RIDING TIPS - Steering

A. If you do nothing else, steer with your eyes.
1. If you look there, you go there.

2. Remember the kid-eating tree. When dad was teaching us (and all the kids on the block) how to ride bicycles in the back yard, every single one of us managed to ride smack into the one tree there. Because we were all looking at it, instead of where we wanted to go.

3. You will automatically steer towards whatever you are looking at. This is equally true for someone who has never sat on a bike before as for someone who has been riding his whole life (as illustrated by the bike-eating tree).

4. Don’t look at the obstacle. Look where you want to go. And you will go there.

B. Countersteering – if you ride, you’re already doing this anyway, because there is no other way to steer a bike that’s moving faster than 5 mph. Better to do it on purpose rather than by accident, however.

1. To turn left, you push on the left handlebar. To turn right, you push on the right handlebar.
a. This is because of a combination of physical forces.
i Gyroscopic Force
• When a sideways force is applied to a gyroscope, the gyro will lean into it.
• Pushing on the left handlebar tries to turn the wheel to the right. In effect, there is a force pushing on the front wheel from the left side.
• If the front wheel is spinning, it is a gyro, and it will actually lean over to the left as a result.
• The harder you push on the handlebar, the farther over it leans.
ii Steering Geometry
• When you turn the handlebars, the front fork rotates along an axis. This axis is at an angle to the ground (its “rake”).
• The contact patch of the front wheel is directly beneath the center of the wheel. The front fork ends at the center of the wheel. But if you extended its axis of rotation all the way down to the ground, it would touch the ground some distance in front of the contact patch, because of the “rake.”
• The distance between the contact patch and this imaginary extension of the fork’s axis is called the “trail.”
• When you apply pressure on the left handlebar, the wheel does in fact turn to the right. But because of this “trail,” the wheel wants to fall over to the left.
• The more you push on the handlebar, the more the wheel wants to fall over.
• Turning the wheel to the left, for example, steers the contact patch out from underneath the motorcycle’s center of gravity. The tire will bank over to the right (and because it is connected to the forks, it will take the rest of the bike with it).
iii Once you are leaned over, the front end only stabilizes the bike. Steering is done by the Rear end.
• As a result, the front end only carries about 1/3 of the cornering load.
• This cornering load is still important. You want that weight on the front wheel, in order to be able to lean and to change
the lean angle.

2. A common panic reaction is when you want to swerve around an obstacle, or turn suddenly, and you FAIL TO COUNTERSTEER.
a. You wanted to go right, and turned the wheel to the right.
b. The bike will start to go left. That’s not what you want to happen, and you try to go right even harder.
c. What happens is, you “lowside” the bike.
i The bike falls all the way down with you sliding along behind it.
ii When you hear someone say “That truck pulled in front of me, and I had to lay the bike down,” what they’re really saying is the failed to countersteer and they lowsided the bike. Nobody drops their bike on purpose.

3. Don’t steer by pushing the bike beneath yourself.
a. Yes, you can steer the bike using just your body. But it is very inefficient.
i Essentially, body steering means you are pushing on the frame of the bike. This effort is transferred to the forks and is translated as a steering input.
• It is impossible to body-steer, or do any kind of steering at all, if the handlebars are immobilized.
ii It takes significantly longer for body steering to take effect. Not a good idea when you need to maneuver Now.
iii It takes a lot more effort than pushing on the handlebars.
• No matter how much force you apply to the frame of the bike, no matter how hard you try to lean it with your body, the slightest pressure on the handlebars the other way will turn you the other way.
iv It is not as easy to control.
v When the bike actually does get around to turning, you wind up using more lean angle than you needed.
vi It makes you fight the bike.
• Don’t fight the bike. Lean with it.
b. To help yourself stay with the bike, put more weight on the outside footpeg while you’re leaning the bike over.
i This keeps your body’s center of gravity closer to that of the bike.
ii It’s the same thing as shifting your weight to the outside of a slow tight turn. This lets the bike pivot more quickly, with less effort.

