faffi Posted December 16, 2011 Report Share Posted December 16, 2011 It just dawned on me that in many ways, Keith Code's principles probably are to motorcycling what Joe Weider's principles are to body building. Just like Weider sat down and studied the various aspects of training and what would work - or not - instead of just watching people move iron, so have Code taken the time to understand what makes a motorcycle perform when it comes to handling in ways that nobody even thought about before. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
warregl Posted December 16, 2011 Report Share Posted December 16, 2011 Interesting comparison Eirik. While I'm only cursorily familiar with Weider's work, this method also reminds me of Sheck Exley. Much like Keith, Sheck literally wrote the book on Cave Diving. He used accident analysis to break down the mistakes made in fatal and near fatal incidents and develop a set of rules and skill sets to address/prevent these issues. As the old saying goes "How do you eat an elephant…one bite at the time". I guess the secret here is knowing where to bite? (Ok so maybe I took that anaolgy one step too far ). Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Dylan Code Posted December 18, 2011 Report Share Posted December 18, 2011 I can tell you that Keith is pretty thorough when it comes to a particular subject. I know that right now he is working on a bunch of material on body positioning. What started as a chapter or three has grown into 10 chapters of very in-depth research on the basics of center of mass, joint position, and other key basics that underlie the whole subject. He consulted physical therapists on various aspects of the skeletal system, muscles, etc. and looked at horse jockeys' relationship with the horses' center of mass and their skeletal systems--differences and similarities with a rider/motorcycle. It goes on and on. I have a list from him of 57 key aspects to good body position on a motorcycle; each one relevant to being stable on a motorcycle. These long lists tend to back people off and consider this pedantic. However, if someone is to truly understand something, and export the knowledge, they are going to have to be thorough and explore all the permutations of that particular subject. He won't just take a photo of the fastest person in GP racing and show it to a student saying: "Look here, that's the right way to do it. Get your head down like that and your arms like this." That would be the key difference between Keith's approach and a "reverse engineering" approach. A good definition of "reverse engineering" is here: Reverse engineering has its origins in the analysis of hardware for commercial or military advantage. The purpose is to deduce design decisions from end products with little or no additional knowledge about the procedures involved in the original production. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
faffi Posted December 18, 2011 Author Report Share Posted December 18, 2011 I'm glad to hear how hard he works to understand every aspect of motorcycle riding. Even if his conclusions should be challenged on some aspects, the throurough documentation will make it easier for other experts to chime in with their viewpoints since it's all taken into a scientific context. It also makes it viable for people also outside motorcycling to give their thoughts since Keith now gets more involved with the human physiology than anybody have ever attemtped before. It will be very interesting to see what this will bring when it gets published! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mugget Posted December 29, 2011 Report Share Posted December 29, 2011 ... I know that right now he is working on a bunch of material on body positioning. What started as a chapter or three has grown into 10 chapters of very in-depth research on the basics of center of mass, joint position, and other key basics that underlie the whole subject. He consulted physical therapists on various aspects of the skeletal system, muscles, etc. and looked at horse jockeys' relationship with the horses' center of mass and their skeletal systems--differences and similarities with a rider/motorcycle. It goes on and on. I have a list from him of 57 key aspects to good body position on a motorcycle; each one relevant to being stable on a motorcycle. Wow - that sounds great. It's definitely an advantage to understand how things work. Just like countersteering, everyone does do it but not everyone understands the concept so they can't maximise the advantage. It sounds like the body position info will have a similar kind of affect. Can't wait to see what's in store! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Lnewqban Posted March 15, 2012 Report Share Posted March 15, 2012 I can tell you that Keith is pretty thorough when it comes to a particular subject. I know that right now he is working on a bunch of material on body positioning. What started as a chapter or three has grown into 10 chapters of very in-depth research on the basics of center of mass, joint position, and other key basics that underlie the whole subject. He consulted physical therapists on various aspects of the skeletal system, muscles, etc. and looked at horse jockeys' relationship with the horses' center of mass and their skeletal systems--differences and similarities with a rider/motorcycle. It goes on and on. Pretty much the same approach that ancient martial arts developers had. I would include Burt Rutan in the group of developers and visionaries having that productive and creative approach to a subject: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Burt_Rutan Kudos to Keith! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Recommended Posts
Archived
This topic is now archived and is closed to further replies.