Counter Steering

The first thing to understand about cornering is counter steering. Steering is a simple enough operation but most riders have learnt to corner or steer a motor bike without fully understanding the process or principles involved.

By pushing the grip in the opposite direction you wish to turn this will start the turn and the bike will start to lean. This action is known as counter steering. By pushing the right grip left you will counter steer and the bike will turn right. Counter steering is the only way a bike will turn with speed and accuracy.

It sounds complicated but you have been doing it the whole time you have been riding without realising it. A motor bike will not turn simply by leaning, you can veer off by leaning your body weight but it takes time and you are not in full control of the machine. In fact this will only work at low speeds and is not recommended.

The dynamics of steering.

As you approach a right hand corner you lean right into the corner, the bike starts to turn right. Because you are holding on to both grips your left hand is pulling on that grip and pulling it towards you. Now the bike is leaning over you put more pressure on the right grip, this pushes the grip away from you. This is the push/pull action and we all do it unconsciously all the time. Once you have reached the desired lean angle you can stop the push/pull action. The bike will stay at this angle until you change your body position and will remain leaned over. There is no need to hold the grips tightly, this is wasted energy, relax.

If the corner tightens as you go around you will need to apply the push/pull action again and lean off the bike further. Counter steering can be applied very aggressively, as you approach the corner at speed you lean the bike and apply the push/pull action with force. This will speed up the cornering lean angle and the bike will drop very quickly. This can take the rider by surprise when you are learning to be aggressive.

Counter steering when applied on the track will speed up your entry into the corner, allowing you to carry more speed through the corner and giving you better exit speed from the corner. To come out of the corner push the grips into the direction of the corner, this will sit the bike up, applied with throttle control and looking forwards to the next corner will improve your exit speed.

Young and inexperienced riders try to turn the grips into a corner when they think they have over cooked the turn, as they get wider through the turn they roll the throttle off. Both actions are wrong and will lead to disaster. It's impossible to get the right approach for each corner, there are variables that must be taken into account. Bumps in the road, camber changes, slides and so on. You must be able to make steering changes as you travel through the corner. You must remain relaxed and look where you want to be all the time.

If you cannot make small changes in the turn you will become a one dimensional rider and you will lose speed and momentum through the turn as well as accuracy.

The counter steer.

You must practise counter steering to understand how it works, it takes up valuable time as you approach a corner to get right. It's important to understand how it works so you can make the correct adjustment during a turn. Remember, seeing a pot hole or the corner tightens up, you cannot turn into the corner, this will send you wide, apply more push/pull action to avoid an obstacle or to turn in faster as the corner tightens up.

The more you practise counter steering the more proficient you will become, it's a bit like putting your seat belt on in the car in the dark. You know exactly where it is and where the buckle is. This is muscle memory, you have done it so often that you don't need to think about it anymore. The same must be applied to counter steering, so that when a car pulls out in front of you, counter steering is second nature and you don't try and turn the bike in the direction you want to go. It doesn't work. If the corner tightens up, counter steer to bring the bike in.

Counter steering if applied correctly will aid your riding and make your track days a better learning experience.

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Counter Intuitive Steering

To understand counter steering, remove the front wheel of a ten speed bicycle. Grab both ends of the axle and roll the tire across the ground fast enough to keep the wheel spinning. Now try to turn the wheel to the left. What happens is the wheel turns right, the opposite way you wanted it to turn. This is the result of counter steering and whether you know it or not you've been counter steering every motorcycle and bicycle you've ever ridden since you were old enough to go over seven miles per hour.

Speed is important because as your wheels turn faster and faster they begin acting like gyroscopes that want to keep moving in the same direction. To get your wheels to deviate from that direction they need to be tricked into doing so. We accomplish deception through counter steering. If you temporarily deflect the wheel in the opposite direction of a turn, the wheel tries to center itself again but overcompensates and continues past the center point and starts to turn in the direction you originally intended for it to turn. The common phrase is "push left, go left. Push right, go right" While the rider is the heaviest part of a bicycle and can initiate a turn by the rider shifting their weight to the inside, motorcycles are far heavier and the rider makes up only a fraction of the total weight of the motorcycle and rider. Therefore, a motorcycle rider cannot initiate a turn at high speeds using only a shift in weight because this alone will not overcome the gyroscopic effects of the wheels, flywheel, crankshaft, alternator and etcetera. The fastest way to coax a motorcycle into changing directions at speed is to steer in the opposite direction of your intended turn.

While the physics behind counter steering are far from intuitive all it takes is a bicycle and an empty street to see how commonplace this phenomenon really is. Ride a bicycle in a straight line at a speed fast enough to take your hands off the handlebars. If you can't do this remove one hand and use the other to hold the handlebars in the middle, overtop the gooseneck. Take the free hand and push the left handlebar forward and release. The bike will temporarily veer to the right followed by a quick left turn, relative to your speed and the force with which you hit the handlebar. Experiment at faster speeds and pushing the handlebar progressively harder until you get a grasp of the phenomenon and feel comfortable applying this to your motorcycle riding. Counter steering is relevant to motorcycling because it allows rider to steer a motorcycle with greater efficiency and in less time than any other steering input. Whether you are pitched over in a turn when you spot a hazard that needs to be avoided or turning down the street you live on, counter steering will get you there safer and turning in less time than it takes to say "push left, go left."

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