lwarner

Pretty cool article. Would've been awkward if he'd had on a Casio, hahah... I liked the watch bit.

Hey Chuck, I haven't heard of people shaving tires before. I know the feeling you're getting at, when your tire starts to get a squarer profile and you lean onto that edge it can feel less stable, like it wants to run wide or fall in. Like Thomas, I would also be curious what pressures you run and also how often you check pressure? Do you have issues with the front and rear equally?

I agree with Cobie on the ideal levels to do moving forward. Also, Lvl 3 is definitely about MORE than body position! We cover BP on Lvl 2 and if possible you ride the lean bike then too. Lvl 3 goes more into how you can best position and move your body on the machine for maximum benefit. About how to move around with the most stability and where to move to. It's cool.

I don't know anything about pedialyte but I went to mayoclinic.com and it said "For rehydration (to replace the water and some important salts [electrolytes]):" a teenager or adult would need 23-45 mL per pound of body weight. So they would recommend a person weighing 185lbs drink between 1.124 and 2.199 GALLONS over 4-6 hours. I'm no doctor, I don't know your weight and I don't know how big the bottle you drank half of was but if those numbers are correct it makes me suspect you may not have had sufficient electrolytes to replace what you'd sweat out.

I don't think the pace would matter in spotting mistakes much. Things like chopping the throttle or adding lean while rolling it on would be evident regardless of pace. Needless to say, at a high ability level, where the rider is able to control the bike at very high speed there would be less or subtler mistakes as the margin for error is smaller and big mess ups at that speed would probably mean we were watching a crash video...

I know Cobie said this but... I'll be there!

Cobie's right about the boots, that's what caused it and ultimately what I changed to prevent a recurrence. It was pressure along the outside of my shin halfway between my knee and ankle that caused it. I'd been trying some new boots and there was just a TINY bit of pressure at the top of the boot, not enough to bother me until I took them off and had no dorsiflexion. I tried on MANY pairs of boots and got a pair of Alpinestars Supertech R's because there is an inner and an outer boot and you can adjust tension separately, with the inner boot equalizing the tension very well, snug without any tight spots and the outer boot has a ratchet on top that I am very careful not to tighten... I actually keep mine as loose as common sense allows. Nothing to do with the knee in my case. It took around 6 months for me to get back to normal, the neurologist I saw told me nerves take a while to heal and to be patient. I'd also be curious whether you ride with the ball of your foot on the end of the peg, in which case there's going to be a high PSI on that little spot, or if your foot is flat across the whole length of the peg and the pressure is spread over the larger surface area?

Great feedback Ardi, JT and the rest of the staff will be stoked!

Edit: duplicate post deleted.

Dazza, it sounds like you are on the right track in your first post when you mention throttle control and being stiff on the inside. Is there a speed that you know for certain you can ride with good technique? Where your SRs won't kick in and you can ride analytically? I think that through perfecting your technique the speed will come gradually, without thought, intimidation or SRs. My .02. P.S. If you don't have Stomp Grips or Tech Spec they could really help with your lock on/push and release/relax.

Why don't we sell those? I want to see Keith do an infomercial!

Becoming more aware of exactly what is taking place when you steer the bike will make you more able to control your bike. Having certainty on exactly what input is needed produced an amazing result in my own riding, particularly at very high speeds (140+mph) where the input requires more force and you have less time to make it. Also, the idea of sticking your head out over your hand (and into 140+ winds) and counting on the steering to take care of itself is pretty unappealing to me... I like to tuck out of the wind.

Hey Laura, now that you mention it I've seen that at some track orgs.

Nice pics UFI. Where's the track?

Barber gets my vote, it's a fun track with nice facilities, beautiful surroundings and lots of cool sculptures around. I also love Thunderbolt in New Jersey. In California my favorite is Infineon (Sears Pt.) followed by Streets. Streets really is a great track to learn on because it has a bit of everything. I also like the infield track in Vegas because it's so short you get a ton of laps on it.

There's a lot of his forehead showing...? Is that basically what you're getting at?

Haha, did it look like this?

Sounds like a blast! Thanks for the write up, did you take any pics?

I'd like to see what the riders actual speed was in each of the various pictures personally. There's a few threads on Body Position on the forum already, I like the one in the first link best. None of the examples in the pic you posted look ideal to my eye. Also, you mentioned that in pic 3 the rider looks parallel but that's not the way he looks to me. *LINK* *LINK* *LINK*

I agree with everything Stuman said, but this one stands out for me. Learn one piece at a time, it's okay to get a bit "fuzzy" on a previous skill while you learn something new.

So you know that you have closing speed but it is wasted because you run into him/her right at the apex? Would you still need to use the brakes if you timed it so that your greater corner speed met his slower speed after he'd left the apex?

Well, in chapter 4 in TOTW2 there's a section called "Stuck On the Gas" that may answer that. There's also some info about how the RPMs react to leaning the bike over onto the side of the tire, which has a smaller diameter... if you don't adjust the throttle to meet the difference in RPM how do you think that would manifest itself: would there be engine braking, would it be neutral (no engine braking), would there be the opposite of engine braking (Ummmm engine fixing? LOL)? It seems to me that your perceptions are accurate.

Good to here, I've already encountered 'opinions' I didn't really agree with elsewhere but I'm really not going to be too postured about things. This is a new form of riding to me so I'm gonna suck up all the info I can and hopefully apply it. But I already know I need mentoring. Guitars, well I have more of them than fingers and toes (yes I have all of them..lol). Just about any flavor you can imagine, built quite a few as well (another hobby mine). Played most my life, played clubs @ 15 with rock bands one night and jazz combos with guys old enough to be my grand parents the next. Played the west coast curcuits for a long time (Oakland CA is home) in long hair shredding metal bands till about the early '90's where I got tired of being a starving musician. Been a programmer for many years now and starving far less! Thanks for the greet man! That's awesome, I play a little. One of these days I'm going to realize my goal of building an archtop. My brother is an assistant for a producer, he's the pro musician and the one who embraced all the crazy technology they've got for recording these days. Anyways, cheers, enjoy the site.

Great pics! Thanks for posting these.

Welcome to the forum... let the sponging begin! Seriously, you picked a great place to learn... there's a few places out there on the internet that seem to want to help but some of them are full of bull-horns and send folks in the wrong direction. What kind of guitar/s do you play?