In the last episode we discussed looking through the turns. Basically, looking where you’re going. Since we have all spent the last couple of months riding around in parking lots practicing, let’s put what we’ve learned to some good use. Let’s try actually turning the bike.

To most of us this seems like a no-brainer. Just lean the bike and it turns, right? Well, not exactly. Yes we do want the bike to lean but how we get it to lean is the secret. Read on and you’ll find out how it’s done. Incidentally, for this article we will be talking about turning at cruising speed. We’ll discuss slow turning in a later installment.

There are four steps to turning. They are slow, look, lean and roll. We’ll look at each of these separately then put them all together.

Slow… This is very simple. Slow down to an appropriate entry speed for the turn. How much do you slow down? Depends on the turn, how fast you are going, and your experience level, not to mention the bike you’re riding. Just how fast you’ll take the turns depends on your experience level. Obviously if you are already at an appropriate speed you won’t need to slow down any more. It all depends on the turn. The faster you take a turn the more lean you’ll need. For those of us that are new to this riding thing, you may want to slow down even more than might be necessary until you gain more of that great stuff we call ‘experience’. Just don’t slow down too much. Keep in mind, too, that some bikes can corner sharper than others. A bagger will scrape peg a lot sooner than a Sporty.

Look… Look through the turn. This is what we talked about last time. You look through the turn so you’ll know how sharp the turn is, how far it goes around, what obstacles may be in the way, where the turn ends,….you get the picture. You can’t go somewhere if you don’t know where you are going.

Looking through the turn is a very important part of proper riding. Once you get used to doing this, you'll breeze right around the turns just like it was second nature. Remember what I said last time – "look where you’re going because you’re going where you look".

Lean… Lean the bike into the turn. The bike WILL NOT TURN if you don’t lean. We don’t lean our bikes just to look cool. We lean to turn. How much you lean depends on the turn and your entry speed.

How do you lean the bike? It’s not done by shifting your weight as some might think. In fact, you don’t want to shift your weight at all. I see people actually move on the seat towards the turn. Not good! Let your body lean with the bike.

The proper way to get the lean is to press on the handlebar in the direction you want to turn. Press left, go left. Press right, go right. How much you press depends on how much turn you need, based on the factors I mentioned earlier. This should be a smooth application of pressure, not a sudden hard motion.

You might be thinking, "this isn’t right". Pressing on the left handle bar will make the wheel turn to the right. If that’s what you think, give yourself a pat on the back. That’s exactly what’s supposed to happen. When you press on the left handle bar, the wheel turns right. This will instantly try to make the bike turn right but, also instantly, centrifugal force created by this attempt to turn right causes the bike to lean left, and that makes you actually turn left. The more you press, the further the wheel tries to go in the opposite direction, and the more centrifugal force makes the bike lean the way you want it to. When you stop pressing, the wheel will turn into the turn and you’ll go right on around it. Since this all happens instantly, don’t expect to see the actual wheel movement.

When the bike leans into the turn, let it. Don’t try to fight it. Let your body lean with the bike. If you have a problem with your equilibrium, or this doesn’t feel comfortable for some reason, tilt your head so it stays straight up, eyes level with the horizon. Still, keep the rest of your body leaned with the bike.

Roll… No, this doesn’t mean roll the bike over. It means roll on the throttle. Accelerate through the turn. This is something that needs to be considered when slowing to your entry speed. You want to be slowed enough so you will be able to accelerate without getting too fast. You want to gradually accelerate as you go through the turn. This acceleration helps keep the bike upright. At the worst, you should try to at least maintain a constant speed if you don’t feel comfortable speeding up in the turn.

Letting the bike slow down in a turn will cause it to try to dive into the turn. Slowing down too much could cause you to loose control and maybe dump it. We’ll get into this more when I discuss braking. Remember, it is very important to keep the speed up in the turn.

So there you have it. Turning made easy. Slow down, Look through the turn, Lean into the turn, and Roll on some throttle. What could be simpler?

That does it for this installment. Stay tuned for further episodes.

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