rchase
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Posts posted by rchase
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If you do decide to use more aggressive body position I would suggest working your way into it slowly. It really can change the way the bike steers and feels and it's important you know what to expect. The more aggressive you get with it the more it seems to change (at least for me). I actually spent a bit of time having to "re learn" the steering input I was putting in on the bars.
This might also be something you want to try working on when you do Level 4 again (we are all repeat offenders here of course). I had a body position I was super comfortable with the last time I did Level 4. I did a session with one of the coaches and they made the suggestion of using the pivot steer action to lock my leg further into the tank and move my backside further off of the seat. It worked wonders and was one of those 5 minute fixes that involved a few minutes on the coaches bike on the side stand. The coaching you would need would likely be different but it's always amazingly helpful and insightful. The coaches always know those right questions to ask that make you go AH HA!
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First here's an interesting thing you can do to analyze body position. Take a piece of paper and place it on the center line of the bike covering the inside of the turn. If you are using "good" body position there should be very little of the rider present. This is a good visual indicator of where your weight is. In your photos most of your weight is right on top of the bike. Do the same thing for a photo of a professional rider and you see maybe and arm and maybe a shoulder.
Why do we contort ourselves around on the bike? Weight shift accomplishes a few things. It allows us to use less lean angle. That less lean angle allows us to have more of our tire available that we can use for additional turning or additional speed if we choose. Techniques like the hook turn allow us to make last minute corrections in bike geometry and enhance steering ability.
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I also see guys slung way off the side of the bike most artificially with their knee down and the bike at maybe 25 degrees and I really don't see the point of going down that road to just end up with less control and feel for the bike.
I actually used to be of this school of thought myself. Aggressive body position works. The key of course is what's aggressive is very subjective. Finding something that works for you is the most critical thing.
I have found with more aggressive body position I use less bike lean angle. When I got faster and suddenly had unused portions of my tire again it left me scratching my head for a bit. I found a position that worked well for me even though I know I can improve it.
I would not worry about your knee not touching. I would work on trying to refine your body position as even professional riders tend to be a "work in progress" over time. One other thing you could do in the short term is use longer pucks. Woodcraft rain pucks are some of the longer ones you can buy that might give you that extra length you might need to "make contact".
Knees touching the pavement is also a style thing. It's not really a requirement. My knee pucks seldom touch the pavement while other riders chew up pucks as fast as they wear out tires. Even more important than using a knee puck to judge lean angle is developing your internal speedometer to know how fast you are going. The information that your knee is touching is of limited use when you enter way too fast and are about to crash.
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I love topics like this. I happened to pass a Cycle Gear on the way from the mechanic picking up my bike and walked out with an Ogio Trucker 8800 gear bag. In the back seat of the car I managed to quickly store two sets of boots, a helmet (inside it's motod case), two sets of gloves and a Forcefield Back protector with plenty of room to spare. You could easily get a suit, helmet, boots, back protector and gloves inside of it and have tons of room left over inside. They had a less expensive Fox racing bag that was also pretty cavernous inside but it lacked wheels.
Here's a link.
http://www.btosports.com/p/OGIO-TRUCKER-8800-GEAR-BAG
I'm glad I picked one up as it will save me a ton of time and hassle getting ready to go to the track. I typically had to bring down the small pieces of gear like gloves helmets boots and back protectors and always worried about forgetting something in my several trips. My tow vehicle was also a mess on the inside with random sets of gloves and boots and other gear strewn all over the back seat.
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If you head to your local Cycle gear they typically have gear bags for Motorcross stuff. A friend of mine has one and it seems to work well for him.
MotoD has a great helmet bag it even has some well thought out netting for a second visor. The school sells them. I used to have my main and spare helmet just out in the open in the back of the car heading to the track. The helmet bag gives me a lot more options on where to put them not having to worry about them getting scratched or bumped into.
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Tyler,
Sorry to hear about the crash. You and the bike will mend quicker and easier than you think!
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Here's a challenge for the Forum; try to come up with a name for Yellow Duck's personal racing team. and let's see if we can make one up that is as cool as the Prairie Dog Racing Team's. Names with Logo's will be graded higher in this contest.
