Review: MSF Advanced Sportbike Techniques Course
Despite riding for over 25 years I have never had any motorcycle riding education either for the road or the track. Having recently begun riding again following my trackday crash and subsequent injury I eagerly signed up for the new Motorcycle Safety Foundation (MSF) Advanced RiderCourse Sportbike Techniques. You can see why they call it the ARC-ST for short!
Having no training seems unusual today since there has been an explosion in the number of organizations offering riding and trackday / racing training, but when I began riding in the mid-eighties you got your license and hoped for the best. The MSF was founded out of the first study of motorcycle crashes the now famous Hurt Report whereby Dr Harry Hurt (how appropriate) collected data on over 900 accidents. One of the starkest findings was that rider error played a major part in crashes (the full report as a PDF is available here).
“In the single vehicle accidents, motorcycle rider error was present as the accident precipitating factor in about two-thirds of the cases, with the typical error being a slide-out and fall due to overbraking or running wide on a curve due to excess speed or under-cornering.”
link: Hurt Report Main Findings
The MSF is well known for its Basic Rider training courses but the genesis of the Sportbike Techniques course was a program they developed for the US Navy after a disturbing number of sailors and marines were suffering fatalities on high performance sport bikes.
“So far in fiscal year 2008, the Navy and Marine Corps team has suffered 12 fatalities on motorcycles,” said Rear Admiral Johnson of the Naval Safety Center. “All 12 of those fatalities have been on sport bikes.” The MSF is developing a course which they, along with the Navy, believe will help Sailors and Marines learn how to handle their new bikes.
link: Navy.mil
The course that is now open to the general motorcycling community is based on the course that was ultimately constructed for the Navy. It is designed for experienced motorcycle riders. Special emphasis is given to self-assessment, risk management, rider behavior, riding strategies and overall skill development.
The 8 hour course is roughly split between 3 hours in the classroom and 5 hours of riding time on a training course. It is specifically designed with sport bike owners in mind and draws heavily from Nick Ienatch’s book Sport Riding Techniques.
The Classroom Sessions
The day started with a self assessment of riding skills and propensity for risk taking and this acted as a nice tool to introduce ourselves to one another and our two instructors.
The curriculum included some elements you might expect along with some you may not. For example body position, cornering lines and awareness of our surroundings through peripheral vision were on the list but so was a discussion about which persona we are obeying when we choose to make different decisions on motorcycles. There was a vibrant discussion about whether our Parent, Adult or Child was in charge when we say chose to exceed a speed limit. The verdict was that we are most balanced when it is our adult that is in charge not the selfish, impulsive child!!
Unlike most other training courses there was instruction about expert techniques such as trail braking. Trail braking involves continuing to brake past the point of turning into a turn. Since the available traction must be shared between cornering and braking the braking effort must be progressively reduced as the bike leans over to avoid a loss of traction. In contrast most basic and intermediate courses emphasize finishing with all braking whilst still in a straight line.
For me the most interesting part of the classroom session was a discussion about Risk Offset. The instructor pointed out that you have a good risk offset if your level of skill comfortably exceeds your level of risk taking. One of the dangers of training for some people is that they take their higher level of skill and add to it a higher level risk taking. The result is no change in risk offset and a crash when it happens tends to be at a higher spend with greater consequences.
The Riding Sessions
After lunch it was time to get on my Ducati S4Rs Monster and start the 8 riding exercises along with my fellow Wild Ducs Ducati Club members who had filled the entire course for the day. The exercises take riders through a progressive series that first warms the tires then practices threshold braking (using both brakes) from 20 – 30 mph. Swerves are introduced as is the need to come to a rapid stop, check mirrors and move off out of the lane as if an imaginary semi-trailer was behind and not going to stop!
Before each exercise the instructor gives a demonstration to make sure the instructions are clear. Trail braking is introduced and then swerving around obstacles but my personal favorite exercise came towards the end. Riders accelerated up to a gate and then entered a series of decreasing radius turns before accelerating again and swerving through a gate before coming to a threshold stop on a marked line. It was important to look through the turn in order to pick up the reference points for the next, tighter turn ahead. This exercise brought many of the theory and practice together and was challenging as well as a lot of fun.
Another popular exercise involved riding in small groups around a mini course that featured decreasing radius turns, rapid direction changes, braking and acceleration. The instructors were looking for body position, adopting the upper body shift as opposed to the full racing hanging of pose.
Summary
By 5pm there was a bunch of smiling, hot, tired but happy riders who had their skill base expanded or at least reinforced. Clearly that is a very satisfactory outcome. Personally I found some of the theory and exercises only reinforced my existing knowledge and the riding exercises took awhile to truly become challenging. However this is very necessary as the whole point is to build from the simple to the complex, you can’t just jump in the deep end.
Nevertheless I felt at times exercises should have been conducted at higher speeds (most exercises were at 20-30 mph) that more closely replicate sports riding on the road, although that could have had something to do with the difficulties of running a big, lumpy twin in first and second gear at very low revs!
Ultimately however development of riding skills at any level requires practice and the MSF environment provided a great opportunity to practice and hone skills.
This MSF ARC-ST is for you if:
- You have been riding a sport bike for awhile and want to take your riding skills to the next level
- You haven’t taken any training for some time and want a refresher
- You are an experienced rider from another discipline (e.g dirt bikes) and have taken up sport bike riding
You want to keep looking if:
- You have recently taken the basic course (take the Intermediate course first)
- You truly are an expert rider (problem is we all think we are:- to thine own-self be true!)
MSF ARC-ST in a sentence:
A custom designed course for sportbike riders to expand their skills and increase their risk offset on the street
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