riding in ruts! they could be stressful no matter what your experience level is
or what your skill level is there's a lot going on in ruts one of the biggest
reasons is we've gone from riding a road like this to riding a road like this I'm
going to talk about a few things to help you feel more comfortable and safe riding ruts
welcome to MOTOTREK I'm Dusty Wessels professional
motorcycle instructor with West38 Moto let's about riding some ruts
so you're riding down the road all of a sudden you see the dreaded ruts nobody likes ruts doesn't
matter what your skill level is doesn't matter what your comfort level is ruts make us all
think twice to quote my good friend and favorite adventure Rider coach Bill Dragoo "Make the rut
your road." if you get in a rut stay in it that's one of the most important things we try and avoid
it as much as possible sure if you can do that but we all know those Wheels get sucked right into
that rut all of a sudden we're in it before you got into the rut you had the entire Road you were
chilling no problem you could scan pretty easily and take your time as soon as you get into the rut
everything becomes faster and everything comes at you faster all your inputs to the motorcycle
your vision very little effect on the front wheel trying not to steer all that becomes a lot more
important if you can stay in second gear do so because it reduces the drive to the rear wheel you
want as much traction back there as possible it also makes the throttle a little easier to manage
you can go this same speed in second gear that you can in first without killing the bike and if you
can do it now you're not having to manage so much the rut's too deep you just don't feel comfortable
shifting to second gear no problem stay in first if you can stay standing and ride in first
that's no problem just understand that any input you give to the throttle is going to
really affect that rear wheel if you have to sit down no problem if that's what your comfort is if
that's where your skills are when you get into a rut that's fine the good thing about sitting down
is now the ground's closer so a much better foot placement when you don't have a place to put one
of your feet stick it on the peg a dangling foot with our human brain is just going to
reach out for something to put that foot on the other thing we want to be careful of is try not
to steer too much and limit your abrupt inputs to the bike so clutch brake throttle a lot more
fine tuning instead of thinking of the throttle or the clutch like a light switch where they're
on and off think of it as a dimmer switch nice and easy control nice and easy inputs if you're
standing up steering goes to your feet be very light on the bars almost like you're riding sand
or loose gravel you really don't want too much impact moving around again you went from having
an entire road to now having this much space so very little steering when you're riding ruts if
the front wheel starts to get grabbed by the rut here's what you do immediately start to slow down
okay don't over correct that's the biggest thing just loosen up it's going to hit it it's going
to bounce off of it what we do our human brain overreacts and we try and steer away from it
as soon as we do one of these you've just bounced that front wheel right off both sides of the ruts
and now you've got this wobbly effect which may have happened to a lot of us I know it's
happened to me so if your front wheel starts to catch one of the sides of the ruts what you're
doing is you're trying to steer too much so slow down a little bit loosen up your grip
on the bars squeeze the tank the inside of the seat tank area with your knees what that
does is it relaxes your upper body it gives stabilization down low which is what you need
it'll relax your grip on the bars it'll loosen everything up for you try not to steer too much
another thing that makes deep ruts or any rut challenging especially when you're stuck in it
is Vision what do you do you've got a lot going on you've got to look for a lot of things number
one you want to find your exit so now what we have to do is continually scan back and forth
as much as we can to see what's in front of us baseball size rocks the rut turns maybe there's
a log maybe there's a divot or a pothole inside the rut you have to constantly scan again you're
always looking for your exit or you're looking for a transition point where you can go over
the middle to switch ruts it's easier to do this standing up you can see much better you can see
much further if you're sitting down it's going to be more challenging to see what's in front of you
just remember make sure you're scanning and your scanning's got to happen fast something that looks
like a small rock 20 or 30 feet ahead as soon as your front wheel gets to it could be much bigger
so what's the traction going to be like or what's the terrain going to be like in the
Rut for the most part underneath you is going to be like what you've come through but in a
rut this deep and this packed down or not packed down the traction points definitely are going to
