Covering the clutch.

[F5 Dave]

Yes.

Riding a light, highish-compression four stroke single like mine carries the temptation of thumping down a gear or two and letting the engine do the work as you approach intersections, but I've gradually weaned myself off that.

And after an interesting fishtail-gone-wrong dumping me on my backside on the motorway while filtering in the rain, I've decided that the rear brake is best avoided on my bike.

Some bikes have touchy rear brakes. I purposely bleed air into my 750’s rear as it is touchy, I’m getting around to putting a smaller calliper on it one day.

It is still worthwhile learning the feel of the rear esp in the wet as you won’t be using the front anywhere near enough.

Go find a carpark & practise rear only. The real key is to look on the horizon. If you drop your eyes & MOST learners do until you instruct them not to, heck ½ the so called experienced riders at track training days do to some extent, anyway you go where you look & if you look down then that is likely what will happen. If you look up & straight then the bike will very likely correct itself, unless perhaps the camber is off kilter.

One should never be afraid of the brakes.

[TwoSeven]

I never cover the clutch or the brakes. It'll get you a ticket in the UK if the copper is watching carefully enough. I once had a bike copper follow me half way across london watching my lever usage


When you cover a lever there is a tendancy to use it in an emergency (when your brain goes thru that startled bunny phase - grab lever first, think second). Pulling the wrong lever in at the wrong time can cause even more grief.

Clutch - will cause the rear wheel to lock and skid if braking.
Front brake - will cause the front wheel to lock and dump you on the ground.
Rear brake (excessive) will cause the rear to come round (and possibly dump you).

Any of the above in the wet will likely spit you off the bike.

So having that little bit of extra time locating the levers is often enough to allow the brain to engage properly.

If you think about it - having to grab those levers so fast that you need to constantly be covering them probably means your going to hit whatever it is anyhow.

[toads]

I don't cover the clutch unless I'm in the process of going up through the gears at the time, and only cover the brake in traffic, I'm left handed which makes my left hand pretty quick and there's no need, I also have my foot hovering over the back brake while going through traffic cos I never just whale on the front brake, icky things have been known to happen to me in times past, I always use front and rear brakes together., if I needed to change down gears in a huge hurry cos of an emergency I'd probably not even bother using the clutch,

[sAsLEX]

another thing is try free wheeling through a corner with clutch in, repeat normally and feel the difference a bike will handle heaps different without the enigne-wheel conection going on.

[NC]

Yer, I do...

I think it's habbit from living in Orc-land...

[erik]

CSL, my clutch lever is kinda worn like that too.

I pretty much always cover the front brake when riding in traffic, but when I'm on the open road and there isn't much traffic, then I don't cover it.
Same with the clutch, I think.

I try to use the rear brake along with the front brake as often as I can, I find it makes quite a noticable difference and I figure if I keep practising it, then maybe it will one day shorten my stopping distance a bit in an emergency.

Tiggerz, can the uk cops really give you a ticket for covering the levers?

The way I see it is that if you're in an emergency and you have the front brake covered, all you have to do to stop is start to squeeze. If you don't have it covered, you've got to let go of the throttle grip and move your fingers up over the brake lever before you can even think about how hard to squeeze the brake. The extra time taken to move your fingers into position will also mean that you'll have less time to stop if you have to, so you'll have to brake harder than you would otherwise.

[jazbug5]

At the risk of being thought even more of a dolt (is that even possible ..?), could somebody explain the process of safe braking?
I haven't actually had anything bad happen yet, and have had to slam them on in a couple of 'situations', but I can't remember if I had the clutch depressed at the time or not... or what the hell I was doing. Hmmm.

PS
I know who the shouty man is, I know who the shouty man is..!

PPS Sorry didn't have time to reply to your note earlier, CSL... see ya on Friday night, though.. unless you fancy an after-work cobweb clearer, that is...!

[bgd]

Don't cover either clutch or front brake unless I think there maybe a problem developing. Will cover rear brake when filtering sometimes. Have a lot of engine braking (in the lower gears, i.e. filtering speeds) so a quick roll off the throttle and a bit of back brake slows me pretty quickly.

Wasn't aware of any UK restriction on covering levers, although training certainly frowned on it.

[riffer]

I don't cover the clutch when riding at all. Half the time I don't even use it for upshifting, just downshifting and coming to a stop (if I can't find neutral on the move).

If I am lanesplitting or coming up to intersections and I don't trust the cars I will hover over the front brake, but to be honest, I can find them pretty fast when I need to. It has't been a problem yet (fingers crossed).

[Blakamin]

PS
I know who the shouty man is, I know who the shouty man is..!

I'm thinking i might look at my Basic Handling cert... about the only bit that i remember is "eyes up"

[Ms Piggy]

I actually cover my front brake all the time as well, another thing the shouting scary man at my BHS day drilled.

Actually on my ride home tonight I realised that I never cover my brake - shouty man drilled into us NOT to do that! Saves knee jerk (well finger jerk really) reactions that cause you & your bike to end up on the tarmac.

[Ms Piggy]

Don’t be scared of shouting Irishmen. Eyes up!!

Have I guessed right?

Yes! It took me quite a while to get over that experience actually!

[Gasman]

I was just wondering if any of your seasoned riders, or not so seasoned for that matter, cover your clutch at all times when you ride?

It was drilled into me by the scary guy that took me for my BHS test that I should ALWAYS cover my clutch. I've actually also noticed that by doing this it's worn my clutch lever on the underside & it kinda flops around.

So what do others think? Is this a good idea? Bad idea? Or just a matter or preference?

Ta Muchly.

I only cover the clutch when approaching an intersection or a possible problem. Same with the front brake (although tend to hover there more often). Somehow I've never got used to riding with two finger out etc. - damned uncomfortable. Some people swear by it though.

I notice some of you like to use engine braking a lot. I'm trying to get out of the habit of using it just to slow up in normal situations, and notice that some web sites etc advise against it too. It's OK when approaching a changing light etc, but I guess it just comes down to the fact that the engine and drive train weren't designed to be brakes, so it saves wear to not use them that way.

[Ms Piggy]

At the risk of being thought even more of a dolt (is that even possible ..?), could somebody explain the process of safe braking?
I haven't actually had anything bad happen yet, and have had to slam them on in a couple of 'situations', but I can't remember if I had the clutch depressed at the time or not... or what the hell I was doing. Hmmm.

PS
I know who the shouty man is, I know who the shouty man is..!

PPS Sorry didn't have time to reply to your note earlier, CSL... see ya on Friday night, though.. unless you fancy an after-work cobweb clearer, that is...!

Yeah actually same here, same here. My first bin was from slamming on the back brake and now I rarely use it but, I still get quite nervous when I have to brake fast.

Jaz & I have already had a drink or two over shouty man and a couple of other women I know were traumatised by him too! Anyway enough about him.

Just sent you a PM Jaz - hope to see ya in your PJ's!

[FROSTY:Me]

Well being totally saintly and all that--yea right
I always cover my clutch and my front brakes.
Actually I usually ride covering both. To me its a matter of reaction time
If I can pull in the clutch and down shift a half second faster then i might avoid that big truck that pulled out in front of me.
Same applies to the brakes.
It has done me well so far on the track too. I was covering the clutch on the hairpin at pukie ,so when Mella yella bogged down I slipped the clutch 125 style.