elizilla

Seriously, Trav, I'm slow, I struggle, the skills have never come easily to me. I just want it really bad, so I continue to work at it. I have stamina and independence, so I'm a good traveler, but I'm not a talented rider and I'm not a risk taker. The only reason I don't get left in the dust more often, is because I put in a huge amount of seat time. soichiro, where do you ride your 100? How do you find places? I live in the city, don't own a place to ride one, but it would be so cool to do it more often. I'm thinking a little dual sport might be a lot of fun, I could take it out on the gravel roads around here.

I am glad to hear it! I have missed you!

Two weeks ago I attended American Supercamp. I'm here to report that this was more fun than any other rider training I've ever done. The class was held at a place called Vail Equestrian Center, near Toledo OH. It was an indoor horse riding arena. There was a large rectangular riding space with a dirt floor, and bleachers along one side. Nothing fancy, but plenty of space. They provide the motorcycles and any gear that you need. The motorcycles are Honda XR100 dirt bikes. They're all alike. Remembering my experience with the MSF bikes, I was relieved to find that these bikes were all in perfect condition, with no quirks to learn. It truly did not matter which bike you got, because they were all good. They also had a trailer full of gear, and you could just go in there and they would lend you whatever you needed; the gear was in good condition and plentiful. I brought my own helmet and gloves but I used their gear for everything else. The class started out with a little orientation talk. Danny told us a bit about the history and mission of the school, then had everyone in the class introduce themselves and explain why they were there. I told him I was there because my friend Mo Draper said it was the funnest thing you could do with your clothes on. He said "Ohhhh, you know the Drapers? Have you met his father? Ol' T-Bone Draper?" I said I had, and he started telling the class, "This guy is 70 years old, and he kept stuffing people on the inside. We couldn't get him to stop, he wouldn't listen. Totally into it. A mad man!" One of the guys sitting near me introduced himself as an MSF instructor. Danny said they wouldn't hold that against him. This turned out to be a recurring theme. A lot of the things you learn elsewhere, are wrong for this type of riding. There's no countersteering, for instance. You almost never use the front brake, instead you use the rear brake even as it makes the rear lose traction and slide - a controlled slide of that type is not undesirable. Instead of putting your body to the inside to reduce the lean angles needed, you push the bike down and keep your body upright. The racing line is different. The goal is to make the turns shorter and tighter so you can make the straightaways longer. You sit as far forward as you can, practically on the tank, and slouch, hunching your back and rolling your shoulders. In the turns you take your inside foot off the peg and put it on the ground. One thing they stressed in this orientation talk, was that it was OK to crash. In fact they made a big point of challenging us to break their bikes. The bikes have upgraded handlebars that are nearly impossible to bend, and they have a whole truckload of clutch levers and other parts. Push your limits, it's OK, because crashing is good for you. They handed out clipboards with diagrams showing the racing line, and dividing the turns into several sections, where we were to focus on a particular thing in each section. Sometimes they even went out and drew lines on the track, marking the sections where we were to be on the throttle, on the brake, cranking our heads backwards to look through the turn, etc. They had originally scheduled two classes, one for racers and one for non-racers. But they hadn't had enough sign-ups, so they had combined the two. They divided us into three groups, which is what they always do, but if they'd had two classes the groups would have been much closer in ability levels. As it was, they had one group for racers, one for the more competitive non-racers, and one for people like me. :-) I actually enjoyed the chance to see how the racers do it. It was startling to see that the average age in the racer group, was about 15 years old. All these young boys, and they were crazy competitive! So crazy that they would stop them periodically, make them get off their bikes and do pushups, just to slow them down. So anyway, for the first exercise, they made a little tiny oval out in the middle of the big horse riding ring. Just two cones, and we were to ride around and around them. I got on the little bike for the first time and was terrified. I had to kick start it. Eep! I never kickstarted anything in my life and I had no idea how. But it took them about ten seconds to show me, and it roared to life on the first try. Whew! Then it was time to ride out on the bike. This bike felt so foreign, I felt like a complete fool. For a moment I really regretted signing up for this. This was not my home. I was going to be exposed as an impostor. The guys running the school were hollering at me to get moving, go faster, etc, and I was tempted to just leave. What was I doing here? But I kept going, and before I knew it, I was able to adapt to the bike. By the end of the session I felt much happier, and I never felt so out of place again. That first moment was the low point of the weekend, I think. I was always the kid picked last in gym class, and every riding school I attend has moments where I want to fall back on the tricks I used to survive high school gym. "Sorry, I can't play, I forgot to bring my gym clothes." Finding excuses to not get out there, hanging back