Subconscious

[Maha]

That part of the brain that we call on at times without knowing it.

Watching a programme last night about F1 drivers and their subconscious skills/thoughts that get them through corners etc, got me thinking...

Its about the 'note' of my bike during cornering that tells me its going ok...
Hard to explain, but, Subconsciously, I am listening to the engine note before/during and after the corner. Never really thought about that until last night.

Theres is so much going on during the action of cornering...body position/eyesight/lines/engine note/gearing/entering/exiting etc, and thats just one corner!

All this is done and completed within seconds and at times, before you know it, you are at the next corner. I rely on the engine note (subconsciously) to let me know that I have choosen the right gear and speed to get me through the corner without fault.

Cheers Brain, I love you.

[Slyer]

We'd be screwed without our subconscious.
Far too many things for our conscious mind to be able to do at once, breathe, pump blood, steer etc.

[Blackshear]

My eyes do the lookin, my hands gauge and correct, body takes up the slack/errors during cornering...
*Shrugs* teamwork brah, teamwork. Just happens.
But inreference to your one honed, er, 'part', I'd have to say the vibrations going through the bike. Rev's, what the tyres are doing... I DUNNO ALRIGHT, LEAVE ME ALONE!

Also, my asscheeks tighten, my balls receed and my heart pounds when shit hits the fan :baby:

[klingon]

Yeah, subconscious is great, isn't it?! Never ceases to amaze me.

You really only become aware of it when you start to mess it up. When your subconscious is doing a perfectly good job of something then your conscious brain starts wanting a bit of the action and starts "thinking" at an inappropriate moment. Like mid-corner. Best to just disengage it again and let your subconscious stay in charge.

[Maha]

My eyes do the lookin, my hands gauge and correct, body takes up the slack/errors during cornering...
*Shrugs* teamwork brah, teamwork. Just happens.
But inreference to your one honed, er, 'part', I'd have to say the vibrations going through the bike. Rev's, what the tyres are doing... I DUNNO ALRIGHT, LEAVE ME ALONE!

Also, my asscheeks tighten, my balls receed and my heart pounds when shit hits the fan :baby:


Vibrations/revs ets come by way of what the engine is doing yes?
Hence the 'engine note'....when this is correct, we know exactly where we are with the bike, all happens in a split second. Without thinking.

Riding 'balls to the wall' is all well in good (and this is not about how to to ride) but your actions are controlled by the top three inches, not the lower 3-4-5-6 inches.

[Maha]

We'd be screwed without our subconscious.
Far too many things for our conscious mind to be able to do at once, breathe, pump blood, steer etc.

At speeds over 350kph, the brain cant keep up with what you see in front of you (not that 350 plus will effect any of us on the road) thats when the subconscious part steps in, and sometimes fails at those speeds. Accidents happen on the track at times.

But for your everyday/weekend ride, if you ride a particular road regularly, that little part at the bottom rear of your brain certainly helps, familiarity?? I guess in part. I for one need to hear my bike.

[Stirts]

Its about the 'note' of my bike during cornering that tells me its going ok...
Hard to explain, but, Subconsciously, I am listening to the engine note before/during and after the corner. Never really thought about that until last night.

How funny, and I never realised this until reading this post but if I forget to wear my earplugs my riding is effected dramatically. Now I know why :stupid:


your actions are controlled by the top three inches, not the lower 3-4-5-6 inches.

And I thought it was the other way around :whistle:

[Maha]

I guess everyone has their 'this corner at in 3rd at 110' going on when its posted at 55-65 or whatever?
Theres a long straight up this way with a 45 posted corner at the end of it. Personally, I take it slower than what I normally would because its a bastard and can catch you out. Not all posted 45 corners are the same it seems (camber etc) I have seen much quicker riders brake before it and brake part way through it because it tightens up. Mind games on a bike?
You know what you are comfortable with going into any speed posted corner because its in your subconscious.

