welcome to MOTOTREK! i'm Dusty Wessels professional motorcycle instructor with
West38Moto. riding steep and tight uphill and downhill corners will require you to use momentum
vision and body position the two most important things to riding uphill are commitment and
momentum if you're not committed and you're not sure about how steep the hill is hop off your bike
and walk it but first we'd like to thank The Ridge for sponsoring this video i've been carrying a
wallet in my front pocket since i was 16 years old thank you Ridge Wallets for designing an awesome
rugged tough wallet it's the slimmest wallet i've ever had in my front pocket the ridge wallet is
RFID blocking and comes with a lifetime warranty i like using the strap to hold my cash but it
comes with a clip too thank you ridge wallets for making a rugged minimalist wallet when entering
an uphill corner it's best to have as much speed as possible you can always ease off the throttle
and gravity will slow you down normally when we're riding uphill we want our weight forward
in this case that's the same on the approach but as soon as you get into the corner we need
to shift our weight outside we also need to shift our weight back this is because we want the front
wheel to track better in the terrain that we've got in a turn so we want to lighten it up we also
want to put as much weight as possible on the rear wheel to gain as much traction as possible
what's going to determine how much weight you shift to the outside and back is how fast and
tight you decide to take this corner the slower you go the more weight you have to shift outside
as you're riding through this uphill turn and you've got your weight shifted all the
way to the outside keep it here our tendency is to see our exit
and want to go and what we do there is shift our way to the inside or we just move neutral a bit
that can cause the bike to fall and at this point if the bike falls you don't have the ground as
close to you as you do when you're on flat ground so you're going to fall and you're going to tumble
and the bike is going to fall wheels up that's a bad position for everybody to be in
right here the key is to keep your weight outside all the way through the corner
until your wheels get straight before you move your body back to the neutral riding position
when you're riding your adventure bike up steep hills that have tight corners
your vision is going to come in chunks you can only see what's in front of you right
now you won't be able to see your exit right away as you go through the corner
keep your eyes up and focus as far down the trail as you can
for safety purposes always ride right when you can ride the furthest on the outside of the corner
this is going to reveal what the trail is going to throw at you much sooner that's a good one
for this corner it's a left if i'm way outside i can see the whole road as my vision comes clear i
don't know what the traction looks like up there i don't know what trail obstacles are going to be
just remember your vision's coming in chunks you can't see everything right
away
when riding downhill it's important to control your momentum there are multiple ways to control
your momentum going downhill through a corner you can use your brakes you can
use your clutch or you can use the engine brake if you're comfortable in first or second gear
with the steepness and tightness of this corner use your engine rig it's the smoothest way down
the other way to control your momentum downhill is to use your brakes if the hill's too steep
and the corners too tight for first gear engine brake that's just too fast for you
pull your clutch in compress your front brake and get your weight back why your front brake downhill
it's the best brake because that's where all the weight is now if it's too loose underneath you
or there's a lot of baseball sized rocks and that front wheel is having a hard time engaging terrain
and getting traction to control your momentum add in your rear brake do this nice and easy you don't
want to lock your rear wheel because it'll slide just add the rear brake in enough to compress the
suspension and squat the bike and assist the front brake in controlling your momentum when
riding off road and approaching steep downhills and corners body position is very important
when you approach the corner you need to initiate the turn by pressing on your inside foot peg
then shift your weight to the outside or counterbalance hold that body position until
both wheels get straight before shifting back to neutral and then ride on
for safety purposes always ride right however if you can determine there's no oncoming traffic
take this corner as wide as possible
this gives you the ability to look further down the trail and assess the terrain
not all corners are as smooth as this one we know from riding on trails the inside of these corners
especially on the up or the downhill when it's steep has got a lot of stuff in it it's chopped
up another reason to stay outside however when you get to a point on the outside of the corner
and you can see the rest of the trail get to the inside or the middle as quick as possible
you don't want to exit on the outside of the corner because that takes away all your lines
if you're on the outside that's where you're going to end up as soon as you can see
the trail in front of you cut it off as fast as possible get back to the middle or get to the
inside remember vision momentum control and body position
are the key techniques to riding steep up and down hill corners
you