So, I've been riding just about a month now. My biggest issue at the moment seems to be: I want to make sure I'm not teaching myself any bad habits. However, I've noticed that the days I spend time watching videos/reading techniques, I go out and have a horrible ride due to overthinking *everything*. (Especially wrt to cornering, oy- zero confidence when I start thinking about what I'm doing rather than just doing it.)

Anybody have any advice for how to strike the balance? Is it just a get out there and do more thing, as much of learning to ride is?

 

Only advice I ereally have is just get out and enjoy the ride.. Its just like learning how to do anything and slowly getting better.. If you just go out and ride and adjust your techniques with how you feel comfortable than I think that will help..

 

Get off the net and go ride! I'm locked at work and sounds like your free to run, only road time is going to gain you a good experience and feel for riding.

 

If you are trying to work on something specific then find a controlled enviroment to do it in and have a friend tape you. That way you can do it with out thinking about traffic, and you can review the tape later instead of over analizing while you are riding.

To work on cornering I went to a semi-mega church parking lot. They curbed islands every so often that I mentally set as corners that were sharper and varied in direction. I spent alot of time staying there and just working sparper and sharper turns at varied speeds and distantances.

in general just ride and it will come to you. My posture is still evolving several years into riding.

 

I'm locked at work too I'm just a sysadmin so plenty of computer time. Thanks, I was figuring I'm sort of expecting too much of myself too soon.

 

Since you're already riding, make sure you understand "counter steering" then as you're riding your normal roads, pick out blimishes, dead animals, rocks, anything you can focus on in the road and practice counter steering to avoid those things. That will help build a natural response for those things when you really need it. Also if you have a really twisty road, pick the line the car tires run in and follow it, use counter steering to do so. Try to stay in that line, you'll notice it varies in distance from the yellow line. Go faster thru the same area as your confidence grows. Eventually, you wont even think about it, you just do it..... if you practice with proper technique, you'll respond without thought the proper way when an emergency arises..... that beats the hell out of responding improperly! Good luck and be careful....

 

you have all the time in the world and there's no rush ... it doesn't matter how long it takes you so long as you don't take risks or put yourself in danger ... we all started from zero once ... if you feel up to it read my counter steering thread ...


https://cbrforum.com/forum/riding-skills-88/corner-fast-dont-crash-important-update-pg4-body-steer-63523/


but even this maybe too much for you just yet, some of the explanations may confuse and make it sound overly complicated ..it's like driving a car, we do the clutch and gears by second nature but if you were to write down how you declutch and change gear matching, revs, roadspeed etc etc..it can sound overly complex ... counter steering makes a lot more sense when you have some experience, but ..if you just want to feel it's effects go to a very quiet road that is long and safe and free from traffic ... get your speed up around 30-40mph and very gently just push on the bars left to right as if steering left or right ..you are applying a very gentle force through the bars, left, right and just feel how the bike reacts to this ...*that* is counter steering, you torque the bars left and the bike tends to kick over to the right ..you will make the bike sway from side to side


Jules

EDIT: By the way if you have been riding around bends at more than 20mph then you have already been counter steering ... we all do it by nature and subconscioulsy but the real control comes when you know how to counter steer conscioulsy, it's *that* which makes all the difference in the world and can and does save your neck if you start running wide or need to avoid obstacles because you know exactly how a bike corners :-)

 

If you are going to be self-conscious, then tell yourself to LEARN one thing every time you ride. It might be about the bike, the traffic, yourself, whathaveyou.. but tell yourself to learn one thing. Dont try to remember stuf. Learn stuff.

EXAMPLE (from long ago):
When I am coming down from speed for a red light, if I pull the clutch in, the bike will 'release' from the engine braking and actually go faster. So what I self consciously learned is the knack of pulling the clutch in and feathering the brake so the transition is seamless. It feels good too. Be open. Be humble. Learn as you ride.

 

That is the exact thing I was gonna say and I couldnt have said it better. One of the roads I take to go home from work is for some reason has a manhole cover every 50 feet or so and the pavement is risen for about a foot around these so unless I countersteer around them they are like big bumps, I kinda made a game out of it for myself by swerving around different sides of them but staying on my side of the road the whole time, doing this 5 nights a week got me damn good at quick little turns like this.

 

You're getting plenty of good advice here, so just two things I'd say. First, I don't know if you've taken the MSF course yet but if you havent', do it.

Second, in riding -- just like anything else -- there are 3 steps to learning. (I learned this in a college public speaking course! lol) First, you know what you want to do, but you can't do it. In the second phase, you're beginning to be able to do what you want to do, but you have to really think about what you're doing and put a lot of effort into focusing on the minutia. In the third phase of learning, you can largely do what you want to do without thinking (maybe over-thinking is the better way to describe this) and things start to happen more naturally and a lot of skills become almost sub-conscious. You gain muscle memory, your ability to react and multi-task increase, etc. This was applied to public speaking and I later saw its application to learning guitar years ago in school, but I think its pretty applicable to every skill you try to learn and improve at. Anyway, sounds like you're somewhere in phase 2 of learning to ride.

The key thing, like some have said, is practice. That's how you progress. It will start to feel more natural and you'll gain a lot of muscle memory and get more fluid with your riding. Just try to avoid getting comfortable and thinking you've got it down. In this sport, hobby, passtime -- whatever you call it -- if you get complacent, you will get lazy and you're not keeping yourself as safe as you can. Always keep that guard up and stay safe!