Racing lines round corners
- Thread starter jamma
- Start date
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Justinslow
Lovely jubbly
- Location
- Suffolk
Smokin Joe
Squire
- Location
- Bare headed cyclist, Smoker
Read what Yellow Saddle said above, "My bike even countersteers itself when I ride no hands. That's how automatic it is."
What exactly is there to try?
Just give it an extra push and see what happens, I cannot think of anything else as it just comes naturally as you say.
Yellow Saddle
Guru
- Location
- Loch side.
No, it is automatic. Don't muddle the issue. There is no way it can help someone steer around a turn without all the necessary judgement not to hit a fence. Some cases can't be solved with physics.
Flick of the Elbow
less than
- Location
- Midlothian Edinburgh
Back in the day, I thought my cornering was ok until I was riding a handicap race and got caught by the fast group, trying to hold their wheels I realised that they were taking a very different line to me. A few years later I was on a winter training/social weekend in the Peak District trying to catch up with some of the fast boys who had dropped me on a climb. Behind me, a rider who would ride the Olympic road race later that year had done an extra loop for some extra miles was catching me, he caught me just as we started a descent. Great I thought, I just need to stick on his wheel and he'll take me back up to the front group. No chance ! He gapped me by yards on the very first corner, a technical ability in a different league to me.
Moral of the story, ride with the fast boys as often as you can, try to learn from the lines and braking that they are using.
Moral of the story, ride with the fast boys as often as you can, try to learn from the lines and braking that they are using.
Shut Up Legs
Down Under Member
Hey! I just thought of a great cycling forum signature line: "I countersteer, therefore I am a cyclist".
A little googling would reveal the track to be the Middlesborough Cycling Circuit at Prissick Park. Map link here....
https://goo.gl/maps/ouNcmCKCCeq
So, has anyone else raced at this circuit? Is that corner difficult? What tips would you have?
Here's some on-board of a cat 4 race around the circuit to help the discussion along......
https://goo.gl/maps/ouNcmCKCCeq
So, has anyone else raced at this circuit? Is that corner difficult? What tips would you have?
Here's some on-board of a cat 4 race around the circuit to help the discussion along......
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Yellow Saddle
Guru
- Location
- Loch side.
I could not identify the corner in question by following the bunch in the video but it appears to me that there isn't a corner there sharp enough to not being able to pedal whilst racing around it with the bunch.
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Yellow Saddle
Guru
- Location
- Loch side.
Similar epiphany here. On a very, very steep mountain pass I was overtaken by a cycling pro (who I knew very well) and his then girlfriend on a tandem at what I estimate to have been 90kph. It is purely subjective but I was doing 60-odd and they passed me very,very quickly. There was no Strava in those days and all I could glean was that their computer showed a maximum of 90-something for that day's ride. It must have bee where they passed me.
On approaching a very sharp turn followoing that downhill they whisked around it whilst I hit the brakes. Even if they did brake hard and late, tandems just don't slow down that quickly and I could see the way the tandem leaned into the corner that it was still going fast. That's when I realised there are different leagues in cornering. They were way above me.
It also made me think long and hard about tyre grip in such situations and I went on to do some professional studying on the topic. We all corner way below the capability of the tyre's grip. There is so much grip available but it is a difficult entity to exploit. We lack courage, skill and sensory interpretation to do it right. Those who do it right can't describe what it is they do but the one common denominator I found is that all of them learnt it whilst young. It seems that you cannot acquire the skill later in life.
S-Express
Guest
Coner in question appears to be at around 1:30. A 4th cat race may not provide the most shining example of how to corner - just sayin. Either way, how on earth anyone can end up on the grass on a circuit like that is a bit of a mystery...
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rugby bloke
Veteran
- Location
- Northamptonshire
The first time I recognised the corner was at 1.20 in the video. Difficult to tell from the film how fast they are cycling - it did not look particularly quick, but it did not look like it was causing them too many problems, they keep peddling through the corner, taking the expected line.
smutchin
Cat 6 Racer
- Location
- The Red Enclave
Hey, be fair - at least they're managing to stay on the track!
