khp
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Posts posted by khp
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The problem I experienced last year was that coming up the straight at my local track I passed someone but their speed was fast and by the end of the straight I never had room to get into my position to take the line I was comfortable on, I made the turn but was ragged and I guess out of control (which is probably why I remember it so vividly) so I think I charged the turn and fortunately got away with it!
Bobby,
I dont recall if you did Level 2, but if you did, do you remember the "Change lines" drill?
In a situation like this, the "change lines" drill is good for these situations where you cannot hit your "normal" turn point, but you should still be able to hit almost the same line through the corner by turning a little later and quicker (I think - not totally sure about this though), if you're closer to the inside of the turn than you normally would.
Say your normal entry into the corner is at the extreme outside of the corner, and you have a good TP and line that obeys the Throttle Control rule. Now, if your new entry is in the middle of the track, you should still be able to hit the same line by intersecting your trajectory and the "good line" and making a Turn point and steering input that makes you hit that line.
OK, so it's a bit difficult to explain without a drawing, but I hope you get the gist of my point.
Regards,
Kai (off to sleep - it's past midnight!)
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Although with your KZ it may be "as simple as grabbing a bar end and lift it up" that is because the bars on that bike are fairly high, and its center of gravity is probably lower, providing a lot of leverage. The bars on a sportbike are around gas tank height so there is not necessarily any advantage there. I have had to pick up sportbikes a few times and it is not that easy and using the tank rather than the bars does seem to work better because it is in the middle.
Doing it in the gravel trap doesn't help either. But grabbing the barend is the way to go, even on sportbikes. Make sure the steering is locked all the way to one side, and see that the front wheel digs into the ground (or gravel). Then lift with your legs and back.
Kai
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If you are most comfortable with your eyes level to the horizon then by all means do it, but you shouldn't be uncomfortable with your head being in line with the bike either.
I've stayed away and stepped back thinking about the levelling your eyes points made, while sanding an old race fairing (a very boring task that takes about $0.01 of my attention).
And I think you nailed the crux of it there. Leveling your eyes with the horizon is simply a crutch - it can be useful in the beginning when you are crawling, but it should be thrown away when you can walk comfortably, so as not to become a liability when you start running.
Kai
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I don't think I did that drill. What's the "relax drill" stuman?
Kai
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Having worked out for 30 years, reading volumes on nutrition and several types of workouts, I wasn't looking for general fitness information. I try to stay in reasonable shape (power lifting 3x week + 3x cardio/week) - primarily due to vanity
However, I was interested in how the instructors stay in shape, if they do something that keeps them in top form. Or if they rely on lots of riding? What are the demands for you to stay in shape, considering you probably do many long days in the saddle during classes?
Andy Ibbott writes in "Performance Riding Techniques" that basically to become "bike-fit" you need to ride the real bike and goes on to quote a top racer about always ending up being knackered after the first test post-winter (I'm paraphrasing from memory here). But it sure helps having a good cardio-vascular fitness.
Kai
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Here's some pics of the event posted on another forum - you may have to join... hope not.
You need to sign up to see the big pics, but not the thumbnails.
Oh well, we have stuman's pics here
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I am almost ready to scrdule a class date, I just cant afford the 2 day camp for now so im looking at the 1 day at the streets in march. Would this be a good starting point or should I wait and just do a 2 day camp in the fall.
I will do the 2 day camp either way, but I just want to get started for now.
In my personal opinion, you don't need to do the 2-day camp as a starter. Booking just 1 day or 2 days in a row will be an excellent start anyway.
Cheers,
Kai
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Maybe you have hit upon this answer; maybe it's just experience. By that I mean simple saddle time v. fierce racing competition experience.
On a track that I know fairly well I am comfortable with blind corners or blind crests because l know where to place the bike when I enter these spots; whether my head is level or not doesn't mean anything. In corners where I can see - it simply isn't a big deal if my horizon is level or not. I think of exiting the Carousel at Sears Point (or the Andretti Hairpin at Laguna) where I try to hook the end of that corner - if I tried to add in level my head at that point my head would probably fall off my shoulders.
