Leaning into turns.....

"do not worry about hanging off and dragging your knee, work on picking good lines, corner entry and exit.
as you improve in this area the next thing you know you will be dragging your knee on the ground.
If you focus only on dragging your knee you will just hold your progress up.
relax have fun and enjoy"

Thanks. Yeah, I understand the fact that knee down is secondary to most things, but on a bike with tall bars and a fat tank, it's a refletion also of how flexable my 45 year old body is... I'm actually most concerned with getting a 500 pound bike to turn while also not high siding it again or having to replace the pipe where it's getting a bit worn-the track I'm mainly riding at has about 7 right hand turns and two lefts. The more I get myself off the bike and my chest on the right of the tank, off, the less stuff drags on the ground. I have to admit that the little red spots the local racing school painted o n the track have pretty well made finding the right lines a no brainer... I was running the advanced group and really keeping up with real sport bikes surprisingly well, but only catching and passing SV650s for the most part.

 

2 thumbs up for the Lee Parks Total Control courses and his book. Gives you great information on body position VISION, and turn point selection and method. The combination of Total Control and Twist the wrist should be sound foundation of information to put into practice.

Al

 

pics of track day

The pics of last thursday's track day are posted. S...o I was hoping...for cooler pics of me...'cause it's all about me! these are not as cool as i pictured they would be myself...a common problem for me!

To be fair to myself, since I can see light under the pipe and foot peg and knee, i'm pretty sure these were done early in the day before i started going better, but I had hoped my habit off getting my upper body up above the bike dirt track style would be gone by now. I don't look super comfortable, thats for sure.

In the last photos I can see my improvement over the course of the morning so all is not lost. it was freakin' 90 degrees F and after 5 sessions, I was all done, so skipped my last two...thus bringing down the photo count...and of course, I was hoping for a photo of me killing the ground hog!

Oh well. doing another track day on wendesday(my 4th this month, and hopefully second non raining event).

GRON4 Photo Viewer

 

Knees -down is a dangerous way to go in street riding cuz it generally means you're going way fast.

ALSO, the farther you're hung off the bike, the more you are committed to a predetermined line and the less able to make any sudden correction in line that might be needed to avoid road situations.

So, for street riding, keep your weight no more than one buttcheek off center and forget about knee acrobatics.

 

Good advice s-man, but willy has been talking about the track.

BZ

 

Nice pictures! Thanks for taking the time to post them and share your track experience - I'm jealous :biggrin:

One question that I have from looking at the pics - how far through the corner are you looking? From the photos I can't get a good feel for the depth of the corners, but in most of them you seem to be looking a bit ahead, but not really deep into the corner.

The three things that really improved my cornering more than anything was learning to look deep into the turn (as in, at turn-in I'm looking just past apex, and as I approach apex I'm looking past the exit), pre-positioning my body before the curve (as someone above summarized very well), and turning my hips into the curve (a verifiable result of having your feet and upper-body in the correct position).

Cheers!

 

funny you would ask....

funny you ask. while this particular track (blackhawk farms) is kind of a motocross course compared to some, I would say you are right, that I am riding the front wheel. yesterday I went to yet another track day and had some problems/regression in my 1st couple sessions.

I, along with some others slid in debris on the outside of one of the corners, plus it was about 50 degrees, which also subtracted from my confidence. In an attempt to hug the rumble strips and avoid going wide in the slippery turn, plus a sudden fear that I would high side the bike by sticking the pipe, I basically forgot everything I knew and also started really riding the front wheel....I meant to miss the rumble strips by a few inches and because I was looking at them, starting actually hitting them instead...Not good! fortunatley, after my second session, a control rider came up to me and said " You look really tense out there" and advised me to look further out and through the corners and also to "breath in through your nose and out through your mouth". this was his only advice, but it was super helpful to bring me back to where i wasn't defeating myself mentally. After that I went pretty darn good...the best yet, and probably faster than I ever went when I was racing there in 200-2001.

So yeah, looking way out to where you want to be at the end of the corner instead of inspecting the pavement 30 feet in front of me was good!

 

Thanks...I think. Yeah, I'm not a knee on the street guy if for no other reason that a bot's dot could really hurt!

Besides, I prefer backing my V Strom into corners like scotty parker. That way, any mid corner gravel only reduces the effort needed to get the bike loose.

 

So weird seeing semi naked Gen 6.

 

I recall suddenly that ive really hi jacked this thread from it's author!

...might as well re name it the willy's track day angst thread

I wonder if i'm regressing...it felt so good but looks so..not good.

pic number nine is cool though!

looks like i'm laying a blackie. here: GRON4 Photo Viewer

with the preload adjusters all the way in I had almost 50mm of sag and my zip tie was all the way up at the clamp after each session indicating bottoming, probably while on the brakes. I think a lot of my ground clearence issues will be helped by fork springs. I did notice that the shock seemed about right on sag and rebound until after each session...where heat turned it into a pogo stick. I was thnking this bike was realy limiting me, but I saw a guy on a 1989 NT650 carrying more corner speed than almost anyone and also nearly lapped me. I think i'll get springs and a better shock and keep riding this thing till it routinely ties itself in knots d/t ecessive speed, then i'll buy a triump 675. ...after which, I hope to drag my elbows!

 

hijacked thread:5th and 6th track day

I did my 5th and sixth track day of the summer last thursday and this monday. after putting in .95 straight rate springs from race tech, things went the best on monday. I'm no longer carring so much what I look like as how well i'm putting the track sections together.

