter), website is that you have to practice. You can only learn so much from manuals like this, the real learning is going out and trying . You've got to see what works the best for you. PROTECTION: WHEN EVER YOU RIDE WEAR A HELMET!!!!Come on just do it, really you look even more retarted with out one if you ask me, beside isnt it worth it to save a little bit of your gray matter for later. As for shin/knee gaurds and gloves it really doesnt make a diffrence if you wear them or not allthough they can save you some nasty cutts n bruses.

Bigginer stuff

Track Stand Find a slight uphill on concrete. Figure out which foot is your "good" or "forward" or "chocolate" foot, the foot you are most comfortable having in front Get on your bike and roll forward, put your good foot forward Roll to a stop (don't use your brakes at all in this excerise) Keep your pedals level with level ground (this goes for pretty much all the time in trials) (so if you're on a hill, don't keep your pedals level with the hill, keep them level with imaginary level ground) Turn your wheel opposite of your good foot about 45 degrees (right foot forward, turn left...) (this isn't absolute, just sota turn the way that works best for you) Try to maintain your position on the hill by pushing lightly on your front pedal A rocking motion will probably help... Push on the pedal enough to go forward, then let off and roll back a bit, repeat. Keep your head way forward, almost over your front axle Keep your arms close to locked straight but not really locked up Keep your front leg pretty straight Keep your back leg bent a little, and use it for balance along with turning your wheel and shifting whatever body mass you can around over the bike (sounds hard because it is, it will get natural after a lot of practice, even now after mounths of riding am I still not vert comfortable with balancing on most anything) Look about 6 feet forward, it's easier than looking straight down and try to look at something thats not moveing And most important: RELAX! Don't be all tensed up, it's only going to make you really sore.

Rear Wheel Pivot This is where you hop your front wheel either to your left or right, keeping your rear brake locked. To pop your front wheel up: Keep your rear brake locked Squish your body and arms over the front of your bike Then push up and lean back a little. After you get the popping your front wheel up thing down, try leaning to one side when you squish down (so if you didn't bounce up, you would fall off your bike to that side). Then when you pull up, you'll automatically pivot that way. Another thing to remember is that if you land with your weight directly over the bike and with the bike straight up, you'll lose your balance in that same direction. So land with your weight away from the bike, and maybe with the bike angled a little bit, so when you land and soak up the impact sideways like that, you'll be perfectly trackstanding again. try going around in a complete circle with little pivots (it'll probably take you like 20 or more little pivots to get all the way around). You won't be able to make it all the way without practice, so do it until it makes sense Once you've got that down, try to get further in your pivots (this is much more advanced, you should probably skip it and come back to it later...): You still want to lean in the way you want to go, but you'll want to do a kind of preload FIRST. A preload is where you lean the BIKE the opposite way of the way you want to go (it's weird, I know, but you'll thank me later on) So to do it, lean your bike the opposite of the way you want to go, and turn you handlebars opposite, too (if you can, straight is ok). Also twist your hips the opposite way. This is all something you do at once, for a very brief moment, then you explode into your turn, twisting your hips, pulling the handlebars in the direction you want to go. You can get up to 180 degrees with this method, and if you toss in leaning way back and keeping the handlebars real close, you should be able to make 360 degrees (although I havent gotten to even the 180 art yet)

Pop Rear Wheel Up Without Brake This is handy for getting up curbs, and starting to learn how to bunnyhop. Pretty much you want to do the same thing as the rear wheel pivot... squish your arms, then push and pop your butt back and down, and voila, the front wheel will come up. When you get good, you should be able to pop it up so high that you fall off the back of the bike (another good reason NOT to be using clipless pedals). try going up a curb. Don't worry, if you hit it at 5 mph, it isn't really going to hurt you or your bike. Right before you reach the curb, pop up the front. Here's where we separate the roadies from the mountain bikers or trials riders... As your rear wheel approaches, put your head over your front axle and sort of jump up a little bit (called unweighting the rear), so when your wheel hits, it bounces up and over the curb. Not the best way of getting up a curb, but it works for now, until you can pop your rear wheel up.

