Train descent skills - Page 5 (2024)

TobinHatesYou wrote: ↑

Wed Jun 26, 2024 7:45 am

jlok wrote: ↑

Wed Jun 26, 2024 7:31 am

That Doohan moto example was actually oskool not elbow dragging. His head/torso was not even lean-in. Check Marquez for a more modern lean style. Doohan's bike was 2-stroke and very light-weight and flickable vs current motogp 4-stroke bike (50kg heavier).

Doohan is still hanging his ass off the moto in the opposite direction you’d hang your ass off a bicycle. Are you suggesting cyclists position their bodies like Doohan?

I was just clarifying LeDuke's post > viewtopic.php?p=1874521#p1874521

My suggestion would be to find a bike with a balanced geometry that a rider is comfortable to start with, then get light / low profile wheels and get comfortable the tires and brakes and not be affected by the enviornment too much. Practise emergency braking, basic turn of 8, track-stand etc etc.

With the basic handling technique complete, then we can focus on the road to find safe/fast lines; anticipating the traffic ahead (basically situation awareness). We can take reference from all kinds of 2-wheel activities, not limiting to road bikes only. Riding MX moto / MTB would help a lot to get familiar with loose surface. Gain more confidence to handle when s*** happens.

I enjoy descending so much that I was willing to keep climbing (average climber at best...) just for the descents. Today I still try different things and experiment, like those different lean styles. Would I stick to a certain lean style? No. It depends on the situation. Hope that clears the confusion

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TobinHatesYou wrote: ↑

Tue Jun 18, 2024 11:43 pm

The reality is that nobody descends perfectly so feathering the brakes through the apex is almost always faster in real life than doing all of your braking before the turn.

Plus if it's a descent you could be accelerating quite rapidly through the corner when totally off the brakes. So it's quite hard to judge what your mid corner / exit speed will be if you try and do all your braking before turning in on a 180 corner, you'll often either end up too fast and have to correct on the brakes mid corner or too conservative and enter the corner way below the limit.

Trail braking / speed control from the turn in to somewhere just before the apex can be a bit faster and a lot more consistent on longer corners / switchbacks I think.

TobinHatesYou wrote: ↑

Wed Jun 26, 2024 7:45 am

Doohan is still hanging his ass off the moto in the opposite direction you’d hang your ass off a bicycle. Are you suggesting cyclists position their bodies like Doohan?

Looking at recent developments in bike weight and tire width, who knows what the future will bring

The reality is that nobody descends perfectly so feathering the brakes through the apex is almost always faster in real life than doing all of your braking before the turn.

Interestingly this is also what the 20+ years old article on Sheldon Brown's site says:

Why brake in the turn? If all braking is done before the turn, speed will be slower than necessary before the apex. Anticipating maximum speed for the apex is difficult, and because the path is not a circular arc, speed must be trimmed all the way to that point. Fear of braking in curves usually comes from an incident of injudicious braking at a point where braking should have been done with a gentle touch to match the conditions.

and then:

For braking in a curve, take the example of a rider cornering with good traction, leaning at 45 degrees, the equivalent of 1G centrifugal acceleration. Braking with 1/10g increases the traction demand by one half percent. The sum of cornering and braking vectors is the square root of the sum of their squares, SQRT(1^2+0.1^2)=1.005 or an increase of 0.005. In other words, there is room to brake substantially during maximum cornering. Because the lean angle changes as the square of the speed, braking can rapidly reduce the angle and allow even more braking. For this reason skilled racers nearly always apply both brakes into the apex of turns.

I find advice and the discussion in this thread very helpful, especially tips on body positioning, looking far ahead and now braking. Thanks everyone for the discussion!