My Freddie Spencer School (Pro School) Experience
February, 2007
Unbelievably, I’m back again.
I admit it, I’m nuts. I mean, come on. Another trip to Freddie Spencer school?
Well, yeah – but this time is different. Over the winter months I decided I was going to give racing a shot this upcoming season. And, I guess my personality is such that, when I decide to do something, especially something competitive, I don’t like to do it halfway. Not that I have this “win at any cost” mentality, because I don’t think I do (although I sure don’t like to lose). I just like to be prepared for success, and take advantage of any resource I can to insure success.
So, because I was so very impressed with my former experiences with Freddie Spencer School (see www.bwhip.com/Freddie.html and www.bwhip.com/Freddie2.html for details on my first two school experiences), I decided to give their “Pro School” a shot, to prepare for the upcoming season, and try to learn all I could about how to be successful in racing.
I hoped to be able to do a three-day school as I did in both of my previous trips, but found that it had already sold out. Instead, I signed up for the two-day school, and, despite a dicey weather forecast, intend to make the most of it!
Being here continues to be like some kind of fantasy for me. It’s expensive, for sure. A big commitment of money and time. We all make choices in life. Some guys buy hot cars or second homes in the mountains. In my case, over the past couple of years I’ve chosen to invest in becoming a better, faster, safer rider. And I haven’t found a better way to do that, than by coming here and getting help from the pros. Thankfully, I have an understanding wife.
As with my previous trips to the school, I’m going to be posting a detailed accounting of my experience in this blog – both to help me remember it for the future, and to give friends some idea of what they can expect when they come to the school.
DAY ONE
Back in Vegas! This time the Orleans Hotel is very familiar to me. It’s the hotel that the school recommends (and where they pick up the students in the van each day to shuttle them to the school). They also have a good discount for school participants. It’s a decent place, a fair amount removed from the strip, but I’ve found that it helps me stay more focused on riding and less on the freak show that is the Vegas strip.
I head down to the café in the casino area to get a muffin and a smoothie for breakfast, and right behind me in line is one of the instructors, and the guy I happened to buy my 600 racebike from - Ken Hill, one of the fastest racers on the west coast. He’s also a very good guy, and it’s great to see him. Ken tells me that another instructor is coming down from Utah this morning – a guy who is legendary around Miller Motorsports Park and around the region, for being THE top racer in the area – Shane Turpin. I’d heard that he instructs for Freddie, so I was excited to get to ride with Shane. At one of the Miller trackdays last year, he was routinely BLAZING by me on the track, so maybe he could teach me something about how to do that.
7:30 AM the van picks us up. It’s a pretty big group of students this time – 20 to be exact. A bunch of racers that want to start the season off right, I guess. I recognize one familiar face from last year – Bryan, a motorcycle dealer from Illinois, back with two of his high-school age sons. The weather is pretty decent. Sunny and breezy, but fairly warm for this time of year. It does turn downright windy later in the day, but never really becomes a problem.
We head over to the school, which is in an industrial park near the Las Vegas Motor Speedway, where the track is located, in the shuttle van, accompanied by Ken. When we get to the school, Ken gets out, and we stay in the shuttle van. Nick Ienatsch jumps into the van with us, and we drive over to the track to take a couple of laps to learn the layout, and to have some demonstrations by the instructors.
Much to my surprise, it’s a totally different track than last year! Last year, we were on a track in the infield of the NASCAR track there, called the Inside Road Course. I just assumed that’s where they had all their schools. Nope. This time, we’re on a track outside of the stadium, called the South Outside Road Course. Well, there goes any advantage I had over the new students! That’s okay, it’s not a race, and I enjoy figuring out new tracks, so why not.
This track is pretty tight, and definitely has some tricky turns, a couple with multiple apexes. As we drive around in the van, Nick is talking to us all the while, reminding us of the school rules, like passing politely, fall down and you’re done, be nice to the bikes, and a new rule – we never talk about crashing, crashes we’ve had, crashes we’ve seen, nothing. He said the pros don’t do it, and neither should we. Learn from it, and move on, don’t revisit it. I like that rule.
Nick reminds us of the four reasons riders do crash:
Nick addresses the idea of why Spencer School doesn’t teach a method some others do, that being, get your braking done early, then let off the brakes before turning, using just the throttle and maybe countersteering to control the bike through the turn. He explains that the bike’s geometry changes when you are on the brakes. Then, just as you get ready to turn, you release the brakes (using the other method), changing the geometry back the other way, and to a geometry that is not as good for turning. Also, what happens if you don’t brake enough, what then? Now you’re in too hot, and are in a more desperate situation with the brakes. Not good. Or braking too much, too soon. Also not good.
Using their method of trail braking, you are in control through the whole process. Start braking early, very gently. The faster you are going, the earlier you start with the braking. Again, very gently, applying more pressure (while the bike is still upright), then gently releasing brake pressure (not hastily dumping the lever out) as you get to your apex point, and then smoothly applying maintenance throttle and transition throttle through the corner to set you up for driving out of the exit.