There was one corner a couple of years ago, posted 25 that I almost had to use my indicator....:pinch:

[Burtha]

I can't yet apply it to a decent bike yet (as I have yet to get one) but when in me mini coop, I wind down the windows and do exactly the same thing as I don't drive slow and pref sideways.
Its all in the feel and in the 'knowing' ... I can relate, and am looking forward to getting that on a REAL bike sometime soon!

[GSXR Trace]

I don't think this is one of those things i should admit, but... does anyone else every now and then realise they have been riding and not paying attention and wonder how the hell they got to their destination at times? Very rarely i get that feeling when riding or driving... its a little unsettling, but i put that down to subconscious abilities as well!

[Slyer]

I don't think this is one of those things i should admit, but... does anyone else every now and then realise they have been riding and not paying attention and wonder how the hell they got to their destination at times? Very rarely i get that feeling when riding or driving... its a little unsettling, but i put that down to subconscious abilities as well!
All of the time.

[Edbear]

Scientists tell us the human brain is capable of around 100 trillion calculations per second - http://www.wired.com/techbiz/it/news/2002/11/56459

And they reckon machines will match human capabilities by 2020.

http://www.transhumanist.com/volume1/moravec.htm

Anyway, without meaning to take the subject off topic, we couldn't ride or even walk without the subconcious hard at work.

Makes sightseeing much more fun when you don't have to concetrate on the basics too much...

[varminter]

My brain is very useful, hardly go anywhere without it. Not always switched on though

[Motu]

Watching a programme last night about F1 drivers and their subconscious skills/thoughts that get them through corners etc, got me thinking...


Did you catch the accent of the scientist dude? - he didn't have one....so I think he might have been a Kiwi.

He was talking about storing experiences in the cerebellum for instant retrieval by the subconscious mind.Kenny Roberts was talking about this decades ago,for his Superbike school.He called it storing packages on a wall - each package held the skills required to deal with a particular situation,when you were in that situation,you grabbed the package and opened it.Although I like Keith Code,Kenny Roberts comes first for me and doesn't have any fancy theories,just riding facts - like, you'll never lose the front if you are on the gas.

He also says - ''You only have so much storage space in your brain at a top priority level.Important stuff always gets remembered,and the rest drops to low priority.At every race,you learn and slot different things into different levels.When you solve an important problem,it drops to low priority,and this process opens a slot at the top priority level for a new problem.Some things always stay at that top level.Turn one at Daytona,for example,is always on the list.''

That was in a 1989 Cycle magazine article. KR was working on this stuff a long time ago.

[frogamic]

I don't think this is one of those things i should admit, but... does anyone else every now and then realise they have been riding and not paying attention and wonder how the hell they got to their destination at times? Very rarely i get that feeling when riding or driving... its a little unsettling, but i put that down to subconscious abilities as well!

I do this too, it's rather disturbing, especially at lights, when I go through them and then have no idea if they were green or not... I always check in my mirrors to see if the person behind me went through and they always have, so yay for the subconscious!

[Blackshear]

I don't think this is one of those things i should admit, but... does anyone else every now and then realise they have been riding and not paying attention and wonder how the hell they got to their destination at times? Very rarely i get that feeling when riding or driving... its a little unsettling, but i put that down to subconscious abilities as well!

A little too often. I'll start daydreaming about future life scenarios, what could happen if I this, what could happen if I that... Let's say I changed this in the pas- Hey, look, a red lig- WHOOOOOA NELLY! :(

[yungatart]

The other thing that I find interesting about your subconcious is you can 'programme' it.
So you can tell yourself something over and over, and eventually your subconcious acts as though it is real, and volia, it becomes real!
And it is just as easy to programme it for the 'good ' stuff as it is for the bad...eg, I love cornering fast on my bike vs I hate twisties.

