View Single Post
Old August 21st, 2016, 09:04 AM   #11
Mechanikrazy
ninjette.org guru
 
Mechanikrazy's Avatar
 
Name: Al
Location: Orange County, CA
Join Date: Dec 2015

Motorcycle(s): Thruxton R, R6 450 triple, EX300 (sold)

Posts: 263
Another long stretch before updates. Since the last time, I've visited NYST, Shenny, and VIR. Doing VIR with California Superbike School totally changed up my riding position. For sure, it will take some time to adjust.

New York Safety Track
NYST with Evolve

Takeaway: Less coasting. Be more aggressive on the throttle.

Fun weekend for me, not so much for my buddy. We went up for two days, but my buddy had an incident on Day 1. We ended up spending the rest of the day in two different hospitals. Comment of the day by a nurse when we walked in with gear still on: What are they, stormtroopers?

Day 2, I had a great time with Evolve as usual. Was lucky to get a couple tows and try to figure out the lines. NYST is a lot of fun, but a bit far from DC. One big takeaway was how much more aggressive I can be on the throttle. Especially with a 300, that drive makes such a huge difference. Brett from Evolve was awesome at walking me through sections where I should be much more aggressive on the throttle.

_______________
Shenny
Shenandoah with MXC

This was supposed to be VIR day, but VIR had paving delays so I ended up going to Shenny instead. It was a solid day hanging out with great people. This was just a tune up day before two days at California Superbike School, so I was not pushing hard. "Go slow to go fast" did happen a bit here. I was pushing less than my previous times at Shenny, and still somehow dropped 5 seconds off my personal best.

New PR at Shenny: 2:09

_________________
VIR with California Superbike School

Takeaway: Body positioning. Preposition early on the brakes. Switch to clutchless shifting. More upper body movement, less lower body movement.

There was a lot going on here. I had a great time going through levels 3 and 4. Working with Gerry in level 3, and Dylan and Ash in level 4 was a great experience, and Cobie was awesome with taking time out of his day for a random off-track drill.

I spent a lot of time asking questions on body positioning, as I've been having a hard time with body positioning on the 300. The body positioning issue also ties in with some unconscious bar inputs that I've been doing as I haven't been completely relaxed on the bike when in a hang off position. Level 4 was perfect for this as I could focus on the issues that I wanted to.

The days were great, but the new track surface absolutely tore up my tires. I've done 8 days on a set of DR2s and had about 50% tread left. I'm now down to the wear bars on the rear after 2 days at VIR. S20evos with a 150 on the rear will be going on next.

Changes made:
Overall lower body position - This year, I've been hanging off much more aggressively, but it has affected my connection with the bike. Working with the CSS guys, I switched to a less off-seat position, so that I can keep a better lock on the tank with the outside leg. Instead, the focus was to try to get the upper body off the bike a bit more in exchange for the lower body.

Inside foot position - Previously, I've been riding with my inside foot angle at a 45 angle with the outer toes hanging off over the edge of the peg. After some discussion, I switched to keeping my foot parallel with the bike, but tilting it at a 45 degree angle against the rearset and peg. Having Jon and Dylan working with me on my bike, they showed me that I could get the same, if not better, knee positioning with the new lower body and foot position since I wasn't rotating around the tank as much as before.

Prepositioning - This probably messed with me the most the entire time. Previously, I've been getting my downshifts done before prepositioning before corner entry. Talking about it this time, I switched to prepositioning my lower body before initiating downshifts and braking. The new positioning, especially on righthanders, put my shifting foot out of my old comfort zone. I think I was definitely helping to stabilize the bike by prepositioning earlier, but I also had to dial back my braking a bit to have time to adjust to the potentially downshifting issue. I still ended up overcooking it into 1, relative to my comfort level, once and ran way wide due to the whole preposition/braking/downshifting changes.

Clutchless - I've previously played around with clutchless shifting on the street, but I switched over to clutchless shifting after a talk with Cobie. I have previously not done this because I was worried that I might miss a gear on a downshift and overcook a corner. But after trying it out, i definitely feel like I could solidly predict the shifts and I was using less of my mental capacity on my shifts.


All in all, I had a great time and made a lot of changes to my riding. I hope these changes will make me better with less improper rider inputs. Even dialed back, I was 2 seconds faster than last time at VIR.

New PR: 2:04

Link to original page on YouTube.


____
What's next:
After seeing another vortex user's crash and frame damage, I switched back to the OEM footpegs. I got a set of Yoshimura risers and PSR footpegs for the OEM footpegs.
S20evos with a 150 rear.
Pitt Race for the first time next month.

Mechanikrazy is offline   Reply With Quote


2 out of 2 members found this post helpful.