So , perhaps its too soon but, "Team 3 and 2 Half Fingers "
Oh god. Too soon!
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My advice? Ease into it and see what the bike does when the front end gets light. If it's still stable increase your speed as long as you remain comfortable. If you aren't comfortable don't do it. It's costing you attention. There's plenty of other places on the track to make up that time.
Thanks, sounds good, but this "feel comfortable" needs to be digged in further. I have another thread ready to go...
Sounds like an interesting thread. I have struggled with "feeling comfortable" on the bike myself and it was not just a question of ergonomics.
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I roughly remember part of one of Keith's books with a topic called "steer for the rear" which might be some good reading. Essentially what it says is the actual steering is handled by the rear tire. The front tire sets the lean angle. Once the lean angle is set what is the front tire actually doing other than riding along?
On high powered bikes it's quite common for the front wheel to lift under heavy acceleration exiting corners. Wheelies had bothered me in the past because of the perception of the steering and braking being lost. You can set the front wheel down very quickly by shifting, slowing your roll on or lightly dragging the rear brake. Once you get used to them they are a lot of fun. Even short shifting one of my bikes at certain tracks gives me a small "micro wheelie" under full power. I recently rode at a track where a friend of mine always did a wheelie coming out of a certain turn. The first few times it happened to me as my speed increased I tried to stop it. I eventually found it was more work trying to prevent the wheel from lifting and a lot more fun to just let it happen lap after lap.
Will you crash? That depends on the bike. Most of the modern 1L bikes have wheelie control that keeps things sane and keeps you away from the tipping point where you go backwards. Beyond that it's all up to the traction profile of the tire and the situation you are presented with on the track. It's certainly possible to crash but is it likely based on the specific situation? That's something you have to feel out for yourself and make your own decision on.
I think the most important advice that's been given though is to maintain a light grip on the bars. If you do get the front unloading slightly or even fully lifting it prevents you from losing control of the bike with a tank slapper. It's important to keep in mind that the bike wants to remain stable when it's moving and it's our inputs that tend to make things go wrong. Motorcycles are somewhat of a paradox. A machine that's at rest is completely unstable and will fall over. At speed it helps the rider out by correcting issues on it's own and does not even need a rider on board to remain balanced and travel in a straight line.
My advice? Ease into it and see what the bike does when the front end gets light. If it's still stable increase your speed as long as you remain comfortable. If you aren't comfortable don't do it. It's costing you attention. There's plenty of other places on the track to make up that time.
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I love the guy on the red #33 bike. You can almost hear him cackling like a mad man in his helmet while he drifts through that corner.
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Wow. Not a lot really to add here as Hotfoot nailed it.
Except for a couple of tidbits. It's important to keep in mind that rear brakes ABS is completely disabled for Race mode on the S1000RR. This is to make it easier to "back it in" for corners.
As Hotfoot said the Race ABS system on the S1000RR is one of the better systems on the market. With the addition of the Race Calibration kit you can fine tune ABS intervention even more as well as many other settings on the bike.
Some systems however are designed mostly for road use and don't work as well on the track. They are limited in function and are tuned for the "worst case scenerio" of a wet road as most road riders don't use the brakes super hard all the time. Many of these systems end up being disabled for track use.
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A collection of some amazing riding set to an 80's sound track.
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Hey. Welcome to the forums! I have found the forums extremely helpful for those "weird questions" that pop up from time to time. Having a group of similar minded people to bounce questions off of is helpful.
BTW? The screen name Webberman? Are you the go to guy for the next cookout?
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Something I learned the hard way is it really does not matter what bike you are riding. Riding issues follow you on any bike no matter how big or small it is. Visual issues are much the same approaching a corner on a S1000RR at 160mph as it would an SV or a 250 at their slower speeds. Granted the consequences and SR's are slightly more pronounced at higher speeds but the problem and result is much the same. I have "parked it" heading into corners on both little 400cc machines and big 1L bikes because of the same visual issues. Unfortunately reducing power output and increasing handling does not fix rider error. It just makes it slightly less noticeable.
