rchase
-
Posts
1,117 -
Joined
-
Last visited
-
Days Won
12
Posts posted by rchase
-
-
Our off season here is pretty short, but my plans are to make the SuperSingle easier to work on - it has a lot of odd fasteners and spacers and stacked washers to make all the bodywork and various parts and accessories fit. I want to streamline all that so that it is easier to remove fairings, wheels, timers, etc. without having to deal with a ton of little parts and having to use such a variety of different tools. It may require building some custom parts, but after racing it a whole season and taking the fairing off a thousand times, it certainly seems worth it to make that process faster and easier!
LOL. I'm glad I'm not the only person that has a bike with insane fasteners! Taking the bodywork off of my FZR400 requires the same level or organization. Fasteners that fit in one part of the bodywork does not fit in others. Misplace one washer bolt or screw and you spend a ton of time figuring it out again.
Have you considered doing DZUS fasteners? My MV came from the factory with DZUS fasteners for all the bodywork. In about 2 minutes you can bring it down to a bare bike.
Kurvey Girl sells a good selection of various sized DZUS fittings with nice drawings and measurements so you know exactly what you are getting.
-
That is an intelligent and well thought-out answer, thank you. I hear the advice "trust your tires" thrown around a lot at track days, and I was never quite sure what people could do with that advice - it's pretty vague. However, you have outlined a systematic approach to work toward the traction limits of your tires without triggering SRs and with good measurable feedback (data logger and traction control) to track your progress and give you additional info beyond just how the tires feel to you. Good job.
It's always scary to think about riding without maximum possible traction, but I'll say that I learned a LOT about traction riding on some tires that were over cooked and had gotten slippery. Once I felt that bit of slipping and knew the sensation, my fear of the unknowns of traction limits was greatly reduced; I had a much better idea of what to expect. I imagine that the riding you have done in the wet has prepared you well for recognizing it when you really do start pushing the limits of traction in the dry. With the technology you have in the bike and tires and your good riding technique, you will have to be riding really hard to start squirming or sliding the tires; some riders recommend doing some riding on downgraded (less race-oriented) tires, to create an opportunity to feel the tires move around more.
Have you read Keith's article, "The Bands of Traction"?
Hotfoot. On the Article no I had not. Until just a few moments ago. Whoa! I think I'm going to read that again. Thank you for that!
The funny thing about advice you hear around track days. Some of it actually does make sense if you do some digging and find out the why. I rejected a lot of the advice I got in the past because nobody could explain the why logically. I'm taking a slightly different approach now and I hear and listen to the advice and dig for my own why. Sometimes you get some bad advice but at least hearing it and fact checking it for yourself it's always informative even if it is to fully understand why it does not work. Doing your own research misinformation is as powerful and good information as both are an opportunity to learn.
I may (like many other things) be over thinking this. Perhaps the advice "trust your tires" is a clever way of telling me to stop over thinking and just ride. That's the plan for next year.
What's most ironic though about the timing of this conversation is the temperature I will be riding in on the upcoming track day. It's going to be in the 50's all day on a track with mostly right hand turns. Lefts are going to be quite interesting on cold tires. Perhaps I'll learn more about dry traction than I think. Wish me luck! Thank you again for that article!
-
Very cool video. It's always amusing to see the speed differences and advantages and disadvantages 4 vs 2 wheels gives.
-
It's pretty amazing what ultra light wheels do for a bikes ability to turn.
-
Hotfoot,
No problem at all. Always ready to get some insight no matter what.
As for the "Learning to trust my tires". Since the moment I started riding traction has always been a BIG boogie man for me. My dad who taught me how to drive a car was a rally racer and always stressed the importance of understanding how much traction is available by "feeling" the traction you have with intentional slides. Because of this I have always never really trusted the traction I have on motorcycle tires in the dry. In the wet it's not really a problem. The tires are quite easy to get to the edge of grip. I know exactly where I stand in the wet because of that feedback. In the dry the speeds required are higher with a much higher potential of a minor slide to turn into a major mistake. The traction feels limitless but I know for certain it's not. Because it's so hard to feel that edge and know where it is I don't have a lot of trust in the tires. Tire warmers have helped with this mental tick knowing that they are "as warm as they can be" but there's still a lot of mistrust in my mind. Until I actually trust them and head out to the outer limits of traction I'll never fully understand "how much" traction is available. The BMW's traction control system and the datalogger is hugely helpful. The TC system is there to save me from big mistakes and the datalogger can show me what's going on with the traction. Eventually I'll be able to correlate the sensation with the data.
