South West Bikers | Motorcycle Forum

I have the knee down DVD, I dont need it, I learnt on my 400, just thrashing about, leaning over and thought something broke, but it was my knee scraping along the tarmac, kinda scary at first, but get used to it!

baskie wrote: u should go down to wrigly's round about in estover. thats were we all go,

I sometimes go that way home from work in the evening and it looks so sad when you see a group of power rangers going around in circles trying to get that elusive knee down moment.

a roundabout is definately the best way of getting your knee down (not sure how helpful a dvd is).

A couple of things tho:

1. choose a quiet roundabout at a quiet time of day, lots have slippery surfaces from lorries spilling diesel, wrigleys is ok but cops drive by quite often during the summer.

2. don't bother trying if u have huge wimp lines. even if u do manage to get your knee down u probably not ready to and won't really be doing it safely (relative of course) unless you're already a quick road rider. You don't need to be getting your knee down to get rid of chicken strips. An example of this was when lost-id and jay asked me to teach them, lost-id managed it and then crashed on the torpoint twisties the very next day i'm sure over confidence was partially the cause and he got away very lightly.

3. once you've got your knee down don't think for one second that because u scraped it going round a roundabout 20 times that u will now be able to get it down at every bend or at speed- safe, good knee down bends are very few and far between.


As for why riders get their knees down, well it depends? On the road it is showing off pure and simple (not that theres anything wrong with that) but NO-ONE rides any faster on the road by getting their knee down. With racers its a different story, getting their knees down changes the bikes centre of gravity which means they can keep the bike more upright (than if they weren't hanging off) whih allows them to go round the bend faster, as a by product it also lets them judge how much ground clearance they have.

andrew wrote:NO-ONE rides any faster on the road by getting their knee down.

Very true, watch a racer at the IOM TT and they hardly ever get a knee down, different story on a track though.

Also racers dont drag their knees on the ground, touch down then lift it off the ground. Knee down, or more importantly, hanging off does allow faster corner speed with less lean though.

I must the only person with unused knee slider on my right knee but a well used one on the left

cant see i will ever have the guts to get that far down

DynaMight wrote:Also racers dont drag their knees on the ground, touch down then lift it off the ground. Knee down, or more importantly, hanging off does allow faster corner speed with less lean though.

I must the only person with unused knee slider on my right knee but a well used one on the left

I know what you mean I take left handers quicker than right handers must be something to do with the traffic coming the other way. leaning to the left you are angled away from the traffic right you lean into it,
merv

georgie_d wrote:cant see i will ever have the guts to get that far down

I thought that as well, but hay presto i did, and now can keep it off the ground nearly 3 years later

DynaMight wrote:
I must the only person with unused knee slider on my right knee but a well used one on the left

If your doin Llandow there is only 2 left hand bends so you should murder your right slider

lol you were so close....like 2 inches max when following you........

i still couldn't get my elbow down.......knee down does slow ya down........but its fun like wheelies....

miserable sod clunk lol....its only fun.

AGE996 wrote:

DynaMight wrote:
I must the only person with unused knee slider on my right knee but a well used one on the left

If your doin Llandow there is only 2 left hand bends so you should murder your right slider

This worries me, I feel that I'm terrible at right handers!! Only reason I can think is what Mervin said.

most of us wear out left sliders on the road mate but that goes out the window on a track day.

Age

AGE996 wrote:most of us wear out left sliders on the road mate but that goes out the window on a track day.

Age

Not me i do the right slider - if things go wrong i'd sooner take my chances going into a hedge than go head on into oncoming traffic but at the end of the day everyone has there favourites! I have no chicken strips either side but i'd still like to work on my left handers as hanging off feels uncomfortable.

andrew wrote:

AGE996 wrote:most of us wear out left sliders on the road mate but that goes out the window on a track day.

Age

Not me i do the right slider - if things go wrong i'd sooner take my chances going into a hedge than go head on into oncoming traffic but at the end of the day everyone has there favourites! I have no chicken strips either side but i'd still like to work on my left handers as hanging off feels uncomfortable.

exactly the same as above.

Heres the clip I uploaded, http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid ... 2202946442