Rainman,
I'm not sure what point you're trying to make here.
My point was that leveling your eyes with the horizon will reduce the SR triggers, and that can't be a bad thing. So teaching riders to leveling their eyes can be used as a stepping stone - it's a helper, a tool to overcome a particular SR at a particular level of training. But it's not an end in itself to bike stability, like the throttle control rule.
Kai
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I had a quick conversation with Keith on this topic yesterday and I'm paraphrasing here, but his response was that leveling your head causes more problems then it resolves, it puts your neck at a strange angle and makes it harder to go with the bike.
Sorry for coming back to this one, but could you elaborate a little on Keith's comments to this, as I'm rather puzzled by that comment?
I find that keeping my eyes level with the horizon (or close to that) makes wonders for NOT triggering SRs, and I find that (street) riders that I talk to / work with on cornering all come back with an agreement to this statement after trying it out (on the road or track).
Now, the guys in MotoGP are hardly our joe average rider, and their SR levels are clearly on an entirely different planet from us mere mortals: This make me suspect that they deliberately choose "the lesser evil" from their level of expertise, which is not to strain their necks etc, since they have internalized fully the non-horizontal eyes so much that not doing this doesn't impede their riding.
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I learned the two-step some ten years ago, and have been using that ever since on the road and track, so going through the drill didn't make that difference to me, although I sure had (and probably still have) some bad habits that need corrections.
Instead, I'm going to pick the knee-to-knee, because it gave me something that I couldn't find in TOTW2 or anywhere else. It still feels awkward to keep back from the tank, but I'm practising (but not right now when there's snow everywhere).
Kai
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I've had a blast for the last couple of weeks - spinning the rear wheels on the gas, making it slide even on the straights. And all in my dog-of-a-van Toyota HiAce, which is normally impossible to get to spin up the rear because of it's puny 78 ponies - of which several surely have moved on to pension.
But come start of January, we have gotten another 4 inches of snow every week or so - like just this morning. And even with proper winter-tires, an underpowered, light, rear-wheel driven van can spin it up
:D Awww ... I miss springtime so I can take out the bikes. Only comfort is that I giving the racer its proper amount of TLC at the moment (which makes me wanna go riding even more).
Kai
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If you place a tall or overly large person onto a 250 or even some 600s and they may not feel as comfortable as they would on a different 600 or 750 or whatever works.
Remember that a large displacement doesn't equate to a physically large bike. My R1 comes to mind :-)
But heck, I happily rode my Polini DreamBike, which are around 16" long and the seat is 8" off the ground!
But the point stands: what is 'comfortable' to you is highly personal.
Kai
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I'm not a CSS coach, but my advice would be to take Level 1 & 2, and go out and practice the things you've learned and let it sink in. Once you feel that you are ready for another 2-days of training, go back.
Whether that's in 1-2 months or next year doesn't matter that much.
For what it's worth, I did 1+2 and 3+4 with just 2 months in between (but that was because Keith was coming to Europe - my plan had been to wait for this season before going back to school).
Hope this helps,
Kai
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Interesting - thank you!
Do students tend to end up with blisters as well after a long day at one of your classes, or does the relative lack of speed and aggression usually protect them?
I've never had anyone complain of it, they usually complain of mental fatigue or physical tiredness.
I suspect some of the students may well be able to comment if they have or not. guys/girls, any comment?
Never had blisters on my hands from riding a motorcycle.
Other sports like running, taekwondo (even a double-blister once) and tennis/squash yes. Motorcycling no.
But then again, I'm very far off from MotoGP level of riding - I might be able to qualify for a Rookie600 race, but that's all.
Kai
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Right MX riders as you most rightly point out do indeed use this style, they do so for a reason. They have knobblies tyres that can dig into the terrain, search out traction. They also don't from the little experience and understanding I have, have anywhere near the traction levels of a road bike (race bike specifically), so, when the tyre does break loose, it doesn't have the chance to load/unload to any kind of the same levels of forces, i.e. it cannot fire the rider of the higside of the bike. In most cases, if you break traction on a dirt bike, you'd probably be having it just spin around from underneath you (a low side).