Front Wheel Pivot This is where you hop your rear wheel either to your left or right, keeping your front brake locked. To do this, you want to turn your handlebars away from you so when you land, your handlebars are straight in front of you (so, opposite of the way your rear wheel is going). Instead of the suspension being your arms, it's now more your legs. With your front brake locked, you must squish down a bit, pop forward and to one side, and move the bike with your hips (push it out toward your landing spot). I think the hips thing is key to getting any amount of distance. A lot of trials is about throwing your BODY MASS a certain direction, and then letting the bike follow or pulling it with you. This is especially true with the sidehop. You won't have to think about that for a while, though... ;-p

Pop Rear Wheel Up Without Brake This move is, as far as I'm concerned, the foundation of the bunnyhop, and will just plain make lots of moves you want to learn easier and make more sense.Hold Your weight back while just rolling along slowly, jump and throw your weight way forward and push down and forward on the handlebars. You "unweight" the pedals... You'll learn it. You just have to get a feeling for how little weight you can put on the pedals without your feet flying off. When you're doing this move well, you can get your rear wheel surprisingly high, in which case you can probably do 180s on the front wheel now, so try it by rolling along and mixing together the front wheel pivot and this move.

Up Stairs Pivoting So, you think you're pretty good now, huh? You're all rear wheel and front wheel pivoting... Great! Now get accurate. I'd recommend going up stairs first, just because if you lose your balance going DOWN stairs, you might hurt yourself. Which reminds me, just stick to the first 2 or 3 stairs in a staircase. Pivot your front wheel on the first stair, then pivot your rear up and on the first stair... This is hard, so practice it. Come back down, too, rear tire first, then front. When you get good at this, go rear wheel up first, then front. Then front wheel down first, then rear wheel.

Hopping In Place Hopping in place is handy for keeping your balance on off-camber things like rocks. You try to maintain your balance, but when you start to lose it, you hop to correct your balance. Both brakes locked, squish down and push on the pedals and pull up, then absorb the landing with your whole body. If you've learned to bring up the rear wheel without brakes, you should be able to do this. Once you've got hopping in place down, try hopping up stairs. Put your front wheel one or two stairs up, and lean your body the direction you want to go, and hop. Hopefully you'll get your rear tire up one stair, and your front tire will go up one more stair, too... Trying going down the same way. Stairs are awesome for doing weird stuff like this, and they're very safe compared to rocks. Another way of keeping your balance when trackstanding isn't an option is pivoting. Keeping both brakes locked you make little pivots on either your front or rear wheel (you've gotta figure out which in what circumstances yourself) when you lose your balance. I usally piovt most on my front wheel which does require less energy than with the rear wheel and Iam pearsonaly more comfortable on with the front . This is also handy for inching your way over to the edge of something to drop off, or orienting yourself right to do a big move like a sidehop, or getting your aim right and your balance set before you do a pedal-up or whatever.

Getting Up Stuff Where the rubber rear hits the road. Now that you can go up and down stairs, you can go for bigger things, just as long as you can get your front tire on it (well, it's difficult to get on really high things this way, but this'll work up to around 14" objects...). Pivot your front wheel onto it, then work your way around so you are facing the object with your front wheel on it. Roll forward and put your good pedal down on the object (if your bashring hits, go back and do a little hop (like lifting your rear wheel) while rolling forward to get it on top). Now this is the fun part, getting up. You need to have your weight directly over the the bottom bracket, then shift all your weight forward onto the front pedal (like you're trying to pedal into the object) and pull the bike up and forward. The bike should roll up under you. Your first time, you probably will only get a little bit of your wheel up, and then roll back, but keep going at it and thinking about it, and you'll get it soon enough.

More advanced moves

Sidehop Drop Off The safest way to drop off something before you're really comfortable on the rear wheel (rear wheel drop offs are easier on your bike and body when you do them right (explained later), but much more dangerous if you mess up). Pivot to the edge of the drop, crouch down and let your balance sway over towards the landing spot, then when you're ready (you don't have all day, if you take too long, the wheels will get stuck and you'll fall and the bike will hit you), jump up a bit (or pull the bike up off the ledge by the handlebars if you want to do it the advanced, better way) to get your wheels off the ledge, then as you start falling towards your target, pull the handlebars toward your chest and push your legs out towards the ground. This way, you'll land rear wheel first and make it nice and soft. Try to absorb most of the impact on the rear wheel, your bottom bracket and cranks (and your body) will thank you. You can make 5 foot drop offs look like nothing when you get this technique down.

Rear Wheel Hop Backwards When you're ready to start learning the rear wheel hop and pedalkick, you should learn to rear wheel hop backwards first. Just lock the rear brake, lean way forward, then just pull back (no hop, just pull back) and start hopping backwards. If that doesn't quite get you back on the rear tire, then try this: Put your butt down a lot more, cuz from what I remember, the butt has a lot to do with it. Once you get that far, toss a pedal-kick in, and then learn to stay in the same spot on your rear wheel (keep your arms BENT, otherwise you'll WASTE your lower back and shoulders). Then learn pedal-kicking forward...