[Bass]

Do you remember the documentary series "Speed" hosted by Jeremy Clarkson?
There is one program from the series that has stuck in my mind. It was the one where they were testing the mental make up of racing drivers.
They tested the reaction time of Michael Schumaker and found that while it was good, it was by no means exceptional.
They did similar stuff with Colin McCrae.
The final conclusion was that in both cases, it was the guy's subconscious that was doing the driving - they weren't really thinking about it at all.
Their conscious mind was occupied with the exceptional stuff, the stuff that could take them out.
How would you like to be able to drive like Schumaker or McCrae and not have to think about it?
They put Clarkson in McCrae's car and he tried to do a couple of K's at "McCrae speed". He was off the road and in the bushes in less than a minute.

[Motu]

So was Rossi - obviously WRC drivers are better than TV celebs and MotoGP riders.

The progame also talked about visualisation - this is important in life as well as motorcycling.Trials riders have always done this,and even more so these days.They walk the section picking the path the bike will follow,they memorise the route - and put this into action when they ride the section.You can sometimes see top riders standing before a section - hands on imaginary bars,bending legs and arms,blipping the throttle as they visualize themselves riding through the section.Then they put it into action.

All this stuff has been done before - I am surprised at it's ''reinvention''.

[GSXR Trace]

I do this too, it's rather disturbing, especially at lights, when I go through them and then have no idea if they were green or not... I always check in my mirrors to see if the person behind me went through and they always have, so yay for the subconscious!


A little too often. I'll start daydreaming about future life scenarios, what could happen if I this, what could happen if I that... Let's say I changed this in the pas- Hey, look, a red lig- WHOOOOOA NELLY! :(

Ok, red lights... watch out guys! I often realise this when am coming into a corner and suddenly realise i took no notice of the speed of the corner and im thinking... bloody hell this corner is TIGHT... and thats when you have to throw it through the corner and thats when im thankful that i ride well within my ability!

[discotex]

Roberts comes first for me and doesn't have any fancy theories,just riding facts - like, you'll never lose the front if you are on the gas.

That is not a fact as I have disproven it on T5 at Taupo :shutup:

However I still subscribe to the "if in doubt gas it out" rule of thumb and agree it's a fact that more front-end washouts have been avoided by staying on the gas than chopping it.


One of the reasons I think everyone should at least do one slow group trackday is that it trains your subconcious about what the bike is really capable of should you ever need it on the road.

And visualisation really works. I've taken to visualising my lines around Taupo from time to time and it's really made a difference to how consistantly I put the bike in the right place on the track.

[dpex]

At speeds over 350kph, the brain cant keep up with what you see in front of you (not that 350 plus will effect any of us on the road) thats when the subconscious part steps in, and sometimes fails at those speeds. Accidents happen on the track at times.

But for your everyday/weekend ride, if you ride a particular road regularly, that little part at the bottom rear of your brain certainly helps, familiarity?? I guess in part. I for one need to hear my bike.


Actaully, its at speeds over 352.5 where that phenominon kicks in.

[Motu]

That is not a fact as I have disproven it on T5 at Taupo :shutup:


I think you need to be approaching KR's level before you actually gain front wheel control.And he teaches that with mini bikes on dirt tracks...much better than a track day on your favorite bike.Reading KR's article last night - he talks about pushing the front wheel out by turning the bars in,then catching it and maintaining control....you have to catch it before you lose it,can't be done after you have lost control.I used to dispute his gas on theory too,as I have dropped bikes that way....but have since learned he is right...as to be expected.

[discotex]

I think you need to be approaching KR's level before you actually gain front wheel control.And he teaches that with mini bikes on dirt tracks...much better than a track day on your favorite bike.Reading KR's article last night - he talks about pushing the front wheel out by turning the bars in,then catching it and maintaining control....you have to catch it before you lose it,can't be done after you have lost control.I used to dispute his gas on theory too,as I have dropped bikes that way....but have since learned he is right...as to be expected.

Yeah totally. I think we're saying the same thing? I only meant the "you'll never lose the front on the gas" thing isn't quite that simple as clearly people still lose the front while on the gas (without having the other parts of the equation).