We stop the van alongside one of the turns out on the track, and all get out to stand trackside as Dale Kieffer, one of the other instructors, goes through the corner. He does it several different incorrect ways, before showing us a couple of passes where he does it correctly. Braking too early, braking too late. Abrupt inputs versus smooth ones. Varying body positions – head down through the turn versus body being “twisted”, with head over the windscreen while the butt is off the seat.
We drive over to one of the straightaway sections, and Dale does a trail braking demo for us. Braking very hard, as if emergency stopping, but in such a way that the bike does not abruptly jerk downward while slowing, or upward once the stop is complete. They say to practice this constantly, even in your car at stoplights and so on. They emphasize that our stops should always be done this way, even in the pit area, to get into the habit of smooth inputs at all times.
We drive back over to the school, to begin our morning classroom session. The group files in to the classroom, signs in and takes their seats. Time for introductions of instructors and students.
The instructors will be Nick, Dale, Ken, Shane, and Freddie, with one additional instructor. Remember my blog from the Level Two school last year? There was a 15 year old kid there who was on the fast-track to becoming a racer. Well, he’s been doing some racing, and they are now actually having him help out a bit with the instruction as he continues to learn. Makes sense to me, as I have always found that one of the best ways to learn more ourselves is by teaching others. And I recall that he was actually a very good rider, despite his age, so I’ve got no problem with him doing some instructing.
The students are a mix of people from different parts of the USA and the world, including Canada, Romania, Ireland and Italy. Several half are returning students like me, and just about all of them race or think they want to race. The most accomplished racer is a guy named Darren James, who has had some racing success and will be trying to qualify for the Daytona 200 in just a few weeks. There is also a young lady from the Seattle area, that I remember my friends raving about a few years ago up at the track in Spokane. They told me about this really fast girl they’d seen at the track in Spokane, and said she was very smooth. She now teaches at trackdays in the Northwest.
There happen to be quite a few people there from Illinois, and also quite a number of people from the construction industry, including plumbers and a demolition contractor.
At the front of the classroom there is a track map up on the wall, on a dry-erase board. There, Ken draws various apex and exit points around the track to show us what our goals will be. They tell us to be very SMOOTH, as the track may have some dust on it from the wind, and we’ll be on new, cold tires. Nick says that we load the rear tire with throttle to see what kind of grip it has, and we load the front tire with brake to see what kind of grip it has. He reminds us that we should be using some brake at virtually every direction change. Probably not the way most of us are inclined to do it.
As Nick explains to us the concept of trail braking keeping us in constant control of the bike, I’m reminded of an eye-opening experience I had a couple of weeks ago at my trackdays in Pahrump. Turn three at Pahrump requires some pretty serious braking after a fast turn and short straight, where you are in excess of 100 MPH and suddenly need to slow WAY down for a very tight right-hander. I started my braking early, gently applying more pressure as I needed to so that I could get to the apex. I could feel the front tire really straining under the load, to the point that as I leaned in, I could feel it starting to give way (not a good feeling). But because I was totally in control of that front brake, I was able to ever-so-gently release some brake pressure, take away just a bit of lean angle by modifying my line slightly and hanging further off to the inside, and the sliding stopped and on I went. This all happened in a matter of milliseconds, but it felt great to know that I was able to make the subtle changes necessary to save it in that corner. If I wasn’t trail braking, I would be giving up one very important component of making the bike do what I wanted it to do. It doesn’t mean I couldn’t have saved it by not using the brakes in this manner, but why not have all of the tools at my disposal?
As they are talking to us about how we’ll get around this track, apex and exit points and so on, they mention how important it is that we think about every track this way, planning ahead. They tell us that the apexes are determined by our exits, so in planning our lines around a track, we work backward from the intelligent exit path from each corner.
Now it’s time to go riding! This time, I’m assigned bike number 8. It’s an ’06 CBR600RR, with Sato rearsets, the GP shift pattern I’m becoming accustomed to, and a Hyperpro steering damper. It’s shod with Michelin Pilot Powers. The instructors are on CBR1000RR’s.
When I was at Level Two of the school last year in Utah, Jason DiSalvo was a special guest, both riding with us, and sitting in on many of the classroom sessions. Jason isn’t here this time, but there is a special guest doing the same thing. This time it’s Michael Czysz, whom you have probably read about, developing the MotoCzysz bikes (http://www.motoczysz.com/main.php?area=home) , which are very revolutionary and technologically advanced bikes. He’s not riding one of his bikes this time (bummer!), but rather a CBR1000RR. It turns out he hangs out a fair amount of time here, improving his riding, and getting out of the office a bit for some fun and relaxation. He’s become a very good rider, and is a very approachable, down-to-earth guy.
We ride over to the track, which is about a half-mile from the school. We split up into groups of five, riding behind the four instructors. I get in the group behind Dale for this first session.