to avoid engaging, etc. I'm physically stupid, I know it, and just getting out there is huge. I always feel like a loser, an obstacle to the other students. But here I am, and I want to learn. I may be the slowest student, but I'm persistent. I've sought out a lot of rider education over the years, and I have to say that this class felt the least hostile to me, as a physically stupid person, of any course I've ever taken. The only way anyone can fail, is to refuse to try, because it doesn't matter if you crash. The instructors are enthusiastic and encouraging, and the environment is like a rubber room full of charming chaos; you can go bonkers without any consequences at all. And unlike the track schools, they didn't mind that I am a slow learner. They just kept pushing me, without ever seeming at all impatient. And I learned tons. So you ride around the oval. The racing line resembles the late apexes you use on the racetrack, but the turns are very different. You shorten and sharpen the turn, get it over with so you can nail it back into the next straightaway. As a street rider, I would manage my traction pie by not letting the turn tighten so much, but for this, you just want to get the bike leaned over hard, fast, spin through that turn, and then bring it back up fast so you can nail it. Suppose you're doing it right, and you're trying to pass someone who is doing it more like a street rider. You are outside them, coming into the turn. You make your turn really quick and tight, outside and behind them, and then you can go straight while they are still turning, and pass them on the inside at the turn exit, because you're straight and on the gas while they are still leaned over and turning. Round and round the tiny oval we went. At one point they videotaped us, and it was really helpful. I was able to see that I was slowing down way too soon, and that I needed to stay on it as I went deeper into the turn. Once I saw that, I started to feel like less of an obstacle out there, I started to keep up with my group. After lunch they started wetting down the track, and we got to slide around in the mud, still doing more of the same stuff. It got faster and more fun. Then they had us do donuts! We learned to slide the bike in a circle with one foot on the ground and we just pivoted around it until we got dizzy, then we would switch and go around the other way. It was a blast! We'd go around the oval counterclockwise for half the session, then clockwise for the other half of the session. There was a lot of body positioning stuff, you sit on the side of the seat, outside elbow up, inside arm straight, elbows practically in front of the bars. This was great, but I started to worry about how one would learn to switch sides, since we only ever went in one direction at a time. I must have been learning how to do it, or I wouldn't have had room in my brain to wonder about that. And whaddya know, just as I was starting to wonder about it, they reconfigured the track, using much more of the ring. The new track layout was a U shape. Going counterclockwise, you'd turn left, left, left, RIGHT! left, left, and so on. The transition was very challenging, and when I finally crashed, that was where I did it. But it was OK, I got up laughing. This is just how you crash at American Supercamp. There's no drama at all, you just crash, laugh, get up and ride on. At one point they set up a cone weave on one of the long straights, and we got to practice switching left to right even more. I could have done this cone weave a lot more, I could feel myself learning with every pass. It was really challenging, and really good for me to do it. They also had an exercise where they had us line up at one end of the arena, and one by one we would ride in a straight line, accelerate as hard as possible, then brake as hard as we could the minute we passed a cone. They had the door open at the end, so if you failed to stop, you would just go outside, no big deal. After two passes like this, they had us hook a turn as we were braking, turn as sharp as we could, and ride back between a couple of tires and cones. This exercise seemed purpose built for people to lose traction and slide sideways, and people did. People crashed but that's OK, no one was hurt, they all got up laughing. We all got faster and more agile with it. Early on the second day, I was slow and stiff, and one of the instructors came running out and hopped on my bike behind me. He had me put my hands on top of his, my feet on top of his, scoot way forward onto the tank, and we went flying around that track, sometimes practically riding sideways. Who knew that an XR100 would carry two people and go that fast, lean over that far? And when I was alone on the bike again I discovered something else. Did you know that you can ride right over tires and orange cones on an XR100, and it hardly upsets it at all? Easy! Those bikes are amazing. In the email they sent us to tell us how to prepare for the class, they said we should do leg lunges. And in the orientation they told us to expect our legs to ache. Other people reported that this did happen to them. But for me, the place I really felt it was in my forearms. I really had a death grip on the bars, the first day, and that night I really knew it. The second day, I was able to consciously relax my hands, and I didn't feel so sore that night. I also amassed quite a collection of bruises, which purpled beautifully the following week, but they've faded now. I wish the class were longer than just the two days. I think I was just barely getting physically adapted to it when it ended. Anyway, it was worth every penny and I intend to go again as soon as possible. I'm posting this in several communities that I belong to. Apologies to anyone who is seeing it more than once.

