How to Descend Hawk Hill

One of the Bay Area great loves is descending Hawk Hill (and the ascent). The reason being is that when you ride in northern California, you simply understand that riding here is synonymous with elevation gain, and plenty of it.

The initial descent is something like 18% grade and people in the bay area feel like it is akin to a roller coaster, a steep of a double black in mammoth or a back country couloir line for skiing.

And to have this fun hill be so accessible to the city makes it one of the most trafficked ascents in the area with many folks timing their ascent and practicing their descent.

The thing is, there’s so much written on how to climb a mountain, but what about making sure that you can get down the fastest, and quickest (all without falling off into the pacific ocean).

In this post you will learn about how to practice your descents. You will learn specifically about descending Hawk Hill, though many of these tips will be useful to descending any steep technical grade.

There are plenty of non-technical descents in the bay area that are fantastic (The Muir Beach Entry Descent and the Route One connection between Stinson and Muir Beach), though there are some more technical descents that you might use these tips like the backside of Tam descending into Stinson.

The greatest part about having this hill in the San Francisco city back yard is that if you master this descent, you can ride competently almost anywhere else.

Descending Hawk Hill

There are a couple of things to note before thinking about your specific form on the bike of Hawk hill.

The first thing you ought to know about is the initial descent. It says 18% grade on the sign and you feel every percentage point of it. The down hill is steep and you should trust your brakes for the descent.

Towards the end there is a turn to the right that will always have 2 patches of gravel on the road year round. We can’t confirm if they’re the same exact rocks, or if it’s new rocks every single time, but rest assured that they will always be there.

Pick a line in between the rocks because a cars tires will always have moved them out of the way just wide enough for a bicycle tire.

How to Descend Hawk Hill

Here are the things that our team thinks about when riding down Hawk Hill:

Initial Descent

When you are going down the initial descent, you do want to make sure that you trust your front brakes. (In general here are the items that you should be able to know about your bicycle from at home checkups) Your front brakes have the most stopping power for you before you get into any turns.

Camber

Many of the turns on hawk hill have camber in the road. Use this to your advantage so that you are able to lean in further to the turn than you typically would on flat road.

A bicycle tire can lean in at most 45 degrees before sliding out. Use that knowledge and your understanding of the roads’ camber to your advantage.

Brakes

Your front brakes are by far your most power in terms of the stopping power that you have. Use these brakes to slow yourself to a manageable speed before entering the turn. Then while in the turn, use both brakes to maintain balance while adjusting to the correct speed to hit the apex of the turn.

Tire Maintenance

If you are using disc brakes, this is not a concern. If you are doing Hawk Hill Repeats, be mindful of your front tire and how much you are using it.

You may want to shift to the back brake more often because if you go down too often and are laying on your front tire brake, there may be too much heat in the rim and the tire will blow out.

Line picking

Look very far ahead, not down when choosing a line. Commit to the line.

Typically you will start from the furthest outside of the turn to hit the apex of the turn correctly and end on the furthest outside again after exiting the turn.

This helps you maintain speed because your line have as little turning as possible.

Eyes and Focus

This is the case in almost all sports, look at where you want to go, and not what you want to go. Have faith that you control the bicycle, the bicycle does not control you and you do not need to micromanage every movement of the bicycle.

Your body will move you through the process if you trust it and have practiced on easier non-technical hills before.

Repetition

You will get better over time, and you will see improvement after reading this, but the spades of improvement will come after doing this over and over again repetitively.

Posturing

If you are just beginning at downhill riding, we wouldn’t recommend doing any aero postures to get you down the hill faster.

If you do choose one, go into your drops, lift your sits bone out of your seat, place your weight as far back as possible in your bike (floating over your back wheel) and place your head directly over your handlebars.

Do not try this for your first time down Hawk Hill but practice on more gentle hills. There are too many to choose from in San Francisco.

Cars

You will be going down Hawk Hill far faster than a car will be so either go before them, or wait some minutes before descending.

The cars do make sudden sops because the scenery is so beautiful, so it typically isn’t very safe to ride behind them.

Scenery

Decide before you ride if you will enjoy the scenery or bomb the hill. It’s distracting to do both and when you are looking at how the sun’s rays hits the ocean while bombing, you might go in.

Conclusion: Descending hawk Hill

If you are descending Hawk Hill and want to get better, that is good news. Hawk Hill is one of the more technical descents in the area, very close to the city and a very easy climb.

If you find that you are becoming more adept at descending Hawk Hill, you will notice that almost any technical descent that is put in front of you will be easy. Of course, you may want to do some prep work before jumping directly after into descending Mt. Umunhum.

Make sure that your posture is good and you plan well. It is a great ride.