The track is tricky and tight, but kind of fun, with some very challenging corners. There’s a pretty good bump on turn three, which is a tight left-hander that occurs right after a sharp right-hand kink. Turn four is the first one where I drag a knee, about three laps into the first session. Turn five is really tricky. It’s sort of a decreasing radius, double apex kind of thing, and I find it to be pretty slippery in the early going. Others do too. In fact, it claims two riders to lowsides in the morning sessions! Nothing too serious, fortunately. Some quick repairs to bent rearsets and they’re back out on the track.
We keep running laps behind Dale, faster and faster, rotating our position behind the leader so each rider can be right behind Dale and he can give us hand signals for what to improve as he sees us in his mirrors. In my case it’s looking further down the track, and getting my knee out a bit more.
I’m learning the track, and trying to get more comfortable with the bike setup. It’s similar to my own bike, but it’s not my bike, so it feels a fair amount different. The throttle is a bit snatchy, which doesn’t do much for my confidence on low-speed corners as I’m learning the new track. The clip-ons are at a much different angle, suspension is different, and so on, so I’m having a bit of a challenge feeling as comfortable as normal. But as time goes along, it gets better and better.
One valuable lesson re-learned in the morning session, is the importance of keeping my weight from transferring a big load onto my arms (and the bars) as I’m braking hard into corners. We want to keep our upper body very relaxed while cornering, to keep the bike very settled as we make gentle inputs on the controls. If my arms are all stiff because I’m doing push-ups against them due to the force applied from braking, that’s a problem because that’s all being transferred to the front tire. In addition, bumps I’m encountering on the track (like in turn three), are being abruptly felt through those stiff arms, all through my body and the rest of the bike (not good), instead of my loose arms acting as additional shock absorbers. To correct this, I receive more of the braking pressure with my legs and stomach into the tank, keeping my arms as relaxed as possible. This makes a huge difference in feeling relaxed, and better and smoother cornering. I vow to keep working on this.
We stop a few times through the morning sessions for breaks and to get instruction (and while they pick up the crashers).
We do a couple of drills. The cone drill with Dale, where there is kind of a cone slalom course set up in one of the straights, and we go through it in second gear (first gear for us repeat students). We work on smoothly going from cone to cone, keeping our eyes up, inputs smooth, and trying not to go too wide or rush the corners. It always seems boring at first, but I find that it actually really helps out on the track.
After you go through the cones, you continue around the track to an area between turn six and seven, where Ken is waiting for you to come flying around and do hard trail braking, coming to a stop, smoothly but quickly, and then carefully releasing the lever slowly so that the bike doesn’t bounce back up at the stop. We all start to feel much more confident in our braking, and we see results in each turn around the track. After this drill, we proceed around the track to where Dale is, and then run the cone drill again, and keep repeating both drills while learning the track and practicing.
Before long, we head back into the classroom for lunch. I talk to Shane a bit about Miller Motorsports Park, and his experience with tires there. We also talk about Supermoto, and the fun track they have at Miller for it.
Dale and Ken talk to us about what they observed in the morning sessions. One thing they mentioned is that many of us are going back to the center of the seat between the turns. What we’re supposed to do is keep our butt off to the side a bit, to the side where the next turn is headed. In other words, when I come out of the left-hander number nine into the long straightaway, instead of moving my butt to the center of the seat, I need to tuck my head in behind the screen, bring my knee back in, but keep my butt off to the left side still, in anticipation of the next turn (turn one), also a left-hander. That way I save the step of having to move it over again, as I’m already there. Kind of unnatural, especially when there are shift points between the turns. I find it easier to shift when I’m centered on the seat, than off to one side or the other. But if you watch the MotoGP guys, they definitely are ready way before the turn.
Nick gets on the RC51 which is sitting on a rear stand in the front of the classroom, and demonstrates proper body position around the entire track we’re riding, showing how we’ll look in each turn, and between the turns. It’s very helpful.
He tells us that after lunch we’re going to be doing more braking drills – emergency stopping almost to the point of doing a stoppie. Nick grabs an unmounted tire that’s hanging on the wall in the classroom, and demonstrates how we load it up with braking, to expand the contact patch and give us more braking power. He does this by pushing his weight down on top of it, and we can see the contact patch expanding where it touches the ground below.
One of the students asks why they don’t talk more about countersteering. Nick says that we’re learning to steer more with inputs like braking, peg weighting, legs, throttle and so on. He says that the only time they would consciously practice countersteering would be in a quick transition like right/left/right, such as a chicane. Otherwise, he said this method is more advanced and consistently controllable. He also said what we’re learning is more appropriate for a track scenario and not the street, where you aren’t hanging off like this.
Time to head back out to the track for our afternoon sessions. The instructors demonstrate hard, emergency-type stopping, both incorrectly and correctly. From the side of the track, it’s easy to see when they get it right, or wrong, by the way the bike responds. Is it smooth, or jerky? With trail braking, the smoother it can be, the better. So we learn how to make controlled stops such as these, going from high speed to zero, in a very short space, while keeping things very smooth. This helps a great deal with smooth trail braking.