Rear Wheel Hop In Place Once you get that far, try to stop hopping backwards and stay in the same place. It's hard, but eventually you'll get it. This is also a good time to work on your form. You'll want to keep your arms BENT, not straight, otherwise you'll WASTE your lower back and shoulders. Another good tip is to keep your cranks LEVEL with the ground... If your front pedal is higher than your rear, you almost have to hop backwards. Best way to fix that is to use a pedal kick to get yourself on the rear and your cranks level with the ground. If you have a hard time keeping them level, you're probably leaning back to far, so you should pull the handlebars toward you more.

Pedal Kick Once you've got that down, you should try pedal kicking. To do this, stop hopping and let your front wheel drop a little (maybe 1/4 the way to the ground at the beginning), then kick! The kick is kind of weird to learn, but you'll get it with time. The trick is letting the power of your pedal kick out with your brakes. With your rear brake locked, push hard on the pedal, THEN release the rear brake, keep pushing with your foot and shoot forward, then reapply the brake when you land on the rear. This is hard, I dont realy have the hange of it yet but if you practice, you will get better at it.When this starts making sense to you, try dropping your front wheel more before you kick, and kick harder.. you'll get further. Then try putting your butt way the heck back, letting the front drop almost to the ground, then launch your hips toward the stem and kick when you're about halfway to the stem (maybe even closer to the stem: . You should be able to clear gaps of more than a wheelbase doing that. I can get about 6 feet, and I've heard of people getting something like 10 feet or more. Want more distance? Learn to surge well and you will get further. Advanced: How to land balanced on the rear wheel after clearing a huge gap The trick to landing rear wheel and balanced after clearing large gaps is to push the rear wheel out and into the landing spot with your legs. The same time you push your legs out, you'll want to pull the handlebars towards your hips, such that the bike is almost vertical in the air when the rear tire hits. You also want to absorb the landing well by not actually pushing hard with your legs until you have already bent them a lot (this allows your body to position itself over the bike perfectly so that you end up balanced).

Rear Wheel Drop Off Beginner: This is the best way to drop off if it is SAFE to do so. If you are at all sketchy (not sure) about the object you are going to drop off of, don't do it. You can go over the handlebars and seriously hurt yourself. Try this on something flat first. Urban stuff is great. Go for a curb at first. Front wheel at the edge, pedal-kick to the edge, let the front drop, pedal-kick again to go down. Land rear wheel first just like in the sidehop drop off description. Advanced: Next try hopping closer and closer to the edge before dropping your front and kicking. The closer you are to the edge, the more important it is to let your front drop way down (level with rear tire) and the less important it is to kick hard. If you are right at the tip, you may not even have to kick, just let the brake go and push with your legs. The most advanced version of this drop is where you get all the way to the very tip, drop your front wheel a little past level with the rear while your body is crouched over anywhere from the frame to the rear tire (butt a little bit behind the bottom bracket is most comfortable for me), then kick or push your rear wheel down while pulling your handlebar towards your chest, and absorb the landing with your rear tire first, then a good amount with the front tire when it comes down (don't have your weight entirely over the rear or you'll make the drop hard on your body). Mimic this with your bike.. Lift it up, put the rear on the object, and let the front drop, then shoot the rear down and see that doing the drop this way actually makes the drop smaller in essence... You can make dropping off a picnic table look and feel like falling as far as you are when hopping off a curb (and you actually are only falling about that far if you're doing it right). Think of it this way, too, if you'd like. If you're on something high just on foot, when you want to jump off, do you just walk off, without bending your knees? No, you bend your legs a ton, maybe even let your feet slip off the edge and shoot down towards the ground... Same exact idea put into use on bikes. Slightly different viewpoint: Steve Young, big-move Hawaiian rider on how to do BIG drops (8+ feet). He's done 12 foot drops before on his mod, and he says that you don't want to land all on the rear wheel because then the shock will go straight through your body (like landing with your knees locked without the bike). He says what you want to do is come off flat and push the rear tire down at the last second so your back tire hits first, and get your weight way back to absorb the shock, but let the front wheel come down and absorb some of the shock.

