As noted above by Misti and adouglas, drawing the track and making session notes are excellent tools for learning a track, or for extracting lessons from the track. An excellent way of leveraging these techniques is to grab a stopwatch and mentally ride the track. This technique is useful because it integrates visual elements with other senses (vestibular, kinesthetic, auditory, etc.) in the context of the rhythm or flow of the track.
If you try this, you may find that initially your mental lap times are way off, but even that can provide a great deal of information. For example, if your mental time is way ‘better’ (the lap goes quicker in your mind than in reality), that could indicate the mental rhythm you are riding to is out of sync with the track… perhaps because you’re experiencing an elevated sensation of speed (feeling rushed or overwhelmed by the pace).
Mental lap times that are far slower than reality can indicate that you’ve become lost or distracted during the lap, which can help you identify where you need to improve your mental model of the track (and perhaps do some more drawing).
Anyway, maybe give it a try, it’s free, it’s fun, and it’s resolution adjustable; you can go from just trying to learn and get around a track to determining (or programming) where the bike will rotate in a turn, where the rear tire will start drifting on exit, or any other multitude of technique adjustments you want to make.
One last point. This is a mental training technique, but it’s a whole-body mental training technique so MOVE
. Even seated, you can make slight movements to simulate the loads you would be experiencing, or the control/body movements you would be making on the bike.