The instructors position themselves at three straightaway locations around the track, and we do laps, stopping in a hurry at each checkpoint. They watch us to see how smoothly we do it, and then give us feedback. Did you keep your butt off the seat while doing so to prepare for that next corner? Don’t forget! Did you start braking too early, or too late? I find myself really testing the limits of the brakes, hearing them “singing” at me as I give them a good hard squeeze from high speed to a smooth stop.
Next we take this to the next step. Doing the same thing, but while downshifting, and keeping our downshifts smooth using throttle “blips” as we brake. I’m glad we’re working on this, as I know this is an area where I need help, even with a slipper clutch on one bike (soon to be two).
First we practice it on our stationary bikes, parked on the sidestand, engines off. Pull in the brake, gently first, then more firmly. Now pull in the clutch, shift, blip the throttle (while the brake is still pulled in – but without allowing your twist of the throttle to pull the brake lever further in!), then gently release the clutch lever as the engine revs are dropping from your blip. Sound complicated? Now add in the fact that you’re doing this while trying to get from 140 MPH to around 40 or so in a very short amount of distance, while also getting your body in the right position for the turn, and so on. Multitasking, baby!
We start taking laps around the track, working on this in three locations where instructors are waiting for us, watching how we do it. I even add a fourth location to work on it, between turns four and five. In certain spots around the track, I do it perfectly, consistently, and it feels great! The bike is nice and smooth, it sounds cool, and all is good. At other points I TOTALLY SUCK at it! The bike is jerking around, I feel like an idiot, and I wonder what the heck is going on. We practice this again and again for quite a while, and it starts (slowly) to get a lot better. I’m really glad they’re having us do it, because it’s a definite need, and will help me get faster and smoother. I get to the point where I’m good at it about half the time. Still needs work, but I’m going to keep practicing!
During the laps, at one point Ken pulls me aside and has me follow him around for a lap. He says he wants to see me lead the turns more with my knee and my head. I’m a little surprised as I thought that’s what I was doing. But, I follow him around, exaggerating it a bit more as I follow him. I find myself maintaining a much faster pace by doing this, and feeling very comfortable doing it, which is great! Thanks, Ken!
We take a break, and Nick tells us that it’s about time for us to do some video laps. Uh-oh! The pressure’s on! Actually, everyone finds the video to be the single most important part of this training we’re receiving. They all learn so much from what they see on the videos. Nick reminds us that it’s not a race. We don’t get points for being fast on the video – just for being smooth, having good body position, and taking the proper lines. Can I do this, or will I make the same mistake I’ve made in the past, of trying to impress the instructor with my speed, only to regret it when the entire class watches me on the video, completely screwing up the line? I’m sure going to try to get it right this time!
There are two instructors with video cameras, so two students are being recorded at any one time. The rest of us are out there doing laps, trying to work on what we’ve been learning. Nick tells us that we should also be working on “initial throttle.” Figuring out the transition from braking to throttle – when and how much, and the impact on the bike and on our line.
After a half dozen or so of these practice laps, Nick tells me it’s my turn to be filmed. Dale will be chasing me with the camera, taking the “perfect” line around the track. If I don’t take the perfect line, it’ll show up on the video whenever I’m not in the center of the picture. I remind myself to take it easy, don’t worry about speed, just be smooth and make great lines.
I actually manage to keep my “Speed Jones” in check for the most part. I feel pretty good about the lines I take, but then screw up by downshifting too late after turn 7B. This screws me up a bit going into eight, and then I’m still thinking about it (cursing myself) in nine. Big mistake. I need to forget about it and stay focused on what’s coming up! The rest of the lap is decent. When I get to the end, Nick tells me that Dale has given him some feedback for me over the radio. He says to get my head down more, and my knee out more, but that overall I looked pretty good. Usually I’m pretty good about doing those two things, but for some reason I’m still not feeling 100% comfortable with the bike and the track, so I’m not doing it as much as usual. I’m prepared to look crappy when we watch the videos with the class later, and I’m not very happy about it.
We do more laps, working on all of the things we’ve learned, and after a bit more time it’s time to head back to the classroom to watch our videos.
Something occurs to me.
Most of the day we’ve worked on getting better at braking. Slowing down. Stopping.
Huh?
Shouldn’t a race school teach you to GO, rather than SLOW?
But, I’ve never felt faster, or more in control. Hmmmm. They might be on to something here. Controlling our bike through smooth inputs, leads to better, faster, safer laps. Cool.
We get back to the classroom, take off the now-sweaty gear, and change into our regular clothes. We grab a cold drink and a snack, and settle in to watch some video. You can tell that everyone is excited, but a little nervous, about how they’ll look.
Quite a few people are showing the “twisted” body position, with head over the windscreen, hips and spine pointed away from the corner they are in. Some only do it when they are turning right, but not to the left. It’s amazing though, seeing what it does to their cornering. They have more lean angle, when they could have so much less. They can’t add any more without really jeopardizing their safety. It causes them to consistently run wide at the exit.
