From the point of view of Moto Academy NZ we instill in our riders that if you are crashing you are watching, not riding and therefore not learning very much.
If you crash invariably you end up having to watch the rest of the race, nurse an injury, fix a damaged bike, buy a new helmet etc and by definition you are no longer on the track racing, which is what you came there to do.
So, the approach is to ride at the level which teaches you the most while achieving the outcome you started out wanting to achieve, like your approach Deano.
If your original goal turns out to be unrealistic e.g. "I'm going to win every race in my first year" or similar, so that you end up pushing beyond your abilities, then you need to adjust your goals to more accurately reflect the reality of your and your bikes abilities.
Only by riding can you understand what those abilities are and the goals should be.
In my experience very few new or inexperienced riders actually understand why they have crashed, unless the cause is very obvious, and hence they learn very little except how much it hurts.
The Keith Code approach is one of "slow down to go faster" and has so much merit.
The next step, after you reach a plateau what to do then? Do I need to push and crash or can I push and not crash?
That is up to each rider of course, but clearly it is possible to push and not crash by putting in place clear strategies to achieve an improvement.
Such as; get fitter, lose some more weight, understand your tyres and suspension better, study the circuit in more detail, work on each corner in detail, maintain a diary of your work but most of all, get on the track and try different things until you find something that works better than it did before.
So few riders actually do this in a concerted manner, but instead end up just riding round like they have always done.
And the last point: "GO AROUND THE CORNER!!" if you think you can't make it, tell yourself that you can and try anyway. You might just be surprised how you can make it round.
There you go, how 'bout that?
"Life is what happens to you while you're busy making other plans." John Ono Lennon.
"If you have never stared off into the distance then your life is a shame." Counting Crows
"The girls were in tight dresses, just like sweets in cellophane" Joe Jackson
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