Lean angle?

[raftn]

I would like to say i swing both ways, but i dont, i prefere the left!.........i am talking about cornering by the way.

[svr]

Do you all agree that the best thing about bikes is that they feel cool when they lean over?
To go around a corner and feel like: 'wow, thats pretty far over' - is still a kick for me after 30yrs of riding and racing.
The last time I crashed on the road was in the rimutakas 20 yrs ago - 3rd left hander northern side after the top - cold front tyre after a coffee break - and waking up in the ditch with the car driving woman I'd just passed standing over me wagging her finger "you leant it over too far" Haha hehehe cold hearted bitch had a point.

[Al]

I agree with SVR, the feeling when you know you have leaned further than before is good!
I haven't been on the track yet, current bike is not really suited for it, but will be looking at the bucket scene here in Darwin!
Have just had a house built on 40 acres, so finances for this year are "slightly limited"...

[svr]

Your priorities are all screwed up! You should have bought 20 acres, a new 600, a bunch of tires, heaps of track days & 100 dozen beers.

[Toaster]

Interesting thread. I must admit I find left cornering easier than right....

.......especially the left hand corners without sheep standing out in the middle of them.

[Al]

Your priorities are all screwed up! You should have bought 20 acres, a new 600, a bunch of tires, heaps of track days & 100 dozen beers.

Should have, but then I would have to be doing this too as wifey would have taken flight!

[moT]

no ones testicles are exactly the same size if you find out which is bigger thats the way you perfer to lean for woman its which boob is bigger

[Mystic13]

Okay my theory is....

1/ Most riders prefer the left handers because when we drive on the left (as we do down here in NZ) we effectively practise tight left hand turns all day long. We very rarely get to do tight right hand turns. So the lefties are far more comfortable. Where this shows up is of you can do a tight right hander onto a oneway street. Of course this could just be a load of rubbish but it sounds good.

Having said that I think it's also a matter of what you believe. If you believe you lean more one way or the other... you probably do.

Unfortunately I don't have any chicken strips so I can't tell you which way I like leaning more. Except that I do like to lean.

2/ Of course it could be tied to your underlying political persuasion, left, right or centre. Greens would be the bike that spends most of its time in the garage.

3/ Personally I prefer the opposite sex. I don't need to know which way you lean.

[Fudmucker]

Yup I agree - in South Africa, we also ride on the left and I feel better turning to the left. I get the screaming heebie-jeebies when I am passed by a sports biker leaning over so far to the right that only his tyres are on left of the centre line...

[scorpious]

when i corner I like to use the whole road

as I can loose my head using the whole road while rounding a RH corner I prefure the lefties. much more relaxing.

[Henk]

I've always figured it was the oncoming traffic thing and the fact that most roundabuts are off camber. Camber will wear the right hand side of the tyre more than the left. Used to work with a guy that had a Rocket where that was really pronounced.

[gt_phanta]

Damn some of these posts were retarded (and I mean that in the nicest way possible!!).

Preference for left or right turns is the same thing that makes people left or right handed, or perhaps natural or goofy footed on skateboards, surfboards and snowboards. Even the way you naturally stand on a bicycle (which foot you have in front) is related to this. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Footedness.

I really battle on slow right handed turns. On a halfpipe on a bmx, I could only go anti-clockwise... going clockwise gives me the same retarded awkwardness I get when I try throw a ball with my left hand (I write left handed, but I am right hand dominant - everything else I do right handed, including kicking). http://www.helium.com/items/149103-e...d-right-handed

[dpex]

I was, for years, a racing glider pilot. This issue of left or right comfort provided significant advantage when thermaling (ergo, going up in a thermal lifying column of air) The rules are, all must follow the direction of the first plane into a thermal. And so, we knew our own preferred bias (left or right circling) and learned the reference of the aircraft on our tails.

We learned that some competitors simply lost it when forced to thermal in the opposite rotation to their endemic preference. Personally, I slightly favoured left-hand thermalling, but was comfortable with right-hand. One of my major competitors I knew to be hopeless thermaling right-handed. If he was on my arse, and i was first into a thermal, I'd always go right. Not only could he not keep up but inevitably he'd bug out and race off to find his own, leaving me to switch rotate, gain great height, then rush off to the next.

I never did analyze why each pilot had a preference. Nor have I read any data about it. Yet the preference is strong.

Since reading the first post of this thread I have gone out to test my preference and found I prefer left-handers, yet I'm right-handed.

Seems to me that someone could do his PhD on this issue.

[OutForADuck]

For far too many years I used to be much happier in left handers... I think I was a back brake trailer on the track and found this harder in right handers. Then in 95' I smashed up my right arm and its full of plates/bolts and abit useless.. now I enjoy right handers because I can be closer to the throttle.

Just the flexibiliy, strength and co-ordination of our bodies is all... everyone is the same, one side feel better than the other....

Well that's what I tell the girls anyway

[varminter]

When I learned to ice skate (200 years ago) I found it far easier to go round the rink anticlockwise. You have to step the right foot over the left. When I took to rolerblades I learned to go round the other way but it wasn't easy. Ditto for the bike, I'm tempted to try a roundabout the other way