The Art Of Safe Riding

The real fun and thrill of motorcycling lies in taking fast turns. For a true blue motorcyclist, the straight portions of the roads exist just to take him from one turn to the next! Here, the main aim is to get across these turns safely and quickly. The less time you spend going around a corner, the more you enjoy doing it!

The rider's body position during the turn has a great effect on how smooth and steady he is during the turn. His weight should be distributed between the handlebars, the seat and the foot-pegs. Elbows should be slightly bent to absorb the road shocks and counter braking forces, and the legs should be kept ready to shift the body weight and take an active role in controlling the bike. An upright body position helps keep you alert and gives a higher line of sight in traffic. While leaned into a turn, keep your body in the same plane as the bike, although you may prefer to keep your head vertical. In short, keep the angle of your body parallel to the angle of the bike and your head upright. When you corner, there is a balance point where your body weight will seems to disappear from the bike, making you and your bike as one single entity.

Basically, all corners can be sub-divided into three parts: the entry, the mid-turn and the exit. For a fast and a quick turn, all these three need to be integrated into one fluid movement. The start of your corner is from the moment you can see it. From this time on, you should start planning your braking, estimate the speed and the gear at which you will enter and the type of line you would take through the entry. Set yourself up to enter the turn at its extreme outside. If it were a left hander, you would be on the extreme right of the road (or lane) and vice versa for a right hander. Finish braking just as you begin to lean your bike in and your eyes should be looking ahead hunting out the apex. The apex of a corner is the point where you are closest to the interior of the corner. If on an unfamiliar road and the exit is not visible, try to stay out as wide as possible. Match your speed to the curvature of the turn that is visible. Going towards the inside too soon, you may find that if the turn tightens up, you would exit far out into the opposite lane (or into the divider) with injurious results.

As you tighten your line towards the apex of the turn, your eyes leave the apex and hunt out the exit. Sweep towards the apex on a partial throttle (engine not accelerating, but not giving any engine braking either) to balance the bike. At this point, you will be at maximum lean. On an unfamiliar road, look at where the point where the two opposite edges of the road converge. If this point appears to come closer to you - the turn is tightening up. If the point goes away from you - you're getting to the exit and it's opening out. If it stays constant then the turn is continuing at a constant radius. Once past the apex, start straightening up the bike and feed in power progressively, smoothly accelerating out of the turn towards the next.

Remember: slow in and fast out. Complete all your braking and gear changing before leaning the bike into the turn. Hold constant throttle while turning and increase power while straightening up and exiting.



The perceived safest area of a turn is on the inside and this is where the problems begin. The rider steers in too early leading to an early apex. This then leaves most of the actual steering for late in the turn and often results in inadvertently drifting wide at the exit. A proper cornering line for a constant radius turn begins with a wide entrance from the outside of the turn. This is followed by a definite turn-in that gets most of the steering done early and sets up for a late apex (somewhere around the mid-point of the curve) and a straighter line at the exit. By using a late apex (see figure above and photo below) on the street, you get to do more braking while straight up, you get a better view of the exit of the corner, and you minimize the amount of time you are near the edge of the road (or the centerline). Along with all this, make yourself look farther into the turn and you will end up feeling more in control. By placing your attention farther ahead, you give yourself more time to prepare for whatever comes up and you get fewer surprises.


Photo: Late Apex Turn




Photo: Early/Late Apex for a single lane turn


Now that you have learnt about the best cornering line through turn, the way to go faster is to get more weight transfer without more lean. Remember that leaning is just a method of transferring weight to the inside as you hurtle through a corner. The farther you can lean, the more weight you can transfer and the faster you can go through the corner.
Transferring weight without increasing lean is called 'hanging off', and involves sliding your body off the seat towards the inside of the turn. To start with, try sticking your knee out towards the inside of the turn. That is a little weight transfer. See if it helps. But be sure to make all such weight shifts while the bike is upright. Once comfortable with the knee out, try sliding your butt towards the inside of the seat, along with the knee sticking out. You will have reached the limits of hanging off, and the cornering speed, when your butt is completely off the inside edge of the seat and your knee, along with whatever is on the bike that drags, is skimming the pavement around the turn. Obviously, you shouldn't be attempting such riding on normal public roads. This riding on the limit is strictly for the racetracks.

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ken cool

You say that for a left turn one should take the extreme right position on the road. I agree that this is true to keep yourself well balanced through the curve and you are not dangerously close to oncoming traffic when one finishes the curve. However, if we take into account legalities, if it is a left turn at an intersection and not a curve, we have to stay to the Left Lane to turn Left. Else if we take left from the right most Lane, we would be in the line of oncoming traffic coming from behind us.