I still look like a dork but I don't care!

still some speed to rung from myself and the machine, but trail breaking to the max is leaving me feeling near a front end tuck...

photos here:GRON4 Photo Viewer

photos of note: of note, I love the pic number 18 from the rear, worthy of VFR photo of the week...IMHO, and in photo number 24, it looks like nothing is going on but in reality i've just recovered from a near high side after the pilot powers finally gave up the ghost after 5 track days. You can see air under my butt after I stood up into the highside motion. miliseconds from a photo of me real real sideways. heh.

photos I hate: any one showing me holding up faster guys.



in general , a fun and forgiving bike, if it only weighed 100 pounds less...!

 

yes lean over till your knee hits...............trouble bringing your knee out?? hummmm is there something wrong with your knee???:crazy:tank bigger hard to get side to side do you have square tires I heard those make it hard to lean.. okay this might be in top ten stupid posts, by stupid people...:thumbsup::thumbsup::thumbsup::thumbsup::thumbsup::thumbsup:

 

^^^^^^^^^^

Above is really a public service announcement on why you shouldn’t smoke crack.

Back to our regularly scheduled program.

Willy, did someone teach you how to trail brake? Just my opinion, but I would back off of the trail braking. For one track days are really about having fun and if you don’t get trail braking right it will all go wrong. I know all the current racers use this advanced skill, but I am more of an advocate of the Keith Code ‘all braking done before the turn’ and the Freddie Spencer ‘using the throttle to make adjustments’, which I guess isn’t much different but for me its been easier to be smooth on the throttle than smooth on the brakes.

I appreciate the posts of your track day exploits. Hopefully, my buddy will send me some pics soon from the July 20th date friends and I did, but I’m still waiting.

BZ

 

I'm just adding this to the "Where to section".
Everyones pretty much covered how to do it. I just want to add, I use some of my local 4-leaf clover turns to practice on(I'm not saying that you need to ride fast)..... They work great. 1st time around look for crap on the road(oil/mufflers/etc.). From there you can work on technique without worrying about cars(except in the merge areas. I use my signals to show I'm not coming out(right signal). It's a free track (like someone said, his track only has 2 lefts and the rest are all rights). you can do this and still be legal, besides I've never seen LEO's hanging out on these anyway, and if they were you'd see them on the 1st lap........

 

great pix, would suggest moving your head to where your mirror should be and off the top of the tank area, more body off the bike = less lean angle. A good way to position is to have your right elbow over the gas tank on left turns (and vice-versa)..

 

well.. iv'e been trail braking on ice racing motorcycles and supermotos for quite awhile. also suzuki v stroms love parking lot trail braking...

anyway, It comes naturally to me, though I wasn't doing it at the track too much at first. The hardest part right now is the added speed of track riding makes the transition from two fingers gripping the brakes to rolling back on the throttle a little clumsy-the supermotos and dirt bikes you generally get away with 1 finger braking, which makes transitioning onto the throttle a little easier.

part of the reason I decided to get back into the track thing is, I do a 24 hour ice race (the Numb Bum up in canda, aye) where the speeds are pretty high and they have been adding a lot of top gear sweepers (spirals really) that have been intimidating me since here in wisconsin, ourr ice racing tracks top speed is rarely more than 60 mph...where as in canada, I'm. hitting turn one at 90 mph on the big KTMs....and may be 100 mph depending on what bike we race next year.

as far as hanging off, titty/elbow to the tank ect...it seems like every time I solve one problem, I regress somewhere else...hopefully i'll get it all in one box one of these days...


thanks for any and all advice.
willy, member of "americas premier 24 hour ice racing team (actually, america's only 24 hour ice racing team)
The IceHoles Racing Team

 

I hope noone has said this already, but...

I am not an expert, and this may not be an exact answer for your exact question, but one thing that I know and practice (off track on certain turns around my town) is that if you are say, turning to the Right, as you go into the turn put light pressure on the right handlebar turning your front wheel to the Left.

by the way, this only works if you are going fast into the curv, try it with leasurly driving and youll kiss the pavement.

im sure everyone here knows that a bike turns via leaning, not via turning the handle bars. and when you put pressure as if turning the wheel in the oposite way that you are turning it will naturally force the bike in the way you are turning.

this is how pro's are able to go from side to side and turn so fast, do it right and it will throw your bike down into the lean.

oh, ya, might want to practice a time or two before doign it aggressivly, push too hard and youll taste the pavement.

 

Now for a question for myself. if yall dont mind.

I have leaned my gen2 enough to drag the side of my foot many times. now for the noob question. why exactly do you push your knee out?

 

Other than weighting the inside of the bike to help it stay straighter up so that you can CS it deeper, it's used like a curb feeler on a car.

 

ah...yes...it is the thread I hijacked last year...Ive been at it again o nthe naked VFR. I still suck but in new ways.
such is life .
ice raced more last winter than ever before. it is not so much like road racing.

found these truths to be self evident... on a road racing track that a 5 hunert pound bike with linked brakes....no matter how much you want to just tap the rear brake while squeezing the front with one finger thus backing it in to scrub off a little speed......you should not do that. also new and unfamiliar Held gloves with stiff little fingerrtips could cause ones actual finger tips to get caught behind the front brake lever for just a second when you attempt to transgress from one finger o n the lever to a more useful two or even three fingers...it goes without saying that if you have you have just noted said xtra fingers might possibly become insipiantly useful as yon corner approaches with surpsing soon-ness the piquante of life can only be that much spiceir

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