Lots of “ahas” as the videos are watched. It’s easy to see why everyone feels that this is the most valuable part of the training, and it will be fun to see everyone’s improvement on the videos tomorrow.
Time for my lap on video. Uh-oh. Here we go. Get ready for embarrassment.
But, wait. Surprisingly, I look pretty good. Nick mentions that I’m one of the returning students, and points out how well I’m doing things, including looking very compact on the bike for such a big guy.
I absolutely nail the very difficult 5A/5B (where two students crashed), and in fact, no one looks better through there. Wow! Cool! But, here comes 7B, where I downshift too late. UGH! You can see on the video how it screws me up a bit through 8 and even a bit in 9, but it’s not that bad. And the rest of the lap is really pretty good, although I could still get the knee out more and the head down to the side more. But overall, I’m surprisingly pleased. I really expected it to be pretty poor, but maybe I really am learning something. That would be cool.
Michael Czysz does a great lap on the video – nearly flawless. I tell him later how much he helped me figure out the line through turn eight. Most people entered that turn wide, and it’s much better to go in tight, because it sets up a great exit line. I had followed him through there on a couple of laps earlier in the afternoon, and it really helped.
He tells us all how much the school has helped his riding. Shane says the same thing. They both came there as students originally. Shane said after watching his video for the first time he was really depressed, thinking he should give up roadracing. Now he’s got the number one plate!
At the end of the day Nick gives us a sheet with some great tips for race starts. Just when I was figuring out this track, tomorrow we’re going to run a completely different one. Should be fun.
DAY TWO
Amazing. What a great day!
First of all, the weather held up, which was totally the opposite of what had been predicted all week. I was really hoping it wouldn’t rain, but the forecast had been for Friday showers even this morning! Well, it was definitely cooler and breezy/windy, but the only clouds we really saw all day was a big ugly rain cloud dropping some heavy precipitation about 10 miles from us – but it never came our way, thankfully. What a relief. Although I brought my yet unused rain gear, there was no need for it.
The day started as usual, with all of us gathering at the shuttle bus in front of the hotel at 7:30 AM. Off we went to the school, this time with Shane Turpin along for the ride. Shane’s a lot of fun. An amazing racer with lots of great knowledge and stories.
I’ve been trying to look for signs of consistent personality traits among the various racers/instructors that I’ve been getting to know at the school, to see if I have the same tendencies, thinking maybe this will mean I’m somehow a born racer. A few of them, including Shane, seem total high-energy hyper types, always ready to GO GO GO, talking fast, excitable and outgoing. Nick’s a bundle of energy too, and so is Ken. Okay, that must be the secret ingredient, right? Uh, no. Dale Kieffer is a pretty quiet, unassuming guy, and an absolutely brilliant racer and rider. Freddie’s pretty low-key as well. Hmmm. Where’s that trend I was looking for?
We get to the school, and head back into the classroom. There’s quite a bit of nervous energy in the room. Quite a few of the students are talking about their sore thighs and other muscles. Many haven’t ridden at all through the winter, being from the northern half of the country as I am, so this is there first time back on a bike in a while.
Nick calls up a couple of guys to the front of the classroom, where the RC51 is up on a stand. The two guys he brings up are a couple of the Irishmen (from Chicago), with total Irish accents. They sound like those Irish roadracers you see at the Isle of Man TT races. These two guys were particularly “twisted” on the videos we watched yesterday, with heads high above the windscreen, butt off the seat, but hips and shoulders pointed away from the turn. Nick has them each sit on the RC51 one at a time, and shows them how their position on the bike should look at each point of the turn. This is instructive for them and the whole class.
What we see is that more often than not, when a rider is twisted this way, a couple of problems occur. It often means that their arm on the turning side of the bike is locked, not relaxed, as they are pushing their head and shoulders up away from the turn. Bad. Also, because their hips are turned into the bike, how far can their knee go out? If they start to go wide in a turn (which this position encourages), what’s their only real option for turning more? Adding more lean angle to the bike. Also not good. By dropping the head through the corner, particularly when you are standing the bike up at the exit, driving out under heavy acceleration, you add speed while reducing risk. For many experienced racers, having that knee out a bit further has enabled them to save the bike when the front end started to tuck.
Nick talks to us about there being a couple of different types of corners – Entry Corners, and Exit Corners. In other words, some turns make you take the entrance slowly, for a fast exit, and others are a fast entry, and slow exit, depending on the design of the turn. We look at some examples of this on the track map for the track we’ll be riding today, and the different reasons why.
Freddie walks into the classroom at this point, and begins to lead us into the next phase of the classroom instruction. As always, he’s a very engaging guy with really great stories about everything from his GP days, to teaching his kids to ride motorcycles. I’m pleased that he actually remembers me as a returning student, since hundreds go through the school every year.
He talks to us for a bit about how much our riding starts with our thought process, and breaks it down into four parts:
…and how each one leads to the next.