This is exactly why I want to do this. Well, that, and because it's fun. I'm probably more cautious on the street than most. But that doesn't mean I don't want to develop these skills. As a latecomer to motorcycling, and a person who has always been fairly slow to pick up anything that requires physical coordination or grace, it's really good to go to these track days and specifically work on this stuff. Next time I go, I intend to set up camp a whole lot closer to the bathrooms! :rolleyes:

I recently I took the VFR to the racetrack for two days. For those who don't know, here's the basic scoop on how this works. The group that organizes these events is called Sportbike Track Time. STT divides the riders up into three groups, Novice, Intermediate, and Advanced. Each group gets to be on the track for twenty minutes each hour. The Novice group is for beginners and those who seek continued instruction; in addition to 20 minutes on the track each hour, Novice riders are required to attend a 20 minute classroom session each hour, and they are given strict rules for how to ride during each track session. If you've done Novice before, and you so choose, you can go to Intermediate. Intermediate usually has the most crashes, since it's less structured and has more people who are trying to prove something. Advanced is for people who have racing licenses, or who STT invites based on how well they ride. The other cool thing about STT, is that they offer discount pricing to women riders, so it's pretty cheap for me to ride with them. I've done STT track days before, so I'm eligible to go to Intermediate. But I am slow and I know it, so I have continued to ride with Novice. The lessons are the same every day, and last weekend was my fifth and six time with these lessons. I just don't learn this kind of stuff very fast. And after this past weekend I am still slow. Here is how the STT day goes: 7am - Tech and registration open. Everyone needs to have newish tires, good brakes, and a throttle that snaps back on its own, and they must remove/tape mirrors, tape their lights and speedometers and license plate edges, etc. Intermediate and Advanced have to replace their coolant with water but Novices don't. 8:30am - Riders meeting, required for all three groups. The guy in charge of the track day, Monty, gives a speech about the rules, how to enter and exit the track, things you should know about this particular track, what the various flags mean, what to do if you crash, don't be a jerk, the evils of "straight line bombing and corner camping", the importance of staying hydrated, the various available services, lunch, etc. 9:00am - Advanced and Intermediates dismissed from the meeting. Intermediate riders get the first 20 minute session. Novice riders stay for further instruction. Instructors are drawn from the Advanced group. The Novice riders are divided into groups of four to six, and assigned to individual instructors. They try to sort them according to who is likely to be fastest. The fastest riders go to Group 1, and they work down from there, with the slowest in the last group. The Novices are told that the first thing to do, is to examine the entire track. You do this by mentally dividing the track into three lanes, and riding around the track, at a moderate pace, three times, once in each lane. Each group follows their instructor. After the three trips around, the instructor will lead you and show you the racing line. You're supposed to choose things along the track to mark where you want to turn in for each curve, and memorize them. All passing is done as groups, based on the hand signals from instructors. Stay with your group, don't pass within your group. 9:40am - Novice riders get their first track session. From then on, every hour there is twenty minutes of instruction and twenty minutes of riding. Here's what they cover: - At 60mph, you're traveling 88 feet per second. Can you make a plan and execute it in a second? No. If it's within 88 feet of you it's already happened. Looking at this stuff just feeds your brain bad information. Focus your attention farther down the track, where you can still do something about it. This slows things down and makes it so your brain can keep up. - Each turn is divided into entry, apex, and exit. Set the proper entry speed, pick the proper apex, and power on through the turn. - Staying in the sweet spot of the suspension, keeping the bike's weight properly balanced front to rear. - How the bike turns, the rear wheel is key. Countersteering, leaning, throttle steering, etc. - If you don't use the throttle properly and pick the correct apex you'll run wide. - Body postioning demo. There's a bike on stands and each student sits on it. Put your toes on the outside edge of the pegs. Keep your forearms