The idea of "trusting my tires" came from a friend of mine who's a rather accomplished rider. He noticed a number of things about my riding towing me around a track and gave me a list of things I should look at improving. One of those things was trusting my tires. A number of his suggestions have helped already. For a while I was never receptive to advice but lately I have been approaching things with a bit more of an open mind. You never know until you try. I'm ready to try trusting my tires.
My approach to doing this is going to be to take it easy and gradually increase speed until I feel the feedback from the tires or see increased slip from the datalogger (the discharge drill for different reasons). Some of this is going to be blind trust much like the trust I had in you following you around Barber almost certain I was going to crash during Level 1 and 2. I have read Keith's books and do realize that some traction issues can be misleading and sometimes trick you into thinking that's as fast as you can go. At the same time you have to get to that edge to even begin intelligently evaluating those options. What I'm not interested in is learning to charge corners. I already know better.
-
My last track day of the year is coming up and I'm thinking about what my plans are for the off season. What kinds of things do I want to work on next year? I'll probably know better after my time on the track.
My tentative list to improve is the following.
-Body position refinement
-Learning to trust my tires
-Improving my braking
-Going faster on the straights
-Getting comfortable with head shake and wheelies
-Visual refinement
This year I have a wealth of data and video to pick apart which I usually do during the down time.
What kind of off season plans do you guys have?
-
I have Attack Performance rearsets on now and the seat is on order. Been on order for some time now.. hmm....
I looked at those rearsets myself. Wish I had chosen them over the Woodcrafts in retrospect. I went with the Woodcraft ones because of the quality and their overwhelming support. They still stock all the parts for the rearsets on my old 1989 model Yamaha.
The seat for me at least is a massive improvement. It's a lot taller and gives a better grip and it looks pretty spiffy too.
-
Some awesome driving there.
-
Welcome to the forum. Great information here with lots of coaches and current students sharing their experience. If you haven't already you should check out some of the books and the school itself. It's helped me more than I could imagine. Great stuff!!!!
-
Rear sets REALLY improve the ergo's on a bike and are worth every penny. They provide a much more stable base for the rider. Not only is the peg more solid but it also has a knurled grip to bite into your boot.
Go as adjustable as you can. I recently equipped my BMW with Woodcraft rear sets only to end up replacing them for the BMW HP rear sets for more adjustment. The adjustment gives you the ability to get the bike dialed in perfectly for your body shape. I have long legs and even at the lowest setting the Woodcrafts were ever so slightly too high.
A couple of photos of the "difference" between the Woodcraft rearset (high quality but not as adjustable) an the BMW HP rearset. The BMW's peg is mounted on an eccentric that can be adjusted any way you please. The Woodcraft uses two sets of holes (high and low) and the peg can be rotated in a limited amount of motion. Notice the holes behind the peg.
P.S. I learned another trick for people with long legs. Adjusting the rear sets downward is always great for comfort but often you sacrifice ground clearance at a certain point. Raising the seat gives you a bit more room for your legs. I put a BMW HP race seat on my bike to accomplish this. It not only gives me some extra room for my legs but also is made of a material that grips my leathers better so it feels more stable when I am hanging off. It's also missing the leg cutouts that the stock seat has for a positive feel on the edge.
-
Yeah. The Thigh abductor machine really helps me a lot.
-
It's my understanding that CSS Level 3 focuses on BP work - I'm really looking forward to a couple of days at Barber working on this.
Being an old coot, I'm wondering if anyone has a flexibility and conditioning program that will help me get the most out of this coaching?
Wes
What's working for me might not work for you but here's what I have been doing.
Cardio bike at the gym. Progressively turning up the resistance.
Thigh abductors in both directions. 40+ reps
Slow and fast Squats on the balls of you feet.
Lots of stretching.
-
Great article. I find the following the most interesting.
The Stages of Body Positioning
There are three stages to body positioning:
-
Poor form + poor riding = ripple-effect, snowballing errors.
-
Good riding + poor form = good but limited range of control.
-
Good form + good technical riding skills = riding that is both fluid and efficient.