He asks how many of us “beat ourselves up” about mistakes we make on the track. Everyone raises their hand, including me, as I do it all the time. I’ll often shake my head after a poor turn, knowing that I botched it, causing too much risk. The rider behind me is probably wondering why my head is shaking like that. Me beating myself up, usually accompanied by muttering to myself, silently or aloud inside my helmet, “You screwed that one up, you idiot!” And of course, while I’m berating myself about missing that last apex, I’m not properly focusing on the ones coming up, often causing me to botch those as well. Freddie says it’s okay to beat ourselves up, but we need to do it the right way – by fixing it! He uses Nicky Hayden, whom he works with often, as an example. Nicky is #1 in the world, but he makes mistakes of some sort all the time, maybe on every lap – but he keeps practicing, working at improving, and trying to avoid mistakes he made in the past. If Nicky does it as his level, we certainly should be at ours!
Freddie talks about how important it is to set up each corner properly, getting to that apex. How can we have a successful mid-corner and exit, if we don’t set up the entry properly? Yet, what do most riders tend to do? Rush the corner! I know I have a big problem with this, especially when I’m really trying to pick up the pace or go get the rider in front of me. It causes me to turn in early, which leads to missing the proper line through the apex, and then run wide at the exit, especially as I’m getting on the gas to try to make up the time I just lost. I vow to keep working on being more patient with my corner entries.
He talks to us about our first laps out in any trackday, or race practice days or warm-ups. The importance of checking our fundamentals – including body position, being relaxed with the controls, feeling the bike’s setup, getting a good feel for the brakes, and so on. Becoming very much in tune with the bike and ourselves.
Shane shares with us something his dad told him about being smooth on the track. He once told him he was riding like a “rock concert,” where he should be riding more like a “symphony.” In other words, his movements were very abrupt and thrashing around, where they should instead have a nice, smooth, harmonious flow. Sounds like a good thing to think about.
We head out to the track and begin our sighting and warm-up laps. I’m in a group following Ken Hill this time. The new track is much different than the one yesterday. Almost all right-handers, where yesterday they were primarily lefts. A year ago that would have really made me uncomfortable, as you may recall from my first Freddie Spencer school report. Now I’m eager and excited, as I love the rights. Not only that, but this track is much more flowing and faster than yesterday’s, which immediately makes me feel very comfortable and confident.
We begin to speed the laps up, playing “follow the leader” in our group of five behind Ken, rotating positions each lap to give everyone a chance to follow in Ken’s line. I’m feeling really good, much more relaxed and confident than yesterday. I think it’s a combination of getting more used to the setup of the bike, the way the track flows compared to yesterday, and just feeling more relaxed with my riding. Whatever it is, it feels great, and I’m having a blast, moving around on the bike really well, dragging both knees.
The track definitely has some tricky turns, especially 4A/4B, 5A/5B, a nice little kink (and big bumps!) at 6, and the exit of 6 unfortunately leads us right into a newly built concrete wall not too far off the track (that they warned us about at length yesterday). That gets our attention! At a couple of high speed turns around the track, there are some pretty unsettling bumps that also create a challenge when you get up to speed.
We do quite a few laps, with Ken giving individual instruction to each rider immediately behind him, either by hand signals, or by stopping to give verbal instructions and feedback. He also varies the pace to fit the comfort level of the rider behind him, with the rest of us following along behind. A few of the guys are still needing to work a lot on getting their head down through the turns, and man, when I follow them I can see exactly what it does to mess up their turns. You can just see it coming each time, as we do in the video reviews, and then you can see the automatic improvement anytime they fix it.
Whenever it’s my turn behind Ken, he seems to sense my comfort level and desire to improve, so he really gets on it, and jumps the pace up a lot, showing me how much faster I can go. He’s even laying down nice “darkies” burning out exiting various turns to show me I need to get on it. I try my best to keep up, but when you start going that much faster, it’s very easy to fall into the trap of thinking “Oh crap! I’m coming up on this turn way too fast! Pull that brake in hard!” I force myself to not be abrupt with the controls, to start braking earlier, and gently, rather than at the same braking points, hard.
Next we take a break, followed by more cone drills with Dale (in the straight between turns 9 and 1, which gets everyone excited. No, not really. Actually, once I figured out that the cone drill was actually helping me out on the track, it didn’t seem so boring and meaningless. It really does help. This time Dale throws in a twist. He removes a cone every now and then, so you don’t just get into a little “slalom” pattern. It forces you to really keep your eyes up ahead, not just focusing on the next cone. Dale even has to jump out of the way a few times when riders don’t look up and nearly ride into him!
As we exit the cone drill, we proceed on around the track into turn four, a sweeping left-hander that allows pretty good speed to the apex, where you slow way down for a sharp left into the even-slower number 5, which is a sharp right-hander. This time we’re mixing a drill in. Shane and Nick are waiting in turn four, and watching as we carry speed around the corner, and then trail brake to a complete stop, while leaned over. Most people would think that’s crazy, or not possible. Going from high speed to a stop, on the front brake, while at a near-knee-dragging level of lean? But we do it again and again, and I find it pretty easy to do smoothly and well, after all of this braking practice we’ve been doing.
