Target fixation: Can it be avoided?

[pritch]

Do you beleve with some training you could avoid target fixation and be able to steer your bike wherever you like?

I guess that's a yes. On the last few occasions when I became aware that I was staring at the threat, I moved my gaze to an avenue offering escape.

This was a conscious decision replacing the instinctive reaction. The conscious decision part would be a result of training.

[sinfull]

Should probably take this to another thread but since we are here..

Quote:
Originally Posted by sinfull
Don't think Sandra is on KB but said sorry just in case ! Her man is a camera man and has the micky gear !
awesome stuff with some fantastic editing.

Surely you can't say that wasn't a classic case of fixation, sure she had lowsided in that corner on another trackday, that may have created some doubt, but still looks to me like it was a case of fixation !
I watched it a few times and I say it was a bail. Added info that she had already lowsided previously in the same move would suggest even stronger that it was a bail rather than target fixation.
Ok comes down to what we each saw there don't it ! But i have spent a little time with her on the track now and seen her do that corner at that speed many a time !

Ok so ya have run offs at the track (in most cases) but your also doing up to 3- times the speed of road ! Be interested to see an experiment with heat in tyres on road compared to track and grip ??? Hello ! Lets say a third the speed of track, unless your using nylon tyres or ya hit an oil spill the grip would be twice that of the track due to the seal !
I would love to see a study on it. Fair bit of guesswork going into my theory but racetracks and roads are not prepared the same. There is a reason for not using chipseal on racetracks. They are not roads.
Agreed guesswork on my part too !

I've been doing track for 12 months now, last 5 of which i've not ridden on the road at all (personal choice). The knowledge i've gained from the track work would be easy to transfer to road at a third the speed ! Because it is a third the speed !
Entering a hairpin at 60k/hr on the track compared to entering a hairpin at 60k/hr on the road does not equaite to a third of the speed. The difference comes into camber, availiable grip, heat of the tyres, runout room....
Ok so pick on the slowest corner on the manfield track lol but it also comes down to practising that corner ! Are you trying to tell me that you would enter a hairpin you did not know like the back of yr hand of the same tightness, and camber even if you knew your tyres were warm, at 60kph ?

1) My braking, i KNOW i can pull the bike up from 240kph in 150m, get off the pics and drop the bike near on its side eccelerating and have it on its other side again in a distance of perhaps 8 m !
Agreed, however doing it on the track you know exactly where the corner is and how much space you have got. On the road, past that blind hairpin there may not be the same runoff, in fact, it is most likely that there is not the same runoff.
Comon Lance now why would i be doing 240 k on the road or a hairpin i don't know at 60 kph for that matter ? What i was saying is, i have learnt so much about my bike, its capabilities and my own, if i were to come across a situation (say a couple of cows as i'm rounding a corner) i could get on the pics, get off em lay it over one way, stand it up and lay it the other way and know i can ! Why cause i have done it hundreds of times now ! Wont say i'd get away with it but now i would try whereas 12 months ago i would probably just gone into them sideways ! (Nah done it once on a harley at the ton and got through a heard of em after leaving the rise out of martinborough on one wheel and picked my way through em)

2) my tyres, i KNOW i can scrape my pegs with a metzeler racetec give it full twist and it will hang on (a conti sport will let go) add some road chip to that and the sport attack will more n likely hang on !
Again, it comes down to camber and the availiable grip levels. Are you saying that throwing your bike on its side and giving it a handful and it will never let go because you have done it on the track?
I am saying that i have learnt the capabilities of the tyres i use and their limits lance and yes i have done it on the track, but again its where to give it the handfull and yes i learnt that on the track !

3) I KNOW if i lose the back wheel under power in a corner, if i release the gas completely the chances are i will highside rather than lowside, if i back off a litle i should regain control !
2 seconds ago you were claiming that you can lie the bike on its side and give it a handful and it wont let go, now you are losing the backend.....
Stop trying to twist it Lance, read the bit again where it says a conti sport will let go ie road tyre not putting them down but hey i learnt their capabilities Where you ask haha on the fucking track

4) my reflexes in general have improved ! My awareness of whats going on around me has improved ! My knowledge of suspension set up has grown immencely,
Now you tell me i cant take that to the road and not be an improved rider ! (if i were to obey the speed limits)

There are advantages about learning about how brakes and suspension and throttle and things work which will improve riding. The point remains that track riding will teach you how to ride on a track. Road riding will teach you how to ride on the road. There is the old argument is a "better" rider "better" because s/he is faster, or better because they dont crash.

