wishy thinky

There was a one lap shown before a motoGP race recently (maybe France?) where the rider used the bmw rr with lean angle overlay. The lean angle number was all over the place and often didn't seem to match the horizon. Wonder how traction control among other things is done without some sort of magic to compensate for the sensors live rapid scattered firing.

Ah! Found it. Sort of. I have been spending some time looking for the answer to the throttle/lean question (which tire gives? is there warning? is adding throttle and holding throttle equally bad? what are the limits of the rule?). Maybe the search for answers made me super conscious of it and caused a brain freeze today. Knowing this rule--but not understanding how traction is lossed--locked me up. I was approaching a right turn probably going 10 to 15 mph, needing to turn onto a road where traffic is going 50+mph. Need to lean, can't accelerate, what to do, just not sure. Other skills broke down too from the brain freeze. Made this turn so many times before just fine but can't hardly ride today, but think I understand better now.

Looked to squeeze Lv3 & 4 in this year but schedule won't allow. So I'm determined to figure out how to do day-long track days. Will have to drive few hundred miles same day instead of 4+ days commitment for me to attend school travel included. Got most everything figured out now. Few questions left such as will Tires Plus change motorcycle tires, and somethings I have to do for the first time such as removing the wheels from my bike. The rear wheel will be messy, but there's no stopping now. I've already put order in for new brake lines, brake lever guard, duck tape (maybe vinyl tape later) etc. It occurred to me recently that I have not gotten very close to crashing on my own when I read others say that the same stock tires I have on my bike are junk when I thought they are awesome. The discussions in the thread titled "how to read traction" implies pushing the bike to the limit of traction, which apparently I haven't gotten close, etc. There are somethings I should only do with my own bike instead of a rental bike. Interesting how it completely escaped me that the leather jacket "roadcraft" wore in the video didn't have elbow/shoulder sliders. I went back and looked at the custom suits that the various shops make and it appears that none of them have those either. Robert, the info you provided have been helpful. I have narrowed down a suit. The Dainese mugello air bag suit would be so awesome though even if maintaining the battery is a hassle and paying for it might require a mortgage on the house.

I saw this video a while ago. I wonder why the leather wore through as if it was fabric, the hole shown at 2:30 compared to what I'm used to seeing from racing where people just get back on the bike and kept going. At the least, this suit is not roo leathers. https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=4fixjTcraR8

Back when I thought a $500 helmet was super expensive, which was less than a year ago, I walked around a store that had the Taichi suits. I wiped that suit from serious consideration because I didn't know I would be on the sport bike track I am on right now. I seriously didn't know they could weigh that much different. But since they do, wonder what the difference is. The Taichi suits have serious ventilation like the pro race suits and unlike the consumer grade A-suits, but that couldn't be the difference in weight. Since the suit is nearly all leather, could the weight difference be that the Taichi suits use thinner leather? That would explain both the weight and flexibility. I considered the custom suits after reading other threads here, but the sample designs had no appeal. Although I like stuffs that look pretty , I like value and admire people who can stretch what they have to make them go further. For example, if a pair of $300 gloves can last 3 crashes, it would have more value than a $200 pair that has to be thrown away after one crash, so it's worth it to fork out more mula upfront; all crashes are equal right, haha.

Primarily for track and maybe for street also, can gloves and boots take multiple beatings and ok to spend top dollar on? I saw some people wear suits that have been roughed up. Not counting helmets, is the philosophy for suits, gloves, and boots always to spend as much as you can afford? I've read about suit repairs, but haven't seen mention of glove repairs or if it's worth repairing. But seeing how gloves have multiple layers of small stuffs, might be difficult to properly repair. (People with informed answers don't necessarily crash a lot). Secondary question: do the vented "air" boots get damaged when caught in the wet?

I suspect I will be a Level 4 repeat offender at CSS by sneaking back into Lv4 again and again because it's fun on multiple levels--as long as I can pass GO, collect $200 and not have to go to jail for being a suspected sneaky repeat offender.

got it. Next time somebody says "loud handle", I'll know what it means. lol. More than knowing that a technique works is knowing that experienced riders use it.

