Cornering - unlocked level / unlearning

Context - been riding now for 18 - 20 years. Took about 6-7 years to have some coaching. Did a day with rowan sorrel and also jedi many many years ago and this helped me with pumping (esp the legs) and realising a lot of things about my poor technique.

but there's always been one area that has held me back. Cornering! especially berms. The reason being is the outside foot down technique is so embedded in me it's been difficult to change/unlearn. This is especially difficult for berms. I was often trying to change pedal positon on multiple berms ( think bike park wales kinda trails with tons of subsequent berms). There is so much out there about cornering that you need the outside pedals down. This is an issue as we know it doesn't apply to all corners.. Esp berms. I desperately wanted to unlearn this and keep pedals flat and trust the berm and pump/push into the corner.

Now i knew all about bike/body angulation, weighting, vision and using hips more (laser from the belly button). The latter i'd always struggled with.. until this weekend. What unlocked it for me was to open up the knees. point the knees towards the exit of the corner.

Id' seen this explained a bit here

(quite difficult to follow at times)

It completely transformed my riding this weekend. I was able to confidently go round bermed corners no problem .i felt because my hips had turned i had so much more confidence in corners. I knew i'd get round, it just felt so much better. I forced myself to keep pedals level and not drop outside foot. I tend to find left hand corners better as my right foot is forward.

what a revalation!