Manchester Velodrome Taster Session Help!

[wafflycat]

Young'Un.. I have direct experience of your requirement. When WCMnr was much younger, his dad & I took him to a few track taster session. We tied this in with the Saturday morning training sessions of Eastland Velo, a club for youngsters.

http://www.eastlandsvelo.com/

I cannot speak too highly of that club. They were incredibly welcoming and supportive of young riders from outside the area joining in with their sessions on a Saturday morning. Three hours of *proper* track training with some races in there too. My son thoroughly enjoyed it and as I say, I can't speak too highly of just how welcoming the club was. If you get the chance to go, take it if you can.

 

[alecstilleyedye]

my club had a night there and there was a lad of about 12 with us. i don't recall him having any more problems than the rest of us, so i'd go with the adults.

 

[andy_wrx]

I'm going through the track accreditation process at the moment, so I've done a couple of the taster/improvers and a skills session.
Always a few teenagers in each of the taster/improver sessions, some women, most men in thirties and forties - the coaches sussed-out everyone's abilities and split us into two groups if necessary.
One particularly small lad was asked how old he was, I think he said he was 10, the coach simply said 'well, you know you're not supposed to be here, there's a minimum age of 12' (I may have got this wrong, perhaps it was 14...) but they didn't kick him out of the session or anything, just put him in the slower group - which was fair enough, he was slower.

Incidentally, the taster sessions are aimed at beginners and are booked-up solid for months ('the Olympics effect').
There are also taster/improver sessions, aimed at someone who's done a taster session or two, has been round the track before, and is aiming to move up through the process to get track accreditation. You get structured training exercises from the coach, rather than just being left to buzz around on your own.
These are booked-up perhaps 2 or 3 weeks ahead...

 

[a_n_t]

Incidentally, the taster sessions are aimed at beginners and are booked-up solid for months ('the Olympics effect').

Tell me about it! Earliest I could get for an evening was March 12th!

There are also taster/improver sessions, aimed at someone who's done a taster session or two.

You now need the "blue slip" to do a improver session as I found out yesterday

 

[andy_wrx]

You now need the "blue slip" to do a improver session as I found out yesterday

Still, I'll bet you look lovely wearing it !



I did see you'd posted something about a blue slip on another post, or maybe this one further up.
You're right, it must be a new thing, I've not had one.
How d'you get one - do a taster and impress the coach that you're safe? Do you have to persuade him you've done a few tasters, or do they keep a register at reception and you have to do so many ?

I did a taster about a year ago, did another one back in November and decided I'd get myself accredited this time.
I asked the coach (Geordie bloke, Russ) how to go about it and he said he would give me a pink slip (Skills) if I wanted it, but it would be better if I
went to some of the improvers, so I've done 2 or maybe 3 of them with John as coach, got the pink slip and did the Skills session last weekend and now I have my Induction weekend after next.

We were terrible in the Skills, John was coach again and would have b*ll*cked us in the improvers if we'd ridden like that, but when we did it in the Skills he said we did pretty well...very odd, but I think he's very keen we are safe and get the right habits, so he wants us to do things very right and points-out every fault, although in a pleasant enough way and explains what the issue was pretty well.
But there were some people waiting to come onto the track for a SQT as we came off from our Skills session, who I recognised from improvers I'd done - they hadn't impressed me then as being any better than me and they've passed their Induction, so I'm hoping it's not actually as tough as John makes out...

 

[a_n_t]

You're right, it must be a new thing, I've not had one.
How d'you get one - do a taster and impress the coach that you're safe?

exactly that! You used to be able to go from tasters to taster improvers but now you need to be assessed by the coach on a taster in order to get the blue slip to do the improver.

complicated stuff!!