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Old Fox

Your standpoint is right and most such urban 'T-intersections' will have a stop-light for right turning traffic anyway which means that lane is cut-off and impractical for the left turner. When the traffic and road environment is crowded enough for legalities to become paramount, the rider will be at a low enough speed through the turn to make the demarcation between 'entry, apex, exit' rather redundant. In our typical urban scenario, except during very late or early morning hours, rarely can a T-point (as the one illustrated), be taken at speeds fast enough to justify 'setting up for the turn'. The context of the above write-up lies in the call to stress the need for planning, setting up and executing a turn as a maneuver that requires more thought than straight line riding. And the 'T-intersection' example makes for an easy visual pointer to the need to apex late to gain in terms of improved vision across the maneuver, ensure safety post maneuver and conscious application of specific skills to execute the maneuver. A similar diagram could be constructed to show a sharp left-hander on a single lane highway where the direct utility of this technique is equally demonstrable but then again single-lane highway situations are also rare.

As for coming in the way of traffic coming from behind the rider, the rear-view mirrors and 'keep that neck on the swivel' should provide enough clues to that. A skilled rider is someone who is aware of his riding environment 360 deg around him. A slight move towards the right lane to make more space, trafficators blinking away to glory showing the rider's intention to turn left, rear checked visually not once but twice and more and the turn gets executed smoothly. Is done and can be done in a routine basis. The diagram is not to scale and the extreme right position is sort of exaggerated to accentuate the difference between the 'late apex' and the 'early apex'. In real life, the rider may not have to go all the way to the extreme right (as the diagram depicts) to gain the benefits of this technique.

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ken cool

The last para makes it easier to comprehend. One does not need to go to extreme right to take a left.

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Shreyas82

Hi Folks,
I think the pic below gives us an idea of apex line turning...its taken from Proficient Motorcycling - The Ultimate Guide to riding well..a good book according to me..i just scanned and uploaded it

nav75

Don't think the example of 'T' junction to talk about late apex'ing is correct, as at junction we should slow-look-go. As no matter how late we apex, we will miss the person standing on road side to cross the road (on the left side), or a fast coming vehicle from right side (seeing the junction is empty).
The picture from Proficient Motorcycling shows it with the right place as an example, a curve.

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manan_in_2000

We have always been talking and leaning about taking corners, however we forget about taking the biggest corner which is U turn and double quick apex. It has always been the most interesting thing for me to learn and still learning the ways to take the perfect U-Turn and goes quick on Double apex, following pics may help us all understanding how to take U-Turn and Double apex

Braking-Acceleration point





When to fix the speed and lean

Old Fox

I wouldn't summarily dismiss the T-junction as not useful in discussing the late/early apexing while turning. There are two assumptions behind not seeing value in using the T-junction as an example.

1. The apexing is only about turns at appreciable speed.

2. That all T-junctions are urban in context, with medium to high traffic density and cluttered with a profusion of the human element (vis-a-vis cyclists, pedestrians etc)

#1 is not entirely true. Late apex is as much about ending up with a safer line as also about improving vision across the field of the maneuver. The inside line on exit improves safety margins against errant on-coming drivers who might use a portion of the rider's lane. But being able to see better across the turn is equally important and a decided movement to the right before turning left undoubtedly gives improved field of vision. This applies to any except the densest of traffic density situatuion. And that too because then the rider would be slow enough to be able to either stop or change direction very quickly.

#2 T-junctions abound, both within cities and out on the open road, that are wide enough and experience a low enough traffic density to warrant their use as a relevant example. They can be ridden through in a flow. Again, I repeat what I've stated in my post above in reply to Ken's query. These figures/diagrams are NOT TO SCALE and the positioning of vehicles has been exaggerated just as a visual aid. This is not a real-situation simulation.

The picture taken from David L Hough's excellent book is of course a wonderful example though a little difficult to identify with at first sight for us in India as it assumes right-handed traffic while we are used to left-handed traffic in the Indian context. And instructions like positioning a bike on the road and at speed, need to be free from any such ambiguity. @shreyas82 needs to add a note beneath the picture in this respect.

Seeing the confusion that's apparently sprouted out of my use of the T-junction view as the sole example, here's another of a typical single-lane road turning left. Hope this clarifies and makes up for the deficiencies that arose from the T-junction thing.

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anirban13

Old Fox sir, I was hoping you could help me out with this situation:

I'm approaching a T-intersection and I want to turn left. The left turn is a blind turn in the sense that there is a wall and I cant see anything on the road leading left, till I'm into the turn.
Adding to this there is sand spilt from a passing truck at the intersection, spread out over quite an area. I cant see the sand till I'm at the apex of the turn! And it not being a traffic signal, traffic is approaching from the right side of the T also!

Whats the ideal speed and method of taking this turn? I've been in this situation once and the bike skid on the sand and I was sprawled on the road! Thankfully neither me nor my ride were hurt