Pedal-Up This is where you pedal all the way through the jumping to get onto on object (either to bashguard, both wheels, or rear wheel (or front wheel, but I consider that kind of pointless)). A bunnyhop-up differs in that you first gain speed, and then coast along before you do the up. A pedal-up is useful when you don't have as much space for an approach. At first, though, just try rolling slowly forward with nothing in front of you, with your bad foot forward, crouch down, then pull up (not back) on the handlebars as you pump down hard with your bad foot to do the real work of bringing up the front, and continue your spinning to your front foot forward, and you should just pop up into the air... You don't even really have to lift your legs to get your bashguard onto small things, and you'll land good foot forward... If you push your handlebars up and forward and bend your legs, you can get both wheels up on something. If you just push the handlebars up and bend your legs, you can go to rear wheel. Just make sure you trust your brakes and that you stick your legs out so you can absorb the landing and not trust the grip of what you're jumping onto or the grip of your brakes too much... After you've learned doing it starting from a slow roll, try doing it from stopped about 1.5 wheelbases or so back from the object with your good foot forward. Use your good foot pedal stroke to pick up speed, then your bad foot to lift the front and get up, just like before. Then try a little closer. To pick up enough speed now, you're going to need to put your weight far back (almost so much so that your front wheel lifts), then throw your weight forward and pedal hard. Your good foot pedal still gives you the forward momentum, and then spinning fast on the bad foot pedal is the trick for getting up something in tight circumstances. If you have the problem of getting your bashguard on the object, but quickly losing your balance backward, you either need to lean INTO the object, or you need to start closer to the object (maybe both, that was my problem at first). Lean INTO the object: Now, this is scary, I must admit, and when I first learned this (trying to pedal-up to bashguard onto a picnic table (going the direction with the bench in front to be safer)), I planted my front wheel into the picnic table and stressed out my left wrist (didn't realize this til later), and later I smacked my front wheel on the picnic table when going head on, and smacked my head on the picnic table (I was wearing a helmet, thankfully!). But, you HAVE to lean forward, or INTO the object, to not lose your balance... I'd try to practice this on things that aren't too high so you don't run into this problem until you learn how to slide the front wheel over the object. At the last possible moment, you guide the front wheel up and over the object by pulling up your handlebars. The idea is that your body weight is way forward on the bike before you leave the ground, and when you start going up, you lift the handlebars up to get the front wheel to clear, and then push the handlebars forward to land the bashguard or rear wheel or both wheels onto the object, with your weight almost on top of the object (close enough so when you come to a rest, your body moves forward and balances perfectly on the object). When you've got this move perfect, you can pedal-up to bashguard onto a couple-inches thick wall without losing your balance over the other side (nothing to rest your front tire on, you see..). The pedal-up is one of the most useful moves I have learned. I can pedal-up to bashguard stuff that's a little higher than handlebar height on my Monty mod with a full spin (good foot forward in front at the beginning).

Bashguard to rear wheel Practice only on objects where you are fully on the bashguard, and your rear tire cannot reach the ground. Also keep your front wheel off the obstacle (do practice on a ledge or something, such that if you mess up, you don't eat it hard)... Front wheel one inch or so above the obstacle is just fine. This makes it such that your balance rests completely on the bashguard. You need to learn a new balance point. Bashguard balance, let's call it. If you lose your balance forward and your front wheel touches the obstacle, you lose (if there were nothing in front of you, you would've fallen!). If you lose your balance backwards and your rear wheel touches the ground, you lose (if there were nothing there for your tire, you may have fallen off). Once you think you have this bashguard balance down, try this little exercise... Make little hops to the left or right (work on both sides), maintaining this bashguard balance all the time. See how this is helping you to work your way to doing bashguard to rear wheel? Now that you are ready, remember that you do NOT want to hop forward when you do bashguard to rear wheel. You also want to make sure that your rear wheel is not touching the object if at all possible, as that makes things tougher. You want to hop STRAIGHT UP with your weight over the BB, pull the bike up into you and then push the handlebars up and out and aim the rear wheel for the spot your bashguard was. When you land, you should stick it (not immediately lose your balance forward or backward). If you have the problem of your front dropping down immediately after you try to do it, try thinking that you're jumping your body back a bit, and you should eventually get it just right (you'll really be jumping straight up through, this tip is just to fool your mind). It's a power move, no doubt. [Updated: 10/15/99]

Bunnyhop So, you've learned the pedal-up, but now you're trying to get up really big stuff, and the pedal-up isn't working for you, huh? What you want is to do a bunnyhop-up. Pick up some speed far away from the object, coast a bit, then at the right time, crouch down on the front of the bike, shoot the BIKE forward with your butt down so the front comes up a bit, then shift your weight forward and spring up off the pedals from your crouched position while the front comes up MORE. As you start to take off, push the handlebars up and out and squish your legs up, clear the object (imaginary object when practicing at first), then stretch your legs out to absorb the landing. It's like learning to trackstand, it takes a while to learn it, and no amount of great instruction is going to MAKE you be able to do it. Practice it and you'll eventually get it. Getting up onto bashguard is essentially the same as the pedal-up, as far as maintaining your balance goes. Here's what Aaron Lutze had to say about it after practicing with Lenosky for a while - "A lot [of the height in a bunnyhop] comes from pushing the bike out in front of you, so your bike levels off, instead of the front wheel higher than the back... Normally, I lift the front tire over the top then just push forward as hard and fast as I can..."

