Lean, don’t steer, through turns.
You make a car go around a corner by turning the steering wheel. You make a bike turn by leaning it.
That’s a big difference between a vehicle with four wheels and one with two wheels. But we see many new riders try to steer their bike like they’re driving a car. They slow down and pivot the handlebar, creeping around corners.
To learn to steer by leaning, try this on your next ride.
Stuff half-a-dozen paper cups into your jersey pocket and cruise to an empty parking lot. Set the cups in a long line but make them a bit offset like a slalom course. Then ride toward the first cup.
As you approach it, lower your outside pedal and press your weight on it. This will be the left pedal if you’re setting up for a right turn. Then, instead of using the handlebar to steer into the turn, lean the bike by pushing lightly on the bar with the inside (right) hand and pulling up slightly with the outside (left) hand. Keep your upper body vertical as the bike angles over and you put weight on the left pedal.
As you approach the next cup for a left turn, reverse the procedure. Have your right pedal down, push down with your left hand and pull up with your right hand.
It’s almost like you’re trying to point the bike in the opposite direction you want to go. But this technique will make the bike lean smoothly into the turn. Try it.
Remember, these are subtle movements. Don’t exaggerate your push/pull on the handlebar. A little goes a long way. You’ll be amazed at how quickly the bike will tilt and how well it turns — especially at faster speeds as you develop this skill.
Single track vehicles must lean in order to turn. The fastest, easiest, & smoothest way to get them to lean is counter steering. A simple way to remember how to do it is: Push left to go left–Push right to go right. Want to turn left? Push forward on the left handlebar. Turning right? Push forward on the right handlebar. Since bicycles are very light it takes very little effort to accomplish setting up for a turn. There’s no need to “shove” the bar forward. Just a gentle nudge will be all that’s needed.
When I teach riding skills I also stress the absolute necessity or TURNING YOUR HEAD & looking in the direction you want to go. If you’re making a left turn it’s not enough to just look to the left using your eyes. You MUST TURN YOUR HEAD & point your nose at where you want to go. I often tell my classes when turning, “Never look where you’re going! Always look where you want to go.” When coming to a corner, scan for traffic, gravel, road hazards. OK, you’ve seen it & made your decision, there’s no need to keep staring at it. Move your head & your eyes & look directly where you want to go. If you don’t turn your head you’ll ride where your nose is pointed. This is called “target fixation.” Most of you may have experienced this even when riding in a straight line. “Y’know, I saw that pothole coming up & rode right through the @#% thing!” You’re going to go where you’re looking. It’s no fun when you’re approaching a high speed downhill turn, then riding straight off the road into the guardrail like you never saw it coming. You did see it coming, the problem was you looked right at it with your head pointed right at it, instead of looking where you WANTED to go. When teaching bike handling skills to relatively novice riders with only a year or two of experience, I can usually have 8 of them make a “U” turn within a lined parking space without having to put a foot down on bikes with 700c wheels. The secret is turning your head as far as you can & looking directly behind you. Get up enough speed so that you won’t to unclip or fall, & your hands will follow your nose. I always do this with spotters at least for the first few times. I know many very strong, very experienced riders that have a hard time turning around on a narrow 2 lane road without needing to put a foot down.
And as always, practice makes better. In an emergency situation, you’ll always do what you’ve always done.
All two-wheeled vehicles turn by leaning only. No counter steering, that only works for four-wheelers. In a turn the wheel only turns in the direction of lean.
Countersteering is the thing: A decade ago, when I had been road-biking for five decades, I took a motorcycle training course. They retaught me what I knew in my bones: leaning into the turn is the way to turn. I learned a lot. The instructor really knew her stuff,
They taught me how it works. If I want to go right I push down on the right handlebar and lift up on the lefft one. That has the effect of turning the front wheel ever-so-slightly to the LEFT. And that moves the bike ever-so-slightly out from under my center of gravity making me lean to the RIGHT. That’s why they call it countersteering. I guess it’s important in motorcycle driving because those things are way heavier than bicycles. In steep fast turns it takes a lot of countersteering pressure to maintain the turn. (Not that I would ever drive my dinky little motor scooter that way.)
They taught me something else: when moving slowly countersteering doesn’t work. A slowly driven motorcycle, maneuvering around a parking lot, needs to be driven like a car, steering in the direction I want to go. There’s a transition speed where countersteering takes over. The motorcycle-license test measures, among many other things, how well I make that transition when speeding up and slowing down. Swerving to avoid an obstacle and then stopping quickly involves getting that right — or crashing.
Watching my granddaughter learn to ride her bicycle drove home how hard it is to learn to make that direct-to-counter steering transition. Tiny bikes with training wheels CAN’T BE COUNTERSTEERED … they can’t lean. And, when the training wheels come off the kiddo tumbles the first few times making the transition. So training wheels, umm, aren’t good training. Next kid gets a pushbike.
Is it important to teach this countersteering principle to people who ride powerful e-bikes? I think so.
Anyone else use feet and hips to turn? Especially at speed I find this great – and fun!