Quite a few times, I come ripping around the corner, hard on the brakes, seeing out ahead around the corner, that there are people standing on the track (and maybe a stopped bike or two), waiting for me to stop there. I gradually apply the necessary brake pressure, butt still off the seat, head off to the side, and come to a smooth stop right where Nick and Shane are waiting. They are really pleased and impressed, which makes me feel great. A couple of times they look at the back of my leathers and jokingly say, “Hey, it really is Brian. We thought it was Freddie pulling up here.” Maybe they’re saying that to everyone, but either way I feel pretty happy about it. I can tell you that it certainly shows us just how much we can trust our brakes into corners in pressure situations, if we do it correctly and smoothly.
Around the rest of the track, I’m flying along pretty good, feeling better and better all the time. There are a couple of spots with bumps where the front end definitely gets a little loose, which is unsettling, but I find that making minor adjustments to my body position, and staying very relaxed in my upper body, arms, and grip, really helps keep the bike stable, and allows me to recover from a few hairy “drifts.”
Now there’s another special guest out on the track, doing laps with us. AMA pro Jason DiSalvo is back, screaming around the little track on his R1. The guy is pretty amazing to watch. You hear his bike screaming around, blipping the downshifts, taking just outrageous speeds into the corners, but you never see any jerky movements of him or the bike. It’s just all smooth and flowing, despite the incredible speeds he’s carrying. Nice.
After a break, it’s time for some more video laps. Lunch is a bit later today, and after lunch we’ll watch the videos. Everyone is determined to fix what we saw in the videos from the day before, but it looks to me like we’ll see a lot of improvement because I can see the effort people are making, and the good instruction and feedback they’re getting. I feel like I’ll probably do better than yesterday, just because I’m feeling so comfortable with the way the track flows, and my comfort level on the bike is really good.
We all do a bunch of laps while waiting for our turn to be filmed. At one point Nick signals to me. I think he’s saying, “Do one more lap and then we’ll film you.” Turns out this was to be my video lap, and I had no idea! I just go out and do a regular lap, nothing special. It feels pretty good, but like any other I feel like there are some places where I could have done better. When we get to the end of the lap, I stop to check in with Nick, and he says, “Good job, Brian. Shane says you looked really good.” Huh? We already did it? Oh no! I wasn’t ready! I didn’t get to “pose” or anything! Usually on the video laps I’m hyper-conscious about exaggerating my body positions and trying to impress the instructors. That was just a regular-old lap. Oh, no! What did I screw up? What’s everyone going to see on the tape? I immediately try to remember every part of the lap to recall if I was experimenting with different (wrong) lines, or getting lazy or sloppy with my technique. I can’t really think of anything specific.
I start thinking that maybe I was better off not knowing. That way, I wouldn’t be all nervous or trying to impress the instructor with speed (like they’d really be impressed with that!), or exaggerated positions. Also, if in regular laps I was falling into bad habits, I should see it so I can fix it. Okay, let’s take a look and see how bad it is…
We have our lunch, and get ready to watch the videos. Let’s see what Brian looks like when he’s just riding, not knowing he’s being videotaped. This could be interesting. First we see a bunch of the other riders that were filmed before me. Each of the instructors offers critique and suggestions for each rider, which we all learn from. They show us an incorrect technique, freezing the tape, and have us guess what will happen next. It always does. Even Jason DiSalvo makes observations, which is just that much more expertise we can benefit from. Sometimes it’s really subtle stuff like foot position on the pegs that shows why the bike is doing what it’s doing. Interesting stuff, and very honest. The tape doesn’t lie.
Brian’s turn. Ugh. Here we go. I lean forward in my chair to carefully analyze every movement, every apex.
Wow. It actually looks really, really good. And fast. That’s me? The instructors are even throwing out lots of compliments, saying how good I’m looking. We notice a couple of spots, like 5B, where I went a little wide at the exit, and that I rush a couple of turns like 6 and 9, but they’re fairly minor mistakes, so I’m pretty amazed! Nick says that I’m turning the bike so well with my inputs and weight transfers, that it sometimes makes me turn in to early. I’ll keep working on that.
Cool! I’m feeling pretty darn happy. Maybe floating on air, is more like it. I guess maybe all this instruction (and investment) is paying off. Let’s hope so! I imagine DiSalvo thinking, “Oh crap. I better watch out for this bwhip guy.” Yeah, right! Hey, a guy can dream, can’t he?
Everyone looks quite a bit better than yesterday, and you can tell that despite getting physically and mentally tired, everyone is pretty excited about their progress. There are still a couple of hours left in the day, so we head back out to the track to work on what we just watched before wrapping it up.
Nick and Ken tell us that when we go back out, we should all work on consciously shifting our weight from one side of the bike to the other as we move from turn to turn, left to right, and so on. To really get off that seat, and use our inner thigh against the tank to support our weight as we go through the corner.
