Notes
Drove down to Center Trails for my first true Mountain Biking experience. We started with Denman's as that was all flat and I was somewhat familiar with it from this morning. I followed Hazard for the first loop and tried to mimic him. This helped on the few logs as I tried to rationalize "if he can do it/I can do it." Still, there were a few spots I didn't follow him, particularly when we got to new territory in Squirrel's Nest.
After the outpost, I lead us back through Denman's again. I tried to focus on being smooth through the turns and not braking as much. It was good to follow Hazard to learn, but it was quite different setting my own pace. Of course I made a few mistakes, particularly in the narrow section where we had to squeeze between numerour trees - twice I had to stop and once I nearly rode right into a tree.
Finally I agreed to 1 route through hillside. We took the least steep way up and I managed fine other than when I needed to clear a log going uphill - not ready for that. The downhills were the scary part, sections I didn't think twice about running became thrilling rollercoaster rides on the bike as I needed to make precise turns to avoid falling down.
Overall a solid start (at least by mine and Hazard's criteria). I don't know if I'll gain more confidence as I ride to get comfortible or if I just need to accept that this is more of a thrill-seeking, adrenaline-junky type of activity than trail running and get used to it.