I fell into #2 for quite some time. Improving my form on the bike has given me new found confidence. I am finding that I am having to "re-learn" steering in some cases because of how well the bike turns now.
I have found that physical fitness plays a huge role in good form for me. Being physically stronger in my lower body gives me a more stable base and less fatigue when repositioning on the bike frequently. I learned this the hard way this past Level 4 when I had a great on track session where I made some major breakthroughs. When I got back to the pits and got off the bike I found it difficult to walk because my lower body was angry with me for demanding so much out of it.
-
1
-
-
My tendency is to use curbing as a reference point when there is nothing on the surface that can give you good RP's. The interesting thing is curbing while it looks the same if you look close enough you find lots of variations. You could use the edge of the curbing or a number of color variations as a reference point. I have a few corners that I turn on the 3rd white mark from the edge on the outside curbing.
Even when there's no reference points at all to work from and no curbing you can still make it work. Making a note of the "shape" of the corner and where the turn point is in your mind is a way that I use for "invisible" reference points. Not as accurate as an actual physical turn point but it works when there are not other options.
I heard a story about someone who made their own reference points with the rear brake on a brand new track. That's certainly another approach but might get you black flagged.
-
Slow is fast. Laura is living proof. Except her slow is faster than most of the people on the track.
-
Those are some awesome videos. I remember when I first time I saw video of my riding at the track. I was watching the video thinking to myself "hmmm it felt so much faster".
-
Hey guys. Thanks for sharing those photos!
Any other brave souls out there?
-
Is that from CSS? There's X's on the track and talk of the camera bike in the thread.
Nope. Not from CSS. A track day org. Anybody can put X's on the track. There's also no school bikes.
-
I ended up seeing this video on Facebook with a bunch of people making fun of the rider and remembered the first time I was on a track.
Lots of horror to be seen in the video but give the guy a break. At least he's trying. We have all been there either on a track or stalling a motorcycle repeatedly in a driveway somewhere.
I figured it would be a fun topic for us to share stories and photos of our "first time" on the track.
I'll start.
The first time I ever stepped foot on a track was in 2012 at the California Superbike School being held at Barber Motorsports Park. I was THE slowest bike on the track. I started riding in 2010 and probably had a year or so on a Sport bike before taking Level 1. I got assigned bike #21 and it was the first time I had ever been on a 1L motorcycle. I was pretty terrified. The bike's reputation was intimidating as was the sheer difference in rider skill I saw. The coaches tuned into this pretty quickly and provided me some amazing support and I made massive improvements by the end of the day. The photographer immortalized my noobness and I bought the photos. A photo of me in the hairpin at Barber straight up and down (I was afraid to hang off) and so slow you can count all the spokes on the wheels.
Since that first day I have taken Level 4 three times. I even ended up buying one of those bikes that scared me so much the first time I sat on it. I'm still not the fastest guy out on the track and probably never will be. I can however tell you that I'm probably having the most fun. Learning about myself and how to ride has been a fantastic journey.
Are you brave enough to share your terrible photos?
-
Very cool insight into the CodeRace program. I have always been curious. At the moment Level 4 suits my needs pretty well.
-
I'm going to sign up for Barber again this year but likely will do the single days so I can use my own bike. I have the ergonomics dialed in pretty close to perfectly.
Although that may change depending on what my Level 4 repeat offender friends are planning this year.
-
That makes two people who are interested in knowing more. At the moment I'm good with being a Level 4 repeat offender but in the future that may change.
-
The 2015 is a great bike. That new shift assist is awesome. This year's CSS is going to be a challenge for me as I'll have to look away from all of that temptation.
-
I got curious and went out to check mine. My 2014 is also set to the 2nd line. Forks were removed for a full service before 600 miles by my suspension shop. They put it back in the original position.
Seat Preference
in School Questions/General Discussion
Posted
I also have the BMW race seat. I like the fact it's taller (more room for my long legs) and is made of a grippy material (more security for hanging off). It's also made of a denser material than the stock seat to get more feedback in the seat of the pants. For my bike weight is not quite as critical because of the power but lighter is always better of course. The BMW seat is also removable with a single bolt which makes it a LOT easier to get the seat off in the event that you need access to the under seat area at the track. The BMW race seat is also taller in the back. Teamed with the grip it's a bit of extra security when you are hard on the power down the straights.