change again you also only have this much sure your whole contact patch is down but now you
can't move around and get better traction points you have what you have you are in the Rut you've
got to stay in it so expect as soon as the grade changes so we've got a little bit of grade here
you're going to get deeper ruts definitely because that's where things are churning more when you get
a deeper rut that's where more stuff is going to fall into it water small sand granules or
gravel bigger rocks embedded rocks anything else is going to change or definitely affect
traction if you can ride this in second gear that'll help a lot that'll keep more traction
and less drive going to the rear wheel so you have a lot less chance of wheel spin
if you're loaded down for a trip on a bike like this and you come to an uphill that's got really
steep ruts and there's no way for you to get around it and they're deep you might question
going up that road that's that's an indicator right there that you might want to try an upper
Road it's going to be really tough to go uphill inside of a rut when you're going up a hill you
pick a line all looks great and then all of a sudden you get kicked out of your line the
challenge is you don't know what that terrain's like now walk the rut why not go see what it's
like I wouldn't just see deep ruts up a hill and say hey let's go for it I'd check them walk
it make sure you have everything you want make sure it's comfortable for you if not turn around
but with a downhill rut the nice thing is uh you you're going to stay in one spot you're not going
to be going all over the hill what I prefer to do if it's really bad we're talking deep
rut we're talking Steep Hill I shut the bike off just kill it leave it in first gear or if you have
a DCT or not a clutch you're going to have to do a little more work but if you leave your bike in
gear your clutch control now is controlling your rear wheel so there's your rear brake right there
and your front brake right here put both your feet on the ground and walk down if you choose
to ride it you can ride it standing up with the engine off why I say engine off is you don't need
that propulsion you don't need something pushing you down the hill you've got Gravity the other
thing you don't need is managing the clutch in the throttle trying to keep that bike running
so you're comfortable riding but you need to change ruts you're still going to be riding
the ruts but you've got to switch so you've got to go over the hump from one side to the next
there are two techniques one you're sitting and riding slow two you're standing and riding faster
how you do this when you're standing up is it's almost a lofting technique you're compressing
the suspension on the bike you're taking your built-in suspension with your knees and pressing
on the pegs really hard even pushing down on the handlebars it's all about timing you want to time
that so when the suspension rebounds and your body's coming up with the bike the front wheel
is hitting exactly where you want to cross pull on the bars a bit and maybe give it a little throttle
blip the throttle blip is going to lighten the front end again lofting technique we're
not trying to raise the front end off the ground we're just trying to lighten it so a nice little
throttle blip your vision is important here you want to pay attention to exactly where you want
your front tire to hit your transition point and exactly where you want your front tire to land in
the other spot of the rut while you're moving you're moving fast enough you pick a good spot
the rear wheel will follow the front let's see I've got a really big middle a nice big hump in
the middle right here that I'm not comfortable just riding over so I'm bopping along in second
gear and I've got to change ruts and this is too steep I'm gonna sit down okay I'm gonna sit down
and put my feet down and what I'm going to try and do is get my front wheel as close to 90 degrees as
possible that's going to make it easier to get over that rut once you get your front wheel over
that rut stop okay put your front wheel in that rut and position yourself because now getting the
back wheel over is much more of a challenge here you also want to make sure your foot placement
is good now when you're bringing the rear wheel over that takes really fine clutch throttle work
really nice and easy if you can crawl up over the top of this with as much traction as possible and
very little impact is possible to the rear wheel and there's very little spin as possible that's
the best scenario that's not always the case sometimes you got to dump the clutch really quick
give it a Quick Throttle hit to just pop that rear wheel over either their way this situation
crossing over a big hump in the Middle With both Wheels is challenging take your time do it slow
riding motorcycles sometimes is like life you get in a rut you're not sure how to deal with
it and you want to get out next time you're out riding and you find yourself on a ruddy
Road remember to stay in it don't fight it look for your exit and have fun foreign