[Misti]

Originally Posted by ally99

My opinion is all of those questions can be answered by having 2 common practices well developed: appropriate entry speed and always always always looking as far down the road as possible for everything from cars on the roads to signs marking road changes or intersecting streets.
Knowing proper entry speed for whatever type of corner you are coming upon is a skill that takes many hundreds and thousands of different types of corners to develop. On our bikes, being in the proper gear prior to leaning is also pretty important if you're dealing with major elevation changes. It's a good way to help your bike regulate its speed for the down or uphill. If the corner is going uphill, obviously snick it into a lower gear to have enough pull to keep your RPMS up throughout the corner. Downhill is obviously the opposite to avoid hitting the rev-limiter and not being able to smoothly accelerate. Up hill corners can allow you a faster entry speed and downhill ones require you to enter more slowly. There are so many things that we must be aware of when looking as far down the road as possible, and elevation changes are an example.
To be honest, in all the real world corners I've taken up in the mountains where I'm regularly nearing maximum lean, having a need to slow down mid-corner because of an unseen car is very rare. By looking ahead as far as possible, even prior to entering that corner, I usually know if a car is ahead of me, so I start in slower. However, there are those surprises coming around a corner where someone had stopped at an overlook and pulls out in front of you. Those can be a bit nerve-wrecking which is why a small amount of reserve lean is needed on the streets. Usually, however, there are signs letting you know an overlook or a street is ahead prior to the turn, so again, I know to have a slower entry speed for those.
On regular roads (at least everyday roads here in Ga), if I come up on a car, I'm not close enough to max lean to really matter and can smoothly slow down, mostly by rolling off the throttle a hair.
I have no experience riding 2-up, so I have no idea about that one.

Very well said and I agree that a lot of mistakes can be avoided if a) riders learn to judge and set their entry speeds correctly, and b)look far enough down the road to be able to see possible problems early so they have time ro react to them. Nicely put!

Originally Posted by Domagoj

Interesting, so enter speed should be adjusted (faster for uphill and slower for downhill), to be able to roll on through the corner and still have similar exit speed? This does require some lean adjustments through the corner, and makes those corners terribly complicated.

Yes, entry speeds should be adjusted so that you are able to roll on the gas asap once turned and maintain a smooth and consistent roll on throughout the remainder of the corner. This is most important for the downhill turns where then tendency for riders is to enter in too fast and then coast through the turn because they don't feel comfortable rolling on the gas. Entering in at a slower pace will allow you to be able to roll on the gas and roll it on throughout the turn (it doesn't take much of a roll on to achieve the 40%/60% weight balance needed to stabilize the bike) without feeling like you are going too fast for the corner.

Originally Posted by JMcDonald

I have been working on slowing my corner speed, and it is amazing the increase in stability. At first I thought it might have just been me imagining it. But, there is this nicely sweeping interstate offramp that turns 270 degrees and ten merges directly into a 40mph city street. I had previously been trying to maintain a constant speed through this curve, and had found I could, at best be at around 50mph by the time I was actualy in one of the strait lanes on the road--any faster and I could start to detect the loss in traction because I was trying to maintain a constant speed. Now, I have been slowing down through the turn (without actually turning very hard), and waiting til the last 90 degrees to accelerate. I have been able to consistently be in the high-50s mph by the time I am on that same strait road after the ramp! Of course, I couldn't say whether slowing down to 40 and then exiting at 60 is faster than maintaining 45-50mph through the whole turn, but it definitely feels more stable.

To clarify, by entering faster, I can't accelerate as hard because of the reduced traction while leaning a little harder and because I am not accelerating. This means my exit speed is significantly lower without really running into traction issues. By allowing myself to accelerate earlier, I can feel the bike "settle," and I get much higher exit speeds. "Slow In, Fast Out" definitely applies here.
There is also another onramp, a quick S-turn with probably 80 degrees in each direction, with no strait-area in-between. I have found reducing my entry-speed by maybe 5mph or so, I can consistently lean harder, shift my weight more, and accelerate harder (about 50mph exit speed rather than about 45mph) without any tire slippage. Before, I would start to feel slippage if I tried to push any harder, because I guess I wasn't accelerating as hard and getting the chassis settled properly.

This is a good example here of how entering a turn a little bit slower will help you be able to roll on the gas through the turn and have a much more stable bike.

What cues do you take from the road/track that let you know how fast you can/should be going at turn entry?

What are some ways you might be able to improve your ability to judge entry speed?

Misti