"Every motorcyclist I’ve ever met wants to be good at cornering and we all know the feeling we get when we get a bend ‘just right’"!
"One of the most common things riders find most difficult though is judging how fast to approach a bend so here are 5 things ideas that can help":
1) Sounds obvious but as you approach a bend, look ahead for clues in the landscape of where the road might go - tree lines, hedge lines, walls, telegraph poles (which are frequently placed at the side of the road), the location of buildings and headlights of other vehicles at night. Don't overlook the valuable information provided by formal road signs and marking too - bend left or right (with or without a junction on it), double bend first right then left or first left then right, SLOW on the road, chevrons on the bend, hazard warning white lines in the cente of the road...
2) If there are other vehicles ahead (either coming towards you or moving away from you) watch and learn from them as they can sometimes give you valuable information about how tight or gentle the bend might be. High vehicles such as vans or trucks can be particularly useful as you can sometimes see them over a hedge or brow. Keep several things in mind here though – don’t rely on vehicles in front to correctly judge a bend – it is dead easy to follow another driver straight into a ditch! Secondly, a ‘local’ who knows the road may be travelling faster than he/she can see and be unable to stop if something unexpected lays just around the corner. Thirdly, the vehicle may be travelling more quickly than you are comfortable with – creating the very real risk that their speed is out of your comfort zone and this in turn may cause you to panic and lose control.
3) As we all know, it’s a lot easier to increase your speed mid-bend that reduce it so would recommend that “if in doubt: slow in, fast out”!
4) A technique called ‘limit point’ (also sometimes called limit point analysis or vanishing point) can be helpful, especially to help work out your approach speed. My overwhelming experience of this however is that whilst many riders have heard of it, very few correctly understand what it is or how to use it. When explained in the right way though, I often see a very large light bulb go on and when people then go and start to use it, a common reaction is “oh my god, how come no one taught me this before”. When I’m teaching this, I ride in close formation with a rider and talk them through each bend over the radio as we look for limit points and work out what they are telling us. Before heading onto the road, I also draw diagrams which I have found bring to life how this technique works.
5) Whilst a bit cliché, try wherever possible to ride bends at a speed that would give you the reasonable chance of stopping in the distance you can actually see is clear. Being brutally honest though, this is immensely tough sometimes as in reality this could almost be walking pace on particularly tight bends and if we slow down too much, we run the risk of being hit from behind. That said, try and find a sensible balance and get ruthlessly good at hunting for information, seeing clues and assessing risks.
One small point to add on the clip: you will notice on realising we had a very volatile stop situation, I quickly moved over to the curb. I did this as I assessed I was MASSIVELY vulnerable to being hit from behind – have to say that the few seconds we were stopped felt like minutes and I’ve never been so uncomfortable for a long time. I had talked about the very real risk of collisions from behind with my trainee (probably boring him half to death) but on talking it through afterwards he conceded he didn’t react quickly enough to stop in a better position.
The Limit Point