Dirt Bike Skills Lesson Continues
This rider was having a little too much fun and missed a turn in the road.
Next up after the break was something I had done before, except this was on steroids. In the Beginning Rider Course one of the things they work on with you is riding over obstacles in the road. The generic obstacle generally used is a 2×4.
Let’s face it, in real life, all you really have to do to go over a 2×4 is to go over it. It will be a bump but not much more. In this case, Mike substituted a 6×6 landscaping timber. Now we’re talking an actual obstacle. This is the kind of thing–size-wise–you could actually run into on a trail.
The key here is to shift your weight back on the seat and goose the throttle just before you get to it so as to drop the rear end of the bike down and bring the front up, and in the process unweight the front tire so it goes easily up and over. Then you need to instantly back off the throttle and slide forward on the seat. The first time I tried it I dumped the bike and went sprawling. No damage done to me or the bike. Get back on and try again. Mike said the problem was my timing; I hit the throttle too soon and had already lost my front-end loft before I just plowed head-on into the beam.
Next time–and really, every other time–I did better. That was my only dump for the day. Some times were smoother than others, and in more than a couple instances I got smacked soundly on the butt as the rear end went over the beam, jacking up in the air in the process. So it was cool–I had never gone over anything that large before. Good to have some practice.
And that was another thing. I was in a class of one student. That meant I could keep doing things over and over again until I felt like I had them down. It doesn’t work that way when there are a bunch of other students all wanting their crack at it.
So then we headed for the hills. Small hills. The deal was just to ride up the slope and arc around and come back down. The idea here was to get your weight forward on the uphill, swing your weight to the outside of the turn while turning, and then move your weight rearward while coming down the hill. This was not at all hard to do, it’s just a matter of learning that this is what you need to do in this situation.
After that we traversed the slope. That is, we went up on the slope and then rode across the side of the hill with the slope going up on one side and down on the other. And then down the slope. Then back the other direction. The one additional element was to put your weight on the downhill side of the bike, which was to give the tires as good a purchase on the surface as possible. I’ll have more to say about that in a later post. At my request, we did it a couple times and discussed exactly what was going on and why. Doing it was easy; once again it was a matter of learning that this is what you need to do.
And next we did some trail riding. Mike and Kathy have 35 acres, with the house up by the road and all the rest of the property down the hill to the rear. The training track is down where things level off again and the whole area between the track and the house is tall grass. Mike has mowed an extremely twisty trail all through this area with more than a few really tight turns. It’s good because there are no rocks, no holes, no logs, and so if you can’t quite make a turn you just run wide and it doesn’t matter in the least. But of course you want to stay on the path and make the turns. This is what you’ve been training for all day.
Off we went. Once again, making all these curves often required really, really turning your head way around to see into the turn. It was good that Mike had pointed out to me along the way that I would do best if I would put the bike in one gear and leave it there, rather than trying to work the clutch. Dirt bikes can rev very low without stalling so you just work the throttle. That gives your mind more bandwidth to process all the other things you’re trying to do at the same time.
Covering probably 15 times the distance it would have been in a straight line, we worked our way up to the house and if my recollection is correct, I made it all the way staying on the trail, no matter how tight the turns. And I was totally out of breath. Riding a dirt bike can be hard work!
OK, said Mike, what do you want to do next?
Biker Quote for Today
You know you’re becoming addicted to riding when you have rubbed your wife’s steering wheel raw trying to figure out why you can’t roll the throttle wide open.
Tags: United Dirt Bike School