This bit is good and i'll say it again LIMITS ! I have learnt a few LIMITS at the track so i can adapt them for road riding, The bikes limits and a few of my own !
The track riding hasn't taught me how to ride faster lance, my bike could do 246 before i took it to the track and in fact it used to do it quite often on the road as you well know ! It handled ok i guess back then, but there were a few very hairy moments where i OUTRODE MY ABILITIES !
I haven't slowed any mate, i stopped road riding altogether for a while(personal choice) I have never crashed on the track where as i felt i was pushing a few too many limits on the road !
Yes i used to have fixation moments on the road and track too, can think of a couple of occasions it happened while out on a manawatu ride in fact ! Think i now have that under controll also

[cowboyz]

I am not trying to twist what you are saying and not suggesting that full braking practice at 240 is why one rides tracks in any case.
Just putting my side of the argument forward that track riding teaches how to ride tracks and road riding teaches how to ride roads. There a a few things that intertwine between the 2 yes, but a good road rider does not make a good track rider, and by the same token, a fast racer does not always make a good road rider.
Racetracks are there to go fast. That is their design and purpose. Roads are there so people can travel from one place to another without getting stuck in paddocks.
I am not attacking your ability to ride a bike nor the girl on the R6? From what I have seen of your track riding you are doing are fab job and have decided to keep it on the track where you can go as fast as you like - what it is designed for. That is a choice you have made to do something you enjoy. I, for comparison, like to tour and do 600-1000km days and see all sorts of different parts of the country. It is not better - just different. I enjoy getting on the track but I dont do every trackday and the ones I do, there are plenty of peeps giving me the learn. I dont pretend to be super fast. Just enjoying doing what I do.

The main overview is that track riding teaches one to ride a track. There are plenty of things that come into play like learning the track and learning the corners, where and when you can get that bit more out of a corner or your bike. The advantage is, of course you are riding the same corners over and over again that you can learn from and your bike and tyres (providing setup is good) a level of grip that is always there.
On the road there are different cambers, surfaces, shit on the road and things keep changing.

[Neon]

Back to target fixation...

Samgab has a good point about reverting back. We are hardwired to assess threats by whatever means necessary in order to invoke fight / flight reaction (e.g. hmm what's that lion doing over there...) Not much you can do about that. Granted you can override your survival reactions but it is a conscious process - and that's where knowing your limits comes in. If your brain believes you are in control of the situation, you can look where you like. Problem being that in most emergency situations things just happen too fast for our poor brains to process.

So, you have very little control over how you will react if survival instincts engage, but you CAN move the fear threshold.

[Motu]

You need to divert the target fixation to escape routes....using the same force to a better use.You can practice and train your mind as you ride - in every situation imagine it all going wrong,and pick and escape route...off road riders call it picking a line.They scan ahead and choose one of many lines to take.On the road there are many escape routes to your ''oh shit!'' moment,you should always have one for every situation.Properly trained,when you go ''oh shit!'',you will automatically start scaning for the best escape plan....takes a nano second or two,and that's plenty of time when things go wrong.

[mujambee]

Back to target fixation...

Samgab has a good point about reverting back. We are hardwired to assess threats by whatever means necessary in order to invoke fight / flight reaction (e.g. hmm what's that lion doing over there...) Not much you can do about that. Granted you can override your survival reactions but it is a conscious process - and that's where knowing your limits comes in. If your brain believes you are in control of the situation, you can look where you like. Problem being that in most emergency situations things just happen too fast for our poor brains to process.

So, you have very little control over how you will react if survival instincts engage, but you CAN move the fear threshold.

Problem is probably there, instincts. Have done a little more testing and noticed that on normal conditions you can look wherever you like and the bike goes where you want it to go. In fact, I've noticed I do it all the time; when riding among stalled cars I look into their mirrors while steering on periferal vision.

It's only on emergency situations, when instincts take control, when target fixation puts you in trouble, so I don't believe what I wanted to do is possible.

It's like killing trolls with a knife; Not that it can't be done, but you need a lot of practice, and no one gets to practise two times (Terry Pratchet)

You need to divert the target fixation to escape routes....using the same force to a better use.You can practice and train your mind as you ride - in every situation imagine it all going wrong,and pick and escape route...off road riders call it picking a line.They scan ahead and choose one of many lines to take.On the road there are many escape routes to your ''oh shit!'' moment,you should always have one for every situation.Properly trained,when you go ''oh shit!'',you will automatically start scaning for the best escape plan....takes a nano second or two,and that's plenty of time when things go wrong.

