Why A Track Can Look Unreal From The Drone And Feel Wrong To Ride

Social media rewards big shapes. A perfect berm and a clean jump face from 40 metres up look like a finished job. Then you ride it and something's off — you're braking where you shouldn't, sitting up mid-section, or fighting the bike into every corner.

The drone flattens the thing that matters

From above you can see shapes, but you can't see timing. You can't see what happens to the front end when the ground changes halfway through a corner, or how much time you get between two features at race pace. That's all felt, not seen.

Common problems that photograph well

• Corners with a beautiful radius that spit you out facing nothing
• Jump faces built to look symmetrical instead of built for the approach speed
• Long straights that make the lap look fast and make it boring
• Features so close together that only one group of riders can link them
• Cambers cut for the camera that shed water straight onto the racing line

How to actually judge a track

Ride it. If you can't, watch onboard footage instead of drone footage, and watch a mid-pack rider rather than the fastest bloke there. Where does an average rider stop working with the track and start surviving it? That's your answer.

Why Adam rides what he builds

Twenty-five plus years behind the controls and the handlebars is the whole point of the method. Shapes get checked from the seat during the build, not signed off from a photo afterwards. If a section doesn't feel right on the bike, it changes.