Track skills you can practice on the street?

[Everyday I'm Hustling]

Hey all. I'm kind of hesitant to post this here, because this section doesn't seem to get responses too often, but oh well...

Due to Formula Ford being too damn expensive, and the realization I've come to that I need to race something or I'll go insane, I'm looking to start seeing some track time on a bike. I've picked up an '04 250R, and I'm looking to build a decent foundation before I sign up for my first track day. Are there any good practices I can work on outside of the track, whether it's on the street, in a deserted parking lot, etc.?

The only thing I can think of is rev-matching, just because it makes sense from the time I've spent using heel-toe in cars. I grab the brake with two fingers and roll the throttle with the rest, just because it feels the most natural. Is this the correct way?

How about braking? Is there a certain ratio I should work on between front and rear, or should I only use front (obviously outside of mid-corner where I'd use the rear)?

And turning, leaning, etc.? Anything you guys can suggest, really. I've heard this is a good bike to learn all this stuff on, so like I said, I'm looking for a place to start. I don't want to fall into bad habbits from the start, so I'm looking for advice while I'm still a "sponge" so to speak.

Thanks for any help.

[fiveninerzero]

If this is your first time riding, you might wanna figure out the basics of riding a motorcycle first.

That said:

Find a big open parking lot and practice body positioning. Find a reference point to look at to make sharp turns and get yourself off the seat. The one thing that took me a while to figure out was my body position. After I sorted that mess out, I noticed it was key. Loose grip on the bars, lay on the tank, ass off the seat, inside tippie toes on the peg pushing yourself into the turn, outside thigh against the tank, head reaching out trying to kiss the mirror, looking at the apex mometarily, then towards the exit of the turn.

You don't necessarily need to be going fast to do this, and you can even drag knee this way. You can practice your seating transitions (ie. you wanna transition into turning posture smoothly and quickly, as this can upset your chassis)

Another thing is late braking and turn in. To get confident in my brakes, I took a parking lot with big floodlights, and used the light poles as brake markers, turning in sharply as I passed them, simulating the end of a long straight. I braked as hard as possible until I could feel the front end get light. Each time I reduced braking distance drastically. I'm not going to get into the whole back brake fiasco here, if you want a long read on the back brake, just take a look at the currently most active thread here on this forum.
For braking, I recommend as a newbie just to use your front brake and to complete all braking before turn-in, trail braking is tricky if you don't know what you are doing, I still am not completely comfortable with it yet.

As for blipping the throttle, I do something along the lines of what you are mentioning, just as long as you don't lock the back up you should be fine with whatever method you use.

Take it slow, don't try to learn too fast, and don't get cocky and you will pick it up soon enough.

There is a video a british mag made on body position, but I can't find it on youtube dammit...

[OreoGaborio]

I see you just picked up a bike, so i'm gonna assume you're brand spankin new to riding... if you're not, forgive me.

First off, contrary to what 5niner0 says above, i'd recommend you just concentrate on the basics of riding and worry about practicing body positioning and race techniques later. Work on things like keeping your eyes as far ahead as possible, smooth throttle control, smooth braking, smooth shifting, smooth steering inputs and smooth body transitions (if you do decide to start using a little "body english")... see a theme here? Smooth is key. You also want to be nice and light on the bars, don't hold yourself up w/ you hands... . I'd advise you to sign up for the MSF course ASAP!!! Then start looking into trackdays in your area after you've got a few months of riding under your belt.

Once you've got the basics of all the controls down, there's a few books out there you should get your hands on. Check out this link... Keith Code is a VERY well respected writer on motorcycling. http://www.motorcycle.com/mo/mcracin...ookreview.html

To answer you other questions, yes, your rev-matching technique is correct. It's just like heel/toe downshifts in a car. For braking, it's very rare for me to use the rear brake. To achieve maximum braking, weight transfers completely to the front and the rear tire is almost completely off the ground, which means there's VERY little the rear tire can do as far as braking goes w/o locking up completely. Because of this, there's VERY little wear on my rear brakes, maybe a little more on my street bike, but there's virtually NO rear brake pad wear on my race bike... same goes for 99% of racers I race with.

Hope that helps... it's not one of my best or most organized posts on the subject, but it's late & I'm still exhausted from my race weekend

[Everyday I'm Hustling]

Thanks for the suggestions. I'll look into those books as well.

This is my first personal bike, but I have some limited experience. I used to scoot around on this old Honda dirtbike my dad has, but when it came to actually racing, I opted to try four wheels rather than two. So this isn't really my first time riding; I guess it's more like my first time actually trying to ride fast. I got the 250R last wednesday, and have just been riding nonstop to refresh my memory.

Thanks again for the help and any future suggestions.

[kevin_stevens]

And if you really want to practice your four-wheel skills for cheap, get a shifter kart instead.

KeS

[Everyday I'm Hustling]

Originally Posted by kevin_stevens

And if you really want to practice your four-wheel skills for cheap, get a shifter kart instead.

KeS

Haha, I don't really have any interest in them. I had to decide if I wanted to move to fenders (I was going to do either Spec Miata or the 944 Cup) or stay open-wheel (Formula Ford), but since I was working entirely off of my own budget, I knew I wouldn't have enough to be competetive. So then I decided to take a year or so to save, started looking at commuter bikes to save on gas, read up more on the realistic costs of racing them, and here I am.

[kevin_stevens]

Originally Posted by Everyday I'm Hustling

Haha, I don't really have any interest in them. I had to decide if I wanted to move to fenders (I was going to do either Spec Miata or the 944 Cup) or stay open-wheel (Formula Ford), but since I was working entirely off of my own budget, I knew I wouldn't have enough to be competetive. So then I decided to take a year or so to save, started looking at commuter bikes to save on gas, read up more on the realistic costs of racing them, and here I am.

Fair enough - but in terms of value for track time, it's hard to beat karts, and that's where all the pro racers get started these days. Now that I've dropped 120 lbs I'll probably be autoxing one next season instead of my Evo.

KeS

[Everyday I'm Hustling]

Originally Posted by kevin_stevens

Fair enough - but in terms of value for track time, it's hard to beat karts, and that's where all the pro racers get started these days. Now that I've dropped 120 lbs I'll probably be autoxing one next season instead of my Evo.

KeS

Don't get me wrong; karts are where I come from. By "move to fenders" or "stay open-wheel," I mean "move" from karts or "stay" and race basically a bigger, faster, more expensive one. When I say "I don't really have any interest in them," I mean shifter karts in particular. Karts are a lot of fun.

But at the same time, comparing the costs of a competitive Rotax Max season to what I'm reading most people pay for the full-size circuit seasons with bikes, they aren't that far off. And when I can tackle "real," full-size courses with tipple-digit speed for roughly the same prices I pay to tackle mini circuits at ~70mph max, I'm definitely going to look into it

[bittersweetryan]

I like to practice my body position while the bike is on stands. I try to envision a turn coming up and I slide off the seat break then rotate around the tank and get my upper body off the bike. This way I can let go of the bars to make sure I'm using my legs to support my weight when hanging off.

[fiveninerzero]

Originally Posted by OreoGaborio

I see you just picked up a bike, so i'm gonna assume you're brand spankin new to riding... if you're not, forgive me.

First off, contrary to what 5niner0 says above,

Actually, that was exactly what I stated in the first line of my original post as a caveat... I dont know where the contrary came from...I then continued assuming the guy wasn't totally new.
Thanks for reading.

[OreoGaborio]

hehe yeah, i noticed you started off as if he was new, then went right into intermediate techniques ;)