[cyberdos]

What's the purpose? Does it make you corner faster or something? I'm far from it and just curious about what the big deal is.

[?]

 

[DEZixxer]

good question...I don't know, and someone tell me if i'm wrong. But it's my assumption that it has to do with your positioning and weight on the bike in regards to the corner. If the bike it leaned over at the proper angle, you can acheive maximum velocity for that corner. So I think it's a matter of getting the bike over far enough to acheive that speed.

I know that I just can't lean the bike over that far without getting off the seat a little. (I too have never dragged a knee). I think having your leg out counterbalances everything to make it work..

I am at work, I think that sounded really rambled, did it make sense?

 

[RedFinn]

Err, the knee is just to help you measure your lean angle.

If you're Eboz you might be able to save a slide gone bad by using it to lift up the bike, but don't count on it. That's one of those don't try this at home kind of things.

 

[sgates]

Just like RedFinn said, it is used to guage your lean so you don't loose traction and dump it by going to far over. At the speeds needed to corner as fast as possible to cut down your time, lean angles get crazy and tires wear fast, so that is the trick of the trade.

 

[Strong Bad]

King Kenny Roberts started draggin' knee back in the seventies. He would wrap duct-tape around his leg to keep from burning a hole in his leathers. Coming from the American dirt track scene to the European GP prompted this change of style. Accustomed to using his foot to keep the bike moving along happily in dirt track, he used the same idea for road racing. That is, using his knee to keep the bike from falling on its ear while sliding the shit out of the thing.

King Kenny was also responsible for developing slicks for motorcycles back when Goodyear was still in it.

RedFinn is right as well, to a point. I find it that most road racers use the knee puck primarily as a lean angle indicator that doubles for saving those front end sliders. Check out the photo to see what saving one of those can do! More often than not, however, those front end slides result in a trip to the kitty litter.

Remember, every ounce of pressure you put on your knee is taken off your tires, so don't get too crazy with it

 

[cyberdos]

Strong, what is that a pic of? I can't make it out.

 

[636Hooligan]

This may just be my own personal experience, but, once I was able to get a knee down, I found that I didn't try to do it as much afterwards. I think you sruggle and try to get a knee down, and then you are excited, and afterwards it is no longer a big deal. I still touch down in the corners, but it is more of a brief slide to get feedback of your lean angle and then that's it. You don't push down or drag real hard because that just slows you down and upsets handling on the bike. As far as catching the bike in a slide, I have touched down hard a few times in a semi-loose condition-slide, but I don't think that's what saved the bike from going over. If it was going to go down, there would be nothing I could do to stop it. It helps sometimes to just get your balance. Unless of course, you ARE E-Boz!!

 

[dman]

That's the knee of his leathers.

 

[Strong Bad]

That's a picture of the left knee on my leathers.

As for draggin' knee, when I first started doing that I did nothing but wear through knee pucks in half a day! That was then, nowadays it's more of a touch then bringing things up a little bit so as not to wear through the sliders so fast and also for traction reasons!

Here's a larger picture of said knee....

 

[Andy_7676]

in addition to what everyone else said I was also under the impression that the more weight you got low and to the inside of the corner helps you corner better and gives you more "usable" tire.

 

[Strong Bad]

Ideally you want to keep the bike as upright as possible going through to corners to obtain a higher speed.

 

[Andy_7676]

right, and to do that you need to have more weight to the inside of the turn...


to be honest I never hang off on the street, I sit perfectly upright that way you loose your chicken strips muct faster So all you guys worried about chicken strips, do not hang of your bike


ofcourse, if you're fast on a track you might need too to keep you from running out of tire

 

[yellow plates]

purpose of dragging a knee? it looks cool

 

[RedFinn]

Originally posted by yellow plates

purpose of dragging a knee? it looks cool

LOL Especially if you get those pucks with magnesium in them that shoot sparks like crazy

At my local track there's a pretty fast (maybe 100km/h=60mph) 180 degree turn that's elevated in the middle by maybe 3 meters so you enter the turn going uphill and exit going downhill. For some reason I always try to lean the bike over too much on the exit and if my knee wasn't on the ground warning me that I'm incresing lean although I don't mean too, I'd probably have lowsided long ago.

 

[GreenEnvy]

Again, mainly just for telling how far you are leaned over, I just got my knee down for the first time last week, and I feel more confident once its on the ground then I do when its hovering right above, dunno if its just me or not..

 

[EricLA]

Knee dragging can become an expensive habit if done "wrong". I practically went through a set of brand new Teknic knee sliders in 1 weekend at the track. I put too much pressure on my knee. I've been told that your knee should just barely be skimming the ground, just enough for you to know how far you're leaned over. Some very fast people have said that they barely touch down, and then pull the knee up right away. I need to work on that

 

[Blue636]

Originally posted by Strong Bad
King Kenny Roberts started draggin' knee back in the seventies. He would wrap duct-tape around his leg to keep from burning a hole in his leathers. Coming from the American dirt track scene to the European GP prompted this change of style. Accustomed to using his foot to keep the bike moving along happily in dirt track, he used the same idea for road racing. That is, using his knee to keep the bike from falling on its ear while sliding the shit out of the thing.

No offense, you've obviously a more experienced rider than I, but it was actually Jarno Saarinen who started knee dragging. Kenny Roberts did refine the technique, though.

 

[Galloper]

The first guy to get his knee down actually was several years in advance of Kenny Roberts. He was, I recall, a Finnish rider, Jarno Vatrinen, sorry not sure about the surname! The F1 racer, Jarno Trulli was named after him.

Killed in a crash in the 70s I think.

Anyone help me out on this?

 

[Galloper]

Oops, beaten to the punch by Street Walker!

 

[Wintermute]

Originally posted by Galloper
The first guy to get his knee down actually was several years in advance of Kenny Roberts. He was, I recall, a Finnish rider, Jarno Vatrinen, sorry not sure about the surname! The F1 racer, Jarno Trulli was named after him.

Killed in a crash in the 70s I think.

Anyone help me out on this?

Propably you mean Jarno Saarinen? Here is a link:
http://paroni.virtualave.net/main.html