From what I understand from talking to others and reading a bit about MX riding, the point of pushing the bike down under you is because the surface isn't exactly flat underneath the bike - there are big U-shaped grooves in the turns, and by pushing the bike down, they can better use the "positive camber" provided by the walls of the groove.
Cheers,
Kai
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Counter Steering (track Cornering)
Let's me be honest - my current cornering style is bad!
When approaching the corner, I pull upright into the tank, move my body weight across as I brake/change down and bring the bike over – this is where it all starts to unravel – the first part of the curve is fine. The initial lean is the result of forward pressure on the inside bar, but once I start to enter a deeper lean I find I am pushing down on the inside bar. After a few laps I am exhausted.
How is under lower arm positioned? Your lower arm should be as horizontal as possible, to get the maximum leverage from your push* on the handlebar.
*) Technically, we should push perpendicular to the steering heads rotation axis, but that's would mean that the elbow should be even lower than the handlebar...
Cheers, Kai
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Welcome aboard Russel,
Good to see Kiwis here.
Kai, almost antipodean to NZ
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Keep in mind sliding will slow you down! You need to stay on the edge of sliding to use all of the availible grip. Once the tires are sliding they lose grip.
Tell that to Gary McCoy - he was sliding everywhere, and its wasn't exactly the slow way around the track when he was riding GP500.
So let's here it people, don't be afraid to post up your thoughts. Let's here from some others...What do you feel for? How do you know how much traction is available ?
On my small Polini "DreamBike" loosing the front (by putting too much weight on the knee) was quite undramatic - I simply noticed that I was going straight instead of doing a turn, so pressing the front tire into the tarmac would fix that instantly. Mind you, that the Dreambike weighs 20kg and I weight around 90kg including gear.
On the big bike, sliding the front has been from vertical to horizontal in less than a blink of an eye (but slow enough to be able to think "oh ######, this will get expensive" before hitting the tarmac).
I have slided the rear twice (both not on purpose) - both times it was the feeling of the bike just going sideways underneath me, with no warning. Probably very close to what Fajita Dave calls "falling out under me":
The first time was because a cager in front of me was putting down a nice oil mist on the Nordschliefe. I came up to the next corner (taking it veeeeery easily) and suddenly the rear stepped left, moving my angle of direction maybe 15 degrees or so tighter in the turn.
Second time was on the exit of a fast, heavily banked left-hand turn on Anderstorp Raceway. The bike stepped out, gripped, decided not to highside me, and wobbled a few times (meanwhile my mind went "ok lowsiding ... highsiding? no, lowsiding the other way ... no! it stayed upright (phew - let's go into the pits next time)"). A fellow rider said I had laid down maybe a 10m line of rubber in that turn.
To my mind, I have absolutely zip feeling of when I'm close to sliding the rear and how to detect this. This clearly limits my laptime improvements, since I don't ride as hard as I clearly could in the turns (I'm doing 1:12 laps on Ring Knutstorp, where the lap record for bikes is just under 1:00)
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IT is possible that I just happened to get the one bad one. But I'd proceed with caution. Don't go by the sales numbers.
As the saying goes .... 100 squillion fly's can't be wrong - eat ######!
One of my favourite pet peeves: It's very seldom that the technically best product that wins the market - it's the usually best marketing of an inferior product that wins.
Ahem; now let's get back to the riding business. I have more or less decided on the ContourHD 1080p. I just need to save up the cash for it
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A couple of years ago, I was leading a group ride with the local university motorcycling club around one of our favorite haunts - a "golden triange" of great roads around 6 miles long. These roads not only have twisties, but also go fair bit up and down by Danish standards. We tend to have a lot of new riders in the club, since most members are student who've just gotten their first bike, so all group rides have an experienced rider in front guiding the way.
