Solution Focused Bike Riding Techniques

When new riders come to our motorcycle training school and begin their IBT Training to learn to ride bikes they often struggle on the U turn and the figure of eight. Even an experienced rider coming in to do advance training will often struggle on these two very basic exercises.
Some riders will say it’s because they don’t like to lean the bike over, others will say it’s the bike or the turn is too tight, or a host of other reasons. All of which will seem justified to the rider. They are not making excuses.
Often the problem is a quite different symptom and we try to treat the symptom instead of the problem.
Usually the symptoms point to the rider having corner issues, fear of lean angle, bike feeling unstable, bike falling over or running wide, basically the bike just not feeling balanced. But these are just the symptoms. The problem is something different.
Humans have a few safety features built in which unfortunately can be counterproductive if not just dangerous on a motorcycle.
One of the features we have is that our brains want us to be able to see where we are going and as a result we don’t like to go somewhere we cannot see. A good example of this is to try change lanes on a motorway without hitting the cat’s eyes. Even though they occupy a very small portion of the road you will come continuously very close to them if not actually hitting them. The reason this happens is because you’re looking at them. If you try to change lanes and look at the space between the cats eyes you’ll miss them every time. Where You Look; You Go!
Our brains don’t naturally see the whole picture in a scene, we assemble a scene by gathering lots of pieces information together and then form a picture. If we look  too long at one piece of the scene then we can’t gather information about the big picture so our brain will send us in the only direction it has information on.
We can choose to use this feature to our advantage. When we’re about to go into a corner if we turn our heads and look for the exit our brain has a target and it will turn the motorcycle so that it goes in the direct we want it to go. This is not to say that we should be oblivious to the rest of the road. We need to be aware of potential hazards and problems but our main focus should be the direction we want the bike to go.
In our motorcycle training school I ask our students to do a standard figure of eight exercise. I set up two cones 10 meters apart and ask the student ride a figure of 8 around them.  At first I ask them to do the exercise as they like.
Once they have mastered the turns I then ask them to use the cones at the centre of the turns as a reference so that when they approach say the right turn I ask them to look at the cone to their right. Once they are half way round the turn I ask time to look to the next cone which would be at the centre of the left turn. I ask them to continue to look at this turn until they are half way around and then look at the previous cone and so on it goes.
This is the only change I ask the student to make. What happens in every single instance is that the figure of 8 gets tighter. The students start to turn the bikes faster and the size of the turn gets smaller.
The reason this happens is that when the student uses the cones as a reference his/her brain chooses it as a target and unconsciously they turn the bike quicker.
Most students attending their first motorcycle lessons are resistant to the process because after all they are looking one direction while riding the bike in another but once they’ve mastered the technique they can’t deny that it works.
The spin off from this is that where we look; we go.
Another feature we are designed with is that when we see danger we tend to keep our eyes on it. These reactions come from ancient program in our genes that we’re born with and are there to keep us safe from wild animals and aggressors.
Unfortunately the where you look you go instinct and the look at danger instinct combination can often combine to give us Target Fixation.
Let’s imagine you’re riding through a bend and half way around the bend you see a load of gravel on your line. Your first survival instinct kicks in and your eyes are drawn to the danger. Now the second survival instinct kicks in and your brain won’t let you go somewhere it cannot see but because you’re locked into the danger you can’t see a solution so you bike runs into the gravel. This is called target fixation and it can be very dangerous combination on a motorcycle.
At our motorcycle lessons we have found that the solution to target fixation is to train yourself to deal with it. If you look for the solutions while being aware of the problems you can avoid the target fixation problem. When you come around the corner and spot the gravel – look at the clear road beside it. Now you’re using target fixation to your advantage. Your bike will go where you look, you will miss the gravel and get through the corner.
Actively using this technique will make you a better rider. By looking where you want your bike to go rather than where it is going you will be using both the conscious and the unconscious part of your brain together. This give you more thinking time, the unconscious is steering the bike while the conscious part is making decisions where to steer it using ‘where you look; you go ‘
Irish Motorcycle Training