One other thing that I learned the hard way is while it's important to fully understand the physics it's really easy to over think things. Coming up on a corner at high speed is the last place you want extraneous thoughts and doubt in your mind.
The last thing I will touch on is faith. Something I am finally starting to have myself. It takes a lot of faith to know that your tires are going to stick since starting out there's not really a lot of ways to "sample" that traction safely. It's a huge unknown at first.
I have a notebook where I keep notes on my riding. I have a quote that helps me a LOT when it comes to matters of faith.
"Trust yourself, Trust your abilities, Trust the amazing engineering under you and RELAX! You will be just fine"
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I have to agree with the sentiments here of gear and training.
Despite our best advice there's a culture out there that's against rider training and safety gear. It's truly unfortunate that many put "style" or "street cred" above their own well being. It's often impossible to use logic to reason with them. I don't really see laws really working to solve the problem either. Many of them enjoy running from the police. :/
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What SHOULD this rider have done?
Well the super obvious one is to use the correct method to actually steer the motorcycle.
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Target fixation for sure. Stiff on the bars. Rolling out of the throttle. Those are the ones that jumped out at me. Anybody see others?
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I saw this video on Facebook. The good thing is despite the riders lack of gear he appears to be ok in the video.
The reason I'm sharing the video is it's a pretty graphic demonstration on how body steering is not very effective to turn a motorcycle. The rider is on a very capable sport bike that can't negotiate a simple freeway entrance ramp because of his body steering technique.
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Hey. Don't worry. You aren't the only one with this problem. I'm a level 4 student and I'm dealing with the same issue from time to time. Despite the school's amazing training I occasionally revert back to "what I know" which tends to slow me down.
I agree with Kevin. Visual skills will allow you to carry the corner speed that you need in order to get the lean angle you desire.
It's important however to look at how all of this works together. Lean angle turns the bike. The slower the speed the less lean you need to get through the corner. The better the body position the less lean you need as well. I was quite puzzled for a while when I got better at body position and suddenly was no longer using all of my tire.
Working on your visual skills to get you through the corner is what you want to do. Don't worry about the lean angle or knee dragging. It's a byproduct of higher corner speeds and "getting it right".
One thing that's a bit unconventional that's helped me tremendously was a 2up ride with a fast rider. Feeling the cornering forces from a faster rider and being able to know you have traction at higher speeds works wonders on your internal speedometer. I got off of the back of my friend's bike and got back on my own and was 12 seconds a lap faster without really trying. Fair warning though. The first few corners on the back of your friends bike will set off every panic button you have. Pick someone you really trust who has lots of experience with passengers. My friend happened to be Nate Kern the BMW factory test rider. Here's a video of someone else doing a 2up ride with Nate.
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I have personally seen the value of moving my upper body mid turn. It's too much of a weight shift advantage to stop doing. I have experienced going wide and then sticking my head out in the hook turn and almost running over the apex. It works! Sometimes too well at times.
Jason's message is slightly controversial but if you look at what he was trying to say overall it makes sense. There's a lot of people out there (probably not many of us) that are wearing themselves out and not really gaining much speed advantage from it.
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Jason Pridmore wrote a rather controversial article that I found through Facebook. While many won't agree with what he had to say I think he's touched on a number of things we should really think about when it comes to body position and our riding.
http://starmotorcycle.com/body-position-moto-gp-comparison-just-isnt-realistic/
I still think practicing good body position is a good thing. When we ultimately get faster we already are positioned so our bike is less likely to run wide. We just have to be a bit realistic about it.
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I have a 2014 that's completely stock and a 2013 that's had more than it's share of extras installed including Ohlins Suspension, HP Power Kit and Carbon Fibre wheels. I rode my 2013 at the school at Barber and was pretty uninterested in riding the new bike even though I had one reserved. At the next to the last session as I was going out on my 2013 Trevor said to me "are you even going to try our bike" and I started to feel guilty having a bike just sitting there. I took the school bike out on the last session of the day and I was actually really impressed. I ended up riding the 2015 for the last half of the second day. It was great being able to compare and experience both generations back to back.
