How to practice when not at the track??

[Mike:p]

I’m looking for pointers on things that I can practice during my commute.

I ride my bike 5 days a week to school and back, 45 minutes each way. It’s mostly a straight ride on a 4 lane highway with speed limits between 55 and 65. I ride about 65 to 75 respectively. Outside of lighter faster shifts, I can’t think of anything else I could work on during the ride. I do keep my eyes up looking for the popo.

 

[D-Zum]

Nothing. You’re on public roads. Ride as appropriate for that situation.

You want cheap seat time to further hone skills?

MiniGP or some dirt bike time.

 

[Dom17]

As pretensions as it sounds I practice every day.

Step one: listen to all these:
https://soundcloud.com/ken-hill-534763963

5-10 times. That should eat up a few months of commuting.

Getting a dirt bike helped me heaps. Seat time is seat time. You can ride 6 hours a day on a dirt bike on the limit of traction and no red flags will interrupt you. Don't over do it, get a cheap weak dirt bike and ride the balls off it.

Practice your eyes and apexing everywhere. Even with your grocery cart.

Always be smooth with the first 5% and last 5% of throttle and braking even when you are driving your car to the grocery store.

Are you physically flexible enough? Can you run for 20 minutes at a time? If not, work on that cause I can guarantee you can do better.

Work on meditation and mindfulness.

Work on organizing and simplify your track gear packing so you can focus more on riding at the track rather than where you left that tool.

Eyes eyes eye. Always train eyes. Even when you are walking.

When riding your bike on the street realize the fundamentals are the same but the degree of application is different. You need to make sure that your fundamental skills are strong. Listen to the podcasts.

Sent from my Pixel 2 using Tapatalk

 

[djhurayt]

WW, what a fabulous post Dom. That post alone should be a sticky. Well put sir, well put.
To be good at anything, it needs to become something you don't have to think about. Just like you develop muscle memory, you need to traing your eyes and brain to recognize and react without consciously thinking.

 

[adotjdot]

To build on what's already been said...we definitely do not want to be pushing limits like we do on the track. But Dom called it perfectly, the same technique applies, you just need to adjust your level of application.

For street rides:
- Focus
- Eyes scanning
- Smooth application of all controls
- Starting our processes earlier: eyes, brakes, body...
- Blipping on downshifts
- Trail-braking (yes, this works on the street too!
- Smooth clutch releases
- Fingers covering your brakes
- Rolling off the throttle TO your brakes
- Body: we are not going to use full GP body, but we can still work on body timing, upper body and head movement
- Rear brake
- Situational awareness: think of how developing this skill on the road can help you on the track; the cars around you are all being driven by people, you need to be able to judge their movement around you and be able to modulate your controls to adjust where you want the bike to be (sounds kind of like what's happening on the track, right?)

Should I keep going?...;-)

Bottom line is, the more you work on the fundamental skills at every level, the more they become muscle memory and part of your natural process.

Sent from my SM-G955U using Tapatalk

 

[CBRtist]

WW, what a fabulous post Dom. That post alone should be a sticky. Well put sir, well put.

Agreed. Dom is an exceptional asset to our organization.

I look forward to seeing him and his wife continue to progress in our little family.

 

[Motofun352]

Only thing I can add is...always ride with the proper race foot position. Make this your natural way to ride on the street as well as the track. One less thing to think about.

 

[Raceless man]

I like the frequency of panic breaking on the Garden State Parkway due to someone making an incredibly random and dangerous decision to change lanes, brake for cops going in the opposite direction, texting drift, passing on the shoulder..the list goes on and on.

 

[Lenny ZX9R]

As pretensions as it sounds I practice every day.

Step one: listen to all these:
https://soundcloud.com/ken-hill-534763963

5-10 times. That should eat up a few months of commuting.

Getting a dirt bike helped me heaps. Seat time is seat time. You can ride 6 hours a day on a dirt bike on the limit of traction and no red flags will interrupt you. Don't over do it, get a cheap weak dirt bike and ride the balls off it.

Practice your eyes and apexing everywhere. Even with your grocery cart.

Always be smooth with the first 5% and last 5% of throttle and braking even when you are driving your car to the grocery store.

Are you physically flexible enough? Can you run for 20 minutes at a time? If not, work on that cause I can guarantee you can do better.

Work on meditation and mindfulness.

Work on organizing and simplify your track gear packing so you can focus more on riding at the track rather than where you left that tool.

Eyes eyes eye. Always train eyes. Even when you are walking.

When riding your bike on the street realize the fundamentals are the same but the degree of application is different. You need to make sure that your fundamental skills are strong. Listen to the podcasts.

Sent from my Pixel 2 using Tapatalk

Good stuff Dom!