With the bike up right in the garage, I sat on the bike while observing the front forks. I noticed a very small compression of the forks. The front suspension on my bike is stock and soft imo. I leaned my chest into the tank, the forks didn't move at all. In fact, I can only manage to compress the forks the littlest amount by bouncing on the seat. I had thoughts of making video showing movement of the forks as I move around and lean on the bike, but that ended up not being necessary. On the other hand, squeezing the front brake with any amount of forward movement of the bike will compress the forks. I think the hook works because of the downward cg movement, and works best when the bike is leaned over less than 45 degrees, maybe 30 degrees is optimal. I believe that the hook effectively increases the lean by a few degrees, causing a chain reaction that tightens the turn. So if you do pro-racing style and hook early in the turn only to find that you are running too tight, unhooking doesn't seem correct somehow. Steering correction seems the safer way to go?

Drool. This is a BYOB event? The BMW's there are for display only? Dang. My bike doesn't even have single R much less double R... wipe, drrooool, wipe. I'm mad because somebody decided to share

The very last sentence I said in my previous post was a joke. I realized that it could be misunderstood only after I submitted. Glad nobody bit because it was purely tongue in cheek. I was curious if track control had radar guns that they use to check each rider's corner entry speed against the theoretical maximum set by a coach for instance; and binoculars to check lean angle; and microphones to check if throttle is used incorrectly such as when adding lean or banging against rev limiter. Or maybe each bike has data loggers whose data is collected and evaluated soon after to see if the students did something wrong. If this last thing is true, I wonder if I could bring a usb stick to download each of my riding sessions! It would be nice to have lean angle and braking data! If I know I can get data, it might be worthwhile to bring a laptop to look at data immediately after each session. I find the two riding videos helpful, but I review it in depth a little too late because I'm already home and not on the track any more. Is the L4 consultant a world famous racer (wishy thinking right?)? an additional coach? a coach in training? a BMW motorad engineer who speaks english? probably not a returning L4 student? Does the consultant do the heavy lifting as the coach goes out riding with the L1/L2 students? Whereas you can request specific coaches, you probably can't request specific consultants? So many questions and sometimes not sure if I should ask here or wait to ask in school. Unfortnately, if I wait too long, it might be too late or I might forget about the question all together because of how busy things get at school and other reasons. Already searched the cornering forum for hook turn but still have lots of questions, but I think I'll wait for next CSS session. Hope I won't forget.

I was thinking that I am curious what your garage looks like. The answer appears that it's very clean with bikes lined up like a starting grid:). But seriously, how do you get mechanics to work on a track specific bike or a highly modified bike that might not look like what the pics show in his shop manual? Is this a friend?

Since the fruits keep coming up, I'd like to propose the consideration of granny smith and fuji apples. One is green, the other red. One is sour, the other is sweet. They are both apples.

hehe. When I took the first set of 2-days, I thought the level 3 group were behind us behind the wall talking too loudly and had to be hushed. Between that and the body position bike and I thought there's no classroom instructions. Guess I consider gathering around the body position bike to be a demo where maybe I should think of it as classroom. Lv4 I thought is reworking or finetuning skills that I should have already learned so again no classroom, because coaches don't have prepared material. I used the motoGP riders as euphemism for "totally different" techniques that were hinted above. I've read in a number of different places that schools teach one way and don't entertain other ways of doing things. But I think that by claiming to prefer a certain way of doing things, you imply that you've considered/tried other options, have become familiar with their advantages and disadvantages, and therefore should be able to discuss. Sharing that kind of experience is teaching and learning, and there are potential opportunities here. Being too dismissive is just missing opportunities. For sure people have questions, whether they are encouraged to ask or not, as mentioned in Tyler's post, unless it just takes too much time, gets too argumentative, and interferes with prepared curriculum as a result. I like Willsportbike's comment about identifying mistakes. I'm sure there have been many stubborn students who insist that they do things correctly, until a photo or video showed different. I know I'm not one of them because I always do put to practice exactly what was taught.

It seems that lv4 at CSS doesn't have classroom instructions? maybe neither does lv3? One could argue about knowledge vs practice 'til blue in the face, but for me understanding why things work matters a lot. Personally, I think that I would find value in knowing the differences in techniques. If it doesn't take away from riding time or normal curriculum in lv3 or lv4, it would be helpful to insert discussion at school about the different techniques. Marquez does this, Rossi does that, Lorenzo does this, this works for him because of his long legs, that works for this other guy because he's flexible, Pedrosa has to do it this way because he's smaller, this is the best technique for racing but normal people don't have the flexibility to achieve it, etc. That kind of discussion would be very useful.