turn in point

[edward sianipar]

how do you determine where the turning point is ?

[Keith Culver]

Edward,

On the track, you’re going to use your apex and your exit as a report card and keep adjusting your turn-in point until you find the speed and the sweet spot where you hit your apex and drive out to the exit. Some World Champions, Freddie Spencer, would creep up on it turning in later and later until he started to have poor exits. Other World Champions, Scott Russell, would rush it on in there and basically run off the track on the exit and dial it back each lap until he found the same sweet spot. Both of these guys were getting paid very well to win races and needed to get up to speed quickly so they took some chances with Scott taking bigger ones.

It also has a lot to do with your speed on the track. An R1 at 170mph down the front straight at, say… NJMP is going to turn in a lot earlier than an R3 at 110 mph. Even on the same bike, if you got a better drive out of the previous corner and are going 10mph faster down the straight, the braking zone is going to change and the turn-in point would change (assuming you are maxed out). THere is no exact magical turn-in point for every rider, on every bike, on every lap. We are always adjusting.

On the street, it is not as easy of an answer, especially when you can’t see the exit. This is why straight-line-only braking doesn’t work. You need to approach the turn with a focus on the road ahead and practice using your eyes. I use the vanishing point, covering my brakes, usually with some brake pressure on (think 100 points of grip) to enter the turn quickly enough to make the brakes part of my turning process (the bike turns way better this way) but at a speed that I know, I could stop if I needed to before that vanishing point (which is always moving).

I honestly spend very little time focusing on where my turn-in point is on the road because knowing your turn-in point means you can see or know the entire turn. Anyone who knows their turn-in point on a blind corner is either full of it or knows the road very well. I prefer to ride, even the roads I know, like I’ve never ridden it before and there is a truck coming the other way in my lane.

Practice getting your eyes up and into the turn early, watching for that vanishing point, and the turn-in point will come naturally.

Hope this helps a bit, even if its not a specific point.

– Keith

[Aaron Scholten]

Even if you KNOW the road very well, you do NOT KNOW what the clown 5 minutes ahead of you dropped on it.
I know my back roads real well.
Then the day comes when the A hole in a cement truck was driving down the road with the drum rolling dropping plops all down the road of wet sloppy concrete!

Fortunately for me, I am kind of a scardey cat around corners and always take them real easy, as I am quite sure if I would have hit that corner at 20 to 25 mph and rolled up into that foot deep pile of wet concrete it’d have been a not very well ending for me.

Another thing is, is it dry out? How much dust and sand is blowing around that may be laying on the road, pretty much invisible that you are now going to slide on? This silt in Florida, sometimes called glass sand, is very fine and can be VERY slippery when hot and dry on a road!

Another thing is, when people go around corners, if their cars are leaking oil, and it’s puddling up on their struts, tie rods, control arms etc etc under their cars, and that puddle of water hanging around from their air conditioning running, when they make that turn, that stuff tends to slide and slop OFF their car, and onto the road there half way thru that turn. You could have fairly fresh oil that is on the road now making it slick. You won’t know this until you negotiate the turn. It may be clean today, but tomorrow???

Any turn in points you ‘remember’ I’d recommend you file those as on your very BEST day, and expect it to be far worse every time you come into that corner. On this corner is pretty easy and you come in a little hot… to find yourself on the sidewalk heading for a fire plug.

Bike manu’s are VERY PROUD of their plastic, and you’ll pay a ton to replace those fairings when you lay ole bessie down!

[Author]

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