How to ride on wet clay ?

[takitimu]

Hi All,

Growing up in Southland I'm used to mud & riding around on that, but now I'm in Northland, (alot)older & trying to ride relatively quick I'm struggling with wet clay .

Basically I did the Bull Run in the weekend & it was tough, I was really struggling to control my bike, so I was wondering anyone had any tips for handling wet clay tracks.

I tried body forward initially, that was not real successful, about as good as doing it in sand.

Really weighting the outside peg did work.

Sitting mid/back seemed better, but I never really felt in control.

Standing up actually seemed to work better, but it was right at the end I tried that.

Long story short, any tips for riding on wet clay ( especially after a few hundred bikes have gone over it ) would be much appreciated.

Nigel

[scott411]

only way to ride wet caly is to keep the rear wheel clear, that mean not backing off, you have to keep the wheel spinning,
leaning back helps as the front will never have much traction,
most importantly don;t stop, and if thier is a bottle neck infront of you, make sure you can get a run, don;t just stop just behind where they are stuck

[Motu]

Yeah,momenteum - just keep it going,hit stuff faster than you think is really a good idea,look well ahead and plan....or don't plan,don't stop to think.On trials bikes we only have a trials tyre (yeah right) and they clog easily in clay - if all else fails,hook a higher gear and rev the shit out of it.This will help clear the tyre and you move into friction traction mode...like a tractor pull.

[barty5]

if all else fails,hook a higher gear and rev the shit out of it.This will help clear the tyre and you move into friction traction mode...like a tractor pull.

you should be able to blast all the quads that get stuck and cuase some of the hold ups with this method.

[kro]

Having spent the last year riding in exactly this, I can say safely, to keep the juice on, and in the case of crossing ruts, keep ya weight biased toward the rear, pull on the bars, and give it a squirt of gas, this stops the front wheel from trying to sink into the rut, and messing you up.

Wet clay is awesome dude, enjoy it, you can do so much in it, and it teaches you so much about how the front wheel is both you best mate, and your worst enemy.

[Buddy L]

well first of all change the tyres on that bike, will help a lot.
I had a blast on the same ride on the weekend.
keep on the gas like everyone has said faster you are going you just seem to glide over the mud.
also let down your tyre pressures maybe to 6 pounds will help with traction.
and get more time on the bike will help with getting better.

[takitimu]

Hey Everyone,

Thanks for the tips, I've got to be honest, I"m in awe of Motu taking a trial's bike through wet clay, that's got to be tricky.

Traction wise it was not so bad, definitely some tips to help though.

I'll have a shot at the throttle trick Kro, sounds like I should drop a gear, I've been short shifting the KLX because it's pretty flexible like that, but keeping the rev's up & popping it when changing ruts sounds a damn good call when it's slippery like that.

Buddy was right, it was actually a pretty cool trail, the expert stuff was good fun, especially the tree root section & the downhill after that on my first run was great, nothing hard about the expert hills, I just got a bit cocky & washed the front wheel going into a gully to fast & visited a fence, then had a few more disagreements with that fence trying to get out ( it was so slippery I couldn't pull the bike out ).

Definitely learnt a few lessons.

Thanks again

Nigel

[Henk]

What they said. Keep your speed up, don't sit down and don't turn up with shot tyres.

[Buddy L]

You can get more practise this weekend at the tangowahine trail ride, 10 times as muddy and 10 times the fun

[ArcherWC]

Ride wet clay the same way as any other surface, HARD

[takitimu]

Hey All,

I did the tangowahine trail ride & with all the tips, it was a heap better, a bit more practise helped, but being religious about cleaning the rear wheel helped heaps ( handling as much as traction ), I also started to be able to tell once the front was getting full of mud & to be more careful.

I was mostly standing, until things would go a bit pear shaped & I was paddling to stay up ( I didn't drop the bike once ).

Stopping well back from a stoppage ahead helped, though I saw a few going like Archer recommended & it surely makes it loop easy up hill, until they hit a rut & went sideways .

As for the Trail Ride, a heap of bikes, I'm guessing 500-700, 64km main loop ( by my speedo ) with roughly 1/2 being essentially transport sections, some really nice pines sections early on & the forest tracks at times were definitely slippery, there was one clay hill on a forest track which last year was impassable apparantly, this year it was not to bad at all ( though a big queue for the quads getting bellied ), so a fair amount drier this year.

All up a really flowing trail with some wicked clay sections, really good organisation & food, one of the top Northland ones I've been on.

Nigel

[Buddy L]

yer i was their as well, managed only two laps and ripped my tube stem out when the tyre spun on the rim after 120 kays of riding.
I must say this was by far the best year, of the ride being held.
no rain for the 4 days heading upto it. Found the clay real easy this year.
One of the best rides their is.

[cheese]

Man cam you aer always rooting somethign on your biek. Get some 4mm inner tubes!!

[CM2005]

lean away when you corner, keep the front light. and whatever anyone else said! have good tyres!

[takitimu]

Man cam you aer always rooting somethign on your biek. Get some 4mm inner tubes!!

I learnt that one the hard way, chewed my OEM rear tyre 4 weeks back trying to run 8psi, got a new Kenda Mellville with Heavy Duty tube now .

I had a couple of new bit's on the ride.

- Oakley Crowbar goggles, the tearoffs are sweet, you don't lose any serious visibility.
- Renthal Twinwall bar's, combined with the mount it made the bar's higher which made standing even easier, never dropped it, so no comments on bar strength .

Just a shame I had to bail out after one loop, had to be somewhere else later in the day.

Nigel