parallel to the ground, put your chin over your right forearm, rotate your hips around the gas tank and point your right knee out, while resting left knee and elbow against the tank. Take your weight off your hands. Now switch sides, and once again no weight on the hands. On Saturdays they're very formal and do this all in great detail. On Sundays they rush through the lessons more quickly and let things slide a bit, probably because the majority of the students are there for both days and it's just a review for them. Still, there are always a few Sunday-only students. My advice to anyone going for the first time, would be to get a Saturday session, because they're more thorough on Saturday. But if you've done it before and wish they'd stop lecturing so much, Sunday's the best. The track I went to, Gingerman, has some unusual rules. There are two churches on neighboring properties and the track has to observe quiet time from 10am to noon on Sundays. So they run until 6pm each day, to give back those two hours. (I was also pleased to hear Monty criticize the guys with straight pipes. He said that many tracks are starting to enforce decibel limits because this excessive noise causes tracks to be shut down. IMHO too many people who run loud pipes do it solely to show off, and these people need to realize that their peers are not impressed, so it's good that Monty is speaking up on this issue.) Other unusual things - There is a group that is trying to turn this Gingerman STT weekend into a big Ducati festival, and for this purpose they had a trackside dinner, a band, and a movie scheduled for Saturday night. This was sponsored by Red Bull, so there were scantily clad pretty girls wandering around giving away free cans of Red Bull on Saturday. There were also demo rides on Ducatis and Triumphs, which I did not take advantage of since I was too busy with the classroom sessions and the track sessions. Unfortunately the weather did not cooperate. It started raining at around 3pm Saturday, and rained most of the rest of the weekend. The movie had to be canceled because of the rain. By the time I was ready to set up my tent, the whole grassy area where I might have put it was awash, so I decided to sleep in my truck instead. I woke up a number of times during the night and it was always raining. During the day Saturday, I'd been good about staying hydrated, and therefore I had to get up in the night to pee, three times. Each time, it was raining harder. By the third time, it was raining so hard, and it was so dark, that I decided not to walk up to the bathroom. I just peed on the ground near my truck, and got back in. I got soaked to the skin in the thirty seconds it took me to do this. Yuck! On Saturday afternoon, I was a lot less distressed by the rain than a lot of the other Novices. So I came closer to holding my own, than I had all day. On Sunday morning, about half the Novice students did not even start the day. And with the rain, lots of them quit as the day wore on, and a few more crashed out. By the last session, there were only two of us left, me and Cheryl. The one remaining instructor, Travis, basically turned us loose. I passed Cheryl! And I opened up a half a lap on her by the session's end. But before you get too impressed, please realize that my VFR750 is just plain faster than her EX500. By a lot. I could run away from her in the straights, but I suspect we were pretty evenly matched in the corners. So I'm not going to take a lot of credit for mad riding skillz just because I was able to get away from her. The thing that was cool, was that I finally managed to hang off. This has been my bete noir at past track days. Of course it didn't make me any faster, in fact it was basically useless, since no one was getting knees down in the rain. Also I think I'll need a lot more practice at it before it will be smooth enough to do anything useful with it. But just being able to do it at all is a huge change. The thing that was bad, is that I was repeatedly singled out and lectured for my failure to follow other riders closely enough. There are reasons I reflexively refrain from following too close, and on the street these reasons are highly valid. Unfortunately, on the track, this is not a useful habit. I fought it and fought it, but it was an uphill battle, and I think the instructors thought I was arguing with them when I tried to explain why it is so hard for me. Maybe I should find a trustworthy riding buddy or two, and get them to work on this with me on the street, let me follow them closely so I can get past this fear? OTOH, this is just a bad idea on the street, for many reasons. I will have to think about this some more.

Breaking Rule 5, tsk tsk. Nice photo essay on this mod, very interesting to see how they install!