My fellow cyclist say I'm mad, because I go downhill twice as fast as any of them (not so, but faster). I tell them that my brain is trained to pick routes much faster than any of them can.




And on the track/road debate; I've found that usually trackers make slower and safer riders on the road. Probably comes from the fact that you are much more aware of the dangers out there when you have ridden without them. Anyhow, track riding allows you to bring your base riding skills to a level you can't reach on the road (braking, cornering, drifting...).

So if you mean that riding on track makes you a safer road rider the answer is yes, but if you mean that track training allows you to go faster on the road, the answer is probably no.

Here you have plenty of dummy trolls to knive.

[MarkH]

I think that there are 2 important things to do to be a better rider:
1. ride (as often as possible)
2. be critical of everything you do - i.e. think about what you do, why and how you could improve.

In an attempt to improve your riding a good exercise would be to pick your route and look in that direction. i.e. notice the pothole and notice the man hole cover then look to the path between them and go that way, don't keep looking at the pothole because it is not moving and it will always be where you first saw it, just look through the route you have chosen and beyond.

I started riding at 18 years old and rode for about 3 years, then I drove a car for about 20 years, then about 6 months ago I started riding. After 20 years of not riding I found it a little awkward at first and things didn't come as naturally as I would have liked. But I rode a bit, then did an RRRS course (very good for identifying your bad habits and explaining what you should be looking at and thinking about) and I rode some more. Now I have racked up over 16,000 kms of riding and I am finding it all comes much more naturally then at first. I still like to think about what I am doing and why, you should alway be learning!

[samgab]

I think that there are 2 important things to do to be a better rider:
1. ride (as often as possible)
2. be critical of everything you do - i.e. think about what you do, why and how you could improve.

In an attempt to improve your riding a good exercise would be to pick your route and look in that direction. i.e. notice the pothole and notice the man hole cover then look to the path between them and go that way, don't keep looking at the pothole because it is not moving and it will always be where you first saw it, just look through the route you have chosen and beyond.

I started riding at 18 years old and rode for about 3 years, then I drove a car for about 20 years, then about 6 months ago I started riding. After 20 years of not riding I found it a little awkward at first and things didn't come as naturally as I would have liked. But I rode a bit, then did an RRRS course (very good for identifying your bad habits and explaining what you should be looking at and thinking about) and I rode some more. Now I have racked up over 16,000 kms of riding and I am finding it all comes much more naturally then at first. I still like to think about what I am doing and why, you should alway be learning!

Are you the Burgman who filtered past me Northbound on the Mangere Bridge this afternoon, then took the Royal Oak turnoff? I was on my way to the North Shore to get new tyres.

[Mr Merde]

My advice to avoiding "Target Fixation" it to keep your eyes closed

[MarkH]

Are you the Burgman who filtered past me Northbound on the Mangere Bridge this afternoon, then took the Royal Oak turnoff? I was on my way to the North Shore to get new tyres.

That might have been me. Unless you saw me do something bad, because then it would have been my evil twin.

[Movistar]

I read somewhere and pratice all the time:

"Look at nothing, but see everything..."

You can take the piss out of this simple explanation if you want (and you will) but once you get it, and use it, it does make sense.

[Clubbie]

Is it just me, or do others find it hard to actively look where you want to go rather than at the looming-going-to-kill-me obstacle during a severe "oh shiiiiiiit" moment?

I can do it but notice that on the couple of occasions I've had to do it, it's a conscious thing you have to put effort into. The mind is going "But look at that big nasty, look, look!"

All the while your conscious thought is going "don't look, don't look"

Comments?

[MSTRS:Me]

Yeah, I'd agree with that.
Possibly ironic, but those that have ridden for years without lots of moments will maybe not cope well when presented with one?? For all their experience, they have not had much practice at coping with puckertime...

[mujambee]

Yeah, I'd agree with that.
Possibly ironic, but those that have ridden for years without lots of moments will maybe not cope well when presented with one?? For all their experience, they have not had much practice at coping with puckertime...

That's me

[XP@]

I reckon it's like people who speak a second language.
They might be fluent in that second language, but in a high stress situation they will often revert back to their first language.
Same with target fixation, I believe.
One could try to train to NOT target fixate in day-to-day situations, but in an emergency situation, I think, people would revert back to the basic, natural reaction; which is to target fixate.

I may not be correct in this, but I'm not willing to test the theory in a real emergency situation

I find the opposite, possibly because learning a second language is stressful. I sometimes swap to French when tired or stressed (and not just to use expletives).

I use target fixation to my advantage, when i realise i am fixating I think "wrong target" and fixate on a better target like my way out.