4. Don’t steer by pushing down. Push forward.
a. The handlebars do not move up and down. They rotate forward and back.
i Any downward force you apply is wasted effort.
ii Pushing straight down achieves nothing. Pushing down at an angle applies some force forward, which is used, and some force down, which is wasted. Pushing straight forward achieves everything with no wasted effort.
b. For maximum ease and efficiency keep your elbows down and your forearms horizontal.
i This puts all of your energy into the actual steering, so you hardly need to use any muscle at all.
ii Pushing down on the bars hurts your wrists.
iii Pushing down on the bars leads to stiff-arming the bike. Don’t stiff-arm it, stay loose. (see Body Control, below)
C. NOT FOR STREET RIDING – One way to steer a tighter curve without leaning as much, is to hang off the bike.
1. This is when racers put their knee down.
a. What happens is, you shift your body towards the inside of the curve. This shift in the center of gravity makes the bike turn more quickly with less lean.
i You lower your center of gravity without having to lean as much.
b. This way, you keep more traction, more upright stability, and more lean angle in reserve in case you need it.
c. On a sportbike, it also puts your center of gravity over the bike’s wide tire footprint.
d. You probably should never need to do this on the street. Just on the racetrack. Still, it can be a useful skill to have.
2. Never steer the bike while your butt is off the seat.
a. What happens is, your handlebars become the bike’s primary pivot point, instead of your center of gravity.
b. As a result, your bike will wobble unsteadily all over the place. This is never good, but especially not when the bike is leaned over hard!
3. The technique is pretty straightforward.
a. While you’re going straight, stand up on the pegs. (Don’t slow down yet.)
i Of course, you should be on your toes. You should only ride on the balls of your feet, never on your arches.
ii This gives you more control, makes the ride smoother, and upsets the suspension less.
b. Standing on the pegs now, you shift your weight to the inside of the turn. (Don’t slow down yet.)
c. Set one butt cheek down on the seat. (Don’t slow down yet.)
i Don’t wiggle the front wheel while you’re doing this!
d. Okay, NOW you can roll off the gas and start to brake.
e. Get comfortable. You don’t want to shift around during the turn.
f. Grip the tank with your outside leg and your body.
g. Lean the bike over into the turn.
h. To shift your weight even more, put your knee out (not down).

4. If you are not comfortable with moving around on the bike, you can try putting your knee out while remaining centered on the seat. You will slightly shift your center of mass, but also the air-brake effect of your knee on the inside of the turn will make the bike turn a bit more easily.
D. Mid-Turn Steering Correction – a common panic error.
1. You feel you’re going too fast, or too wide, or whatever. So you change your steering while you’re in the turn.
a. Note: Little adjustments are normal, and are of course necessary. But if it’s big enough to be noticed, it’s probably wrong.
i Unless the radius of the curve itself is changing. Then you do need to make larger adjustments through the turn.
b. Mid-turn steering corrections can start a chain reaction of further errors, and you can go down.
i Usually, what you do is lean more while jerking the throttle (which itself makes everything even worse).
ii This makes you unstable.
iii So you stand the bike up to regain stability.
iv Now you start to go wide.
v So you lean over even more than before, trying to stay on the road.
vi You go down.
2. You need to have confidence that the bike will make it through the turn.
3. Most of the time, you don’t need to make mid-turn steering corrections.
a. Unless you’re making a significant change (as in a decreasing-radius turn), your corrections aren’t going to do much anyway. You’re going to wind up exiting the turn at the same place, despite your correction.
b. So why risk creating more problems if you don’t have to? Try to keep yourself to one steering input per turn.
4. Make that one steering input quickly, and you’ll corner better.
a. If you take longer to roll over into your lean angle, you need to start turning too soon.
b. The bike takes a wider line, the more gradually you lean. You can drift out of your lane.
c. You’ll be forced to make corrections, as you first go wide, then pull in tighter to make the corner. And you only want one steering input per turn.
d. Leaning over more quickly lets you make just the one input, you can get back on the throttle sooner and harder, and you accomplish your cornering faster.