I was coming up to a left turn where the inside was obscured by a patch of fir trees, shifted to hangout (as I usually do on non-commuting rides), the bike was fully in my own lane, but my head was across the centerline. As I was about 20m from the approaching turn I thought "Nah, it's better to stay completely in my own lane should some idiot coming in the other direction be too close to the centerline for comfort" - so I moved the bike a bit further into my own.
After making my turnpoint, I found that a bus travelling in the other direction appeared from behind the trees - and we was 0.5m ACROSS THE CENTER LINE! Instead of triggering SR's I just pushed the outer bar, standing the bike up, moving the bike and me to the right side of the lane and out of harms way, pushing the inside again, and I continued my arc, but displaced a 1m or so to the right.
Not exactly a heroic save, but it could have been really messy if it had been one of the unexperienced riders in the group who had to deal with the situation (we have a large disparity of riding skills in the club, because of the new riders).
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Big congrats to all three of you!
Kai
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Hi I was just wondering which courses I could take that would give me a race license? I heard that only code race would grant me one, and that by taking level 1-4 I wouldn't be entitled to one. Thanks.
To the best of my knowledge, taking Level 1-4 will NOT entitle you to a race license.
In order to get a race license in Denmark, you need to know the technical regulations regarding the bike, equipment and the flags. Being a fast or even consistent rider is not a prerequisite for getting the license
I believe that the requirements are pretty close to that in most other countries as well.
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I ran across this the other day and I thought "I want one!":
http://www.mavizen.com/Bikes_and_Kits/TTX02.html
It would be interesting to ride one and compare the dynamics, cornering, etc. Has anyone done that?
Very cool indeed. But their words about "built-in webserver" and "runs on Linux OS" makes me wonder if it's just an elaborate prank. From the
video they're linking to, it obviously isn't.The power pack isn't huge: the biggest is 11kWh and a MotoGP has around 240bhp, and uses on average, say, half the power for around 45minutes of racing. That's ½*240bhp*736W/bhp*3/4h = ~66kWh, ie 6x the energy of the TTX02.
What am I missing here? That the TTX2 doesn't put out a lot of bhp?
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Greg,
I have the ContourHD and have used the GoPro. I like that the waterproof container of the GoPro but I don't like how much it sticks out when mounted. Having said that, it seems easier to just mount and go with the GoPro than it is with the ContourHD. The ContourHD seems to require a bit more thought in mounting. Knowing when the batteries are dead appears to be a problem as the owner of th GoPro has checked it several times before I go out yet it only recorded 10-15 seconds because the batteries were dead.Excellent, it was exactly this kind of info I was looking for. BTW did you see the waterproof case VholdR is coming out with? It's quire compact, but it looks more like for diving than anything.
The ContourHD (first gen 720p version) is small in non-obtrusive wherever you mount it but it has a finicky battery connection which can make it lose power midway through a run. Until I reinforced the battery retention method this was a big problem but now it's not a problem at all - it just works.Sounds like that it's the same problem that my friend had with his 720p camera - the power would cut from the motorcycle vibrations. He had his battery replaced under warranty- apparently VholdR had a batch of batteries that were 0.5-1mm too short, resulting in this problem. With the new battery, he haven't had problems so far, when going snowboarding.
Their methods of creating video files are decidedly different. Video editing programs react differently to files from each and they're both equally hard to work with with Sony's Vegas editing software but in different ways. The supplied editing program with the ContourHD is lousy in that it crashes many times and is very slow. I have no experience with any supplied software from GoPro.Personally, I like the ContourHD better. Either one will be fine and the end quality will depend more on your knowledge of post production editing and compression techniques.
My videos can be found at http://youtube.com/gkgorman
Nice videos, and very fine riding too
I presume the raw files are much better quality than what I see on youtube.
Post-processing? Why do you like I've got a Full-HD LCD TV
I've previously used Pinnacle Studio (about 6 versions ago), so I'll probably give that a go first.
Thanks again for your valuable input,
Kai
:D 
Available Traction
in Cornering and Techniques
Posted
My guess is that he was just a tad too greedy with the gas, offloading the front too much causing the front end to slide.
Kai