The 2015 was pretty amazing. While not as ultimately powerful as my 2013 at Barber the 2015 had an edge power wise due to BMW moving the power down lower in the rev band. On my 2013 there was never enough straight pavement to really keep the bike in it's power sweet spot for my level of comfort. The 2015 seemed to always lurk in that power sweet spot. The 2015 had some pretty substantial chassis and geometry changes that made it turn in effortlessly. Almost as effortless as my 2013 with it's light as a feather wheels. But the biggest thing about the 2015 that had me cackling like a crazy person was the auto blipper. Just being able to flick the lever and have the bike take care of the rev matched downshift saved me a ton of attention heading into the corner. I found myself going deeper into the corners and trusting the shifter to do it's things in places I would never have imagined shifting before.
The DDC system was pretty amazing too. It was almost completely transparent to me. I always "notice" when I go from my stock suspension on the 2014 to the Ohlins on the 2013. For a stock system it's much like having a well setup Ohlins suspension on the bike. Actually slightly better. One that adjusts itself 100x a second. I think as well BMW enhanced the stock pegs a bit. On previous generation bikes I always upgrade to the HP rearsets right away as the stock ones never worked well for my long legs. It was not a problem at all on the 2015. I noticed as well the school's mechanics were able to quickly swap bikes between GP shift and standard shift with a single screw. I'm used to riding both patterns as I have one that's GP and one that's standard. I rode the 2015 in standard without issue.
BMW also made a LOT of changes in the DTC system. Stock the 2014 bikes especially in the more conservative modes hold you back a bit and are slightly overprotective. I actually had to "re learn" throttle control moving to my 2013 because it's DTC system is a lot less restrictive. The 2013's less restrictive DTC tuning gave me a few surprises when I got greedy with the throttle. The 2015's DTC system seems VERY similar to the 2013 with the power kit. It's slightly more protective but a massive improvement over the stock 2014 DTC tuning. It was so good actually that I never even thought to ask to try Race mode. Sport mode was pretty awesome.
I'm normally a pretty conservative rider and I take my time out on the track. Within a few corners on the 2015 I found myself being transformed into a bit of a hooligan to the point where eventually had to think about being a bit more conservative. It was pretty amazing to me that I got that comfortable with a completely new to me bike in that short of a time frame. What's more amazing to me is the bike was mostly stock like it would come off of a showroom floor minus the school's bodywork and other protective equipment.
Within minutes of stepping off the 2015 I was thinking about what color scheme I wanted for my 3rd BMW. Then of course logic and reality stepped in. I need to thin my herd of bikes a bit before buying another bike as I'm running out of room (first world problems). I'm doing the next best thing in the short term. My 2013 has a Proshift autoblipper on order that should be here in a few weeks from the UK. Long term I'm still planning on a 3rd BMW and will probably build a 3rd generation bike that's similar to my 2013 but more as a dedicated track bike.
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Wiping down the rotors with brake cleaner is not a bad idea to keep them clear of oil. Other than that they don't really need much cleaning. ABS rings however do need to be kept regularly clean since they are an optical reference for the ABS sensor if your bike is equipped with ABS.
Question on your upgrade. What are you looking to accomplish with the upgrade? I never gave much thought to braking until I rode the school's brake bike. On a stock set of pads and rotors I was absolutely amazed at the stopping power.
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Great topic. Nothing useful to add here.
I'm just so glad that there are other people who understand the mysteries of motorcycle suspension. I'll keep reading. I might even learn something in the process.
My Knee Gauge Doesn't Worky
in Cornering and Techniques
Posted
Heh heh. Notice where the zipper of T-mckeen's leathers are? On the side of the tank. Here's a shot for fun. Taken at the school. Over exagerated body position in a slow turn gives you hardly any bike lean angle at all. Try the sheet of paper trick on these photos to see where the weight is.
P.S. This is by no means a good body position. I notice several things I could improve such as dropping my inside elbow for starters.