They have us try something to show how we transfer our weight properly on the bike, and help it steer better. They have us stand straight up (on the ground). They tell us to keep both feet on the ground, but shift all our weight to our left foot, without moving our head or shoulders. Try it. You really can’t do it. But with a slight move of your head and shift of shoulders and hips to the left, suddenly all your weight go to that foot. Now think about peg weighting, which we know helps cornering, with your head and shoulders over the windscreen. Interesting, isn’t it?
As we do more laps, I become more conscious of how much I really do support my weight through the turns while hanging off, with my leg against the tank. I thought my thighs were just sore after trackdays because of all the squatting, shifting my butt off the seat to and fro, all day long. I realized that probably a lot of it comes from the load it’s supporting against the tank through the corners and under braking. Another revelation.
Ken has me exaggerate the leading of my head and shoulders into sharp turns. I find this really helps with the slow, sharp corners. It takes some effort, but the bike just drops right in the way it’s supposed to, and I don’t need to fight it into the turns through the bars like I was.
We do a bunch more laps. I’m getting tired, like everyone else, but just having too much fun to quit. I’m passing a bunch of people, and surprising myself with good speed and technique. At one point I do a lap that feels pretty decent. I’m pretty sure I hear the sound of a literbike (like the instructors use) behind me at certain points, but I just focus on what I’m doing, and try to catch up with a couple of slower riders out in front of me.
At the end of the lap, at the “checkpoint” where we stop, Nick pulls alongside me and shuts off my bike to talk to me for a second. Apparently that was him behind me. Uh-oh. He says, “Tell me about that last lap.” I say, “Well, it was okay, although I thought I went a little wide through 5B. Coming out of six, I hit that big bump which messed me up a bit, and sent me off toward the concrete wall, which was hairy for a second, but I made the adjustment, recovered, and fixed it going around 6. It was okay.” He said, “Yep, I saw all of that, but anything else?” Then it hit me. “Well, I think what I have a big tendency to do sometimes it focus so hard on catching the guys out in front of me, that I rush and get away from my fundamentals.”
“EXACTLY!” Nick says. “You were already catching them. You don’t have to do it all in one turn. Be patient, stick to the program, and you’ll wind up catching them sooner and avoiding mistakes that can get you in trouble.” He’s exactly right. Lots of times I find myself doing the dreaded “rush the corner” move while trying to catch someone in front of me. I’m really going to work on being more patient, and disciplined. It leads to the results I want, which is of course to be fast, smooth, and safe!
Nick says, “One more thing. You’re doing well, but I see one more area where you can improve. We’re going to work on getting harder on the gas out of turns. Follow me around for another lap, and I’ll show you where and how. I’m on a literbike, so I’ll pull away a bit in spots, but you’ll get the idea. Get that weight to the inside, head down, and get on it! Let’s go!”
Awesome. This is an area I know I’ve needed improvement in. I’ve gotten to be pretty smooth and consistent, but not very aggressive out of corners. Let’s see where I can fix this to get faster.
We head around the lap, at a very aggressive pace, but I’m pretty comfortable throughout, determined to follow Nick’s lead. I know that with the extra speed I’ll be carrying, I’ll need to apply the brakes earlier at each turn, but I’ll still be smooth with my inputs, not abrupt, as challenging as that may be. Out of every single turn, Nick is leaning way off, getting his head way down to the inside of the bike, and just getting on that throttle hard, laying down some nice darkies. I try to do the same on my 600, and I can feel the difference (and it’s fun!). I do it coming out of five, but my apex isn’t quite right, so the sudden acceleration sends me a fair bit wide of my intended line. It just showed my that when you’re getting more aggressive with your speed at the exits, it’s that much more important to get your lines right through corner entry and apex.
We do a bunch more laps, and while my knees and the bottom of my feet are getting really tired, I just have a huge smile on my face inside my helmet. I’m really working on all the things we’ve talked about, and I feel better about my riding than ever! I’m just blown away that even after doing this a couple of other times, there is still so much to learn and so much more I can improve, which makes it really fun. I’m passing lots of people, and it’s cool to think that I’m among the faster, smoother riders in a group that largely includes people that have already been racers. Wow! Not bad for an old dude (according to my kids, anyway).
All too soon, the day ends, and we head back to the classroom for “graduation.” Nick, Dale, Ken, Shane and Chris are all there to shake our hands, thank us and congratulate us. And we certainly want to thank them. Although we had a slightly different mix of instructors this time than the other times I took the school, they all fit right in. They are friendly, passionate about what they do, have great senses of humor, and really take the time to help each student individually. And you can’t help but respect the way they ride, the racing results they’ve posted, and what you see them produce in their students.
I pull Nick aside and tell him, “You’re killing me, buddy. You could really save me a lot of money if you’d just disappoint me once in a while. Every time I come back here it gets better.” And I really mean it. I can’t afford to keep doing this. But it is absolutely worth every penny.
Tonight I’m physically beat, but so excited I know it will be tough to get to sleep once again (just like last night). Again, my overwhelming emotion is gratitude.
My Freddie Spencer School Level One Review and Blog
My Freddie Spencer School Level Two Review and Blog