5. One steering input per turn.
a. If you’re going to get this right, you have to get the right lean angle at the beginning of the turn.
b. You want as little lean angle as possible – just enough to make the turn.
i Don’t go all the way over. You may need the extra lean if the curve gets tighter on you. If that happens and you’re scraping pegs, there’s nowhere left to go but wide.
ii Less lean angle is more stable.
iii Less lean angle gives you more traction.
iv More lean makes every bump, ripple and slippery spot more likely to cause a slide.
v More lean requires better throttle control.
vi More lean means you can’t go as fast as if you were upright.
c. How do you keep the lean angle to a minimum?
i In extreme turns, as in racing, you can get the knee down. But you should never ever need to do that on the street.
• Hanging off does let you steer more quickly, if you get your body into position and are stable before the turn. But remember, never steer while you’re in the process of hanging off. It makes the bike wiggle.
ii To keep the lean angle down, Steer More Quickly.
• Flick your bike into its lean angle faster.
• This turns your bike faster, at the same road speed, with less lean.
• This lets you get your turning done sooner.
• So you can stand it up sooner.
• You have more lean angle available in case you need it.
• The bike is more stable.
• You can go faster.
• Your traction is better.
6. Don’t be afraid to lean way over, if you need to.
a. It is so hard to drop the bike simply from leaning too far. The trick is to keep on the throttle as that contact patch gets smaller.
b. You’re in too fast for real, or the turn got tighter unexpectedly, or a truck crossed the yellow line. Whatever the reason, you need to tighten your turn. Do it. That’s why you only ride at 75%, so you have that extra room when you need it.
c. The bike can lean a lot more than you think you can, so go for it if you have to.
d. In extreme leans, you risk overloading the tires. If you overload the tires, you will go down. There are four ways to avoid this.
i Hold it where you are, don’t lean any further.
ii Stand it up — dangerous because you will go wider now. Things like buildings, trees and oncoming traffic tend to upset the alignment of your skeleton.
iii Scrub off speed — DON’T let off the throttle, you will go down. Keep the throttle where it is, and the tires will scrub off speed with their own friction.
iv Rear-wheel steering (a.k.a. oversteering) — When you’re at the limit of your tires, adding throttle will overload the rear tire. It will slide. It will slide to the outside of the turn (it does this a little in all turns anyway, but this is aggravated sliding). This will pivot the bike into the corner tighter, and the front wheel will stand up a bit (which is good, because you definitely don’t want to wash out the front wheel).
E. Turning too soon is a big steering error.
1. If you start to turn too soon, then your turn is going to start out shallow. And you’re going to have to turn again (or maybe even a couple more times) to actually make it through the curve.
a. This opens you up to more steering errors, throttle errors, braking errors, vision errors, body errors, etc. Why would you do that to yourself?
b. You wind up being leaned over longer than you need to. Your traction and stability are being sacrificed that whole time. Why would you do that to yourself?
c. And it’s just plain extra work.
2. If you steer later, closer to the apex of the curve, then you’ll only have to steer once.
F. Hesitant steering can be a problem.
1. You doubt your ability to get the bike turned. Why?
a. You’re not familiar with this curve.
b. You feel like you’re going to go wide.
c. You think you’re going to have to lean too much.
d. You’re concerned about oncoming traffic.
e. You’re afraid of losing traction.
2. This causes three errors.
a. You stay on the brakes through the turn, or you coast.
i Don’t brake while leaned over!
• You’ll lose your gyro and go down.
• You’ll lock up the rear wheel and highside.
b. You steer earlier than you should.
c. You steer more slowly than you should.
i This makes you turn too soon.
ii If you didn’t turn too soon, then you’re going to go wide.
iii Either way, you’ll wait too long to get back on the gas.
iv Either way, you’re going to make mid-turn steering corrections.
v You’ll probably wind up using too much lean angle.
vi And of course all the other panic errors will follow. Stiff-arming the bars, tunnel vision, freezing up, etc.
3. Don’t hesitate. Trust yourself. Trust the bike.
a. If you think you’re entering the corner too fast, ask yourself if it’s too fast for the bike, or for you. Your bike can probably handle it.
G. Choose your turn-entry point.
1. Make this a conscious decision.
2. This is a great way to defeat entry panic.
3. It gives you an idea of where you are, where you’re going, and where you need to be.
4. It frees up your attention, so now you can think ahead.
H. Always set your speed before you even begin to lean.
1. You don’t want to have to slow down during the turn (See Throttle Control, below)
2. You don’t want to be slowing or braking while you’re in the process of leaning. That’s a recipe for disaster.
3. Do all of your slowing before you start to lean over.