Surge This move is very advanced, it's the kind of thing you'll see the Spanish riders doing all the time. It's useful when you have absolutely NO space for a run-up at an object. From rest, you put your butt way back and then thrust your hips forward and do an explosive pedal-kick, lift the front and land either bashguard, rear wheel, or both wheels on the object. I suggest doing this about 3 or so inches back from 1 foot tall objects when you start learning, but you need to move back when you try bigger things (don't want to plant your front into the object, do you?) When you go bigger, you may want to go at an angle to the object (like 45 degrees) and do a surge that's half-way between a pure sidehop and a pure head-on surge. You can either land the same way you started (45 degrees or whatever to the object), or turn in mid-air and land head on.. Depends on whether or not you think you'll catch your front tire on the object. This is a weird move, it'll take practice, but after a bit, you should be able to get both wheels onto an object at least a foot high from directly in front of it. Oh, did I mention learning this will do wonders for your pedal-kicking? You'll be able to gap big stuff if you encorporate this into your pedal-kick gap technique.

Manual The key to manualing is body placement. There is a "sweet spot" one must find in order to execute the manual successfully. Center of gravity has a major role in this creating the optimum placement of the body in relation to the bike's bottom bracket, which is designed to be the place where most of the weight on the bike is located. The purpose of this is to put the weight lower on the bike to create a more stable ride. As we all know, when the "sweet spot" is violated, you end up on the ground unless you caught it with the brake soon enough. One's body must be centered over the bottom bracket at all times to maintain this balance that keeps the bike stable, no matter what angle it is at. During a manual, the front wheel floats while the rear wheel tracts underneath the rider, whose body acts as the counterbalance that keeps the angle of the front end of the bike in relation to the amount of weight placed over the bottom bracket. For example, if a rider manuals with the front wheel close to the ground, most of the rider's weight needs to placed behind the bottom bracket to counteract the forces pulling the front wheel down. On the other hand, if the rider manuals with the front wheel high, most of his/her weight will be placed more over the bottom bracket than a low manual. The reason for this is to keep the front wheel from traveling too far backwards, which would cause the rider to fall off the back painfully. In order to attempt a manual successfully for the first time, find a hill that has a very slight angle and ride down it. Without too much speed, move your bodyweight rearwards slowly to get used to the weight transfer and how it effects the handling of the bike. When you find that you are comfortable with your effort to transfer your weight, give the bars a gentle tug while you are transferring your weight and the front wheel will leave the ground. In essence, this is a manual, but in order to do a manual for more than a few inches, you need to keep experimenting with your "sweet spot" on the bike, shifting your weight fore and aft to correct for the changes in speed and front wheel height changes that drastically effect the path of the manual. Once you have figured out how to find the "sweet spot" of the manual, you can experiment with combinations of bunnyhops and manuals that create the ability to bunnyhop onto something and hold the front wheel high and manual the length of the obstacle. The higher the ledge, the harder it becomes to hold the front end up to start the manual and compete the move. Technique and practice both play large roles that create the perfect manual. Manuals are used in BMX racing as well. When one races BMX, he/she wants to be the fastest rider on the tract in order to take the win. When a rider leaves the ground during a race, they are losing speed and momentum. A speed jump is then used to keep the bike on the ground and turn in the fastest time. Speed jumps are manuals that are the main difference between a racer and a casual dirt jumper who strives to catch air and get jacked up. Remember--practice is key and pain can be part of the game, but we must learn from our mistakes and correct so we don't do it again.

Front Wheel Hook Up In this up, you get up an object by smacking into it and using the front wheel as a hook to pull yourself up. This technique will not work for all objects, only ones which you can find a hook for your front wheel on... I've seen video of Cesar using this technique to get up a box that's taller than him! Start higher than you can get up with a pedal up or bunnyhop... It's easier to learn on a downhill, you want to aim your front tire over the obstacle and hook it (which you do with your arms)... As soon as you hit the object with both tires, you hook the front and flex the fork and use the rebound to get up... Think of it like this... When you hit the object with your front wheel hooked, you should be able to jump off the pedals to get the bike to go up because the front wheel is hooked... You just can't wait until you've stopped moving forward to make the motion... Hit and go... Timing is everything with this move... You've gotta figure out the finer points of this one for yourself.. Good luck!