Bikers Classic, Spa

The best trips are often the ones that result from a snap decision. A fortnight or so ago, the training provisionally booked for the weekend was cancelled. It happened to coincide with the Bikers Classic at Spa, a mix of a 4 hour endurance race for pre-80s bikes, a classic 350 GP, a series of parade laps by GP stars of the past, and parades of classic motorcycles of all ages, all on the historic and spectacular circuit of Spa-Francorchamps in the Ardennes.

With nothing else to do, and knowing some buddies I used to go watching endurance there with in the 80s and 90s would be there, the tunnel was booked and Euros exchanged.

With the car packed, I dozed off in front of TV at 10.30pm, and slept till the alarm went off at 3. We were in the car at 3:30, just as dawn was lighting the sky to the east and were at the tunnel by 4. By this time it was daylight. Had 20 mins to kill before loading… checked out the whisky offer price as I’m out of Grants… ho ho ho, more expensive than Tesco…

Out onto the roads on the other side of the channel and the motorway up the coast is clear so we make good time, before heading down towards Gent and Brussels. Just short of Brussels, we stop for a quick coffee and a walk to give Chrissie’s bad leg a break from sitting in the same place, before moving on again.

Around the Brussels ringroad is where we meet the only traffic, and as usual it’s aggressive, even at 9am. Fortunately, after the M25, the ring is so short, it seems more like the Oxford ring road, we’re round it so quickly.

The sun stays out all the way down to Liege, where we take a wrong turn, and end up going straight through the city. No big deal as it allows us to put some fuel in, sufficient to get back to Blighty – petrol’s cheaper here in the UK than in Europe once again – and to buy a crate of beer for the circuit, where it’s always been expensive.

We get to the circuit about 10:30 or 11am, and find our way to the camping area… we decide on the field under the pine trees, and have to get the car up a bit of hill on the dirt road, but find a reasonably flat spot. We put the tent up, brew up some tea and then head off to find Andy and the others.

A couple of CBX1000s (black one at the back behind the Kawa),
a Z1300 and a Goudier-Genoud Kawasaki

Slight technical hitch – it turns out my spare phone doesn’t work abroad. No matter, Chrissie texts him and we find him half an hour or so later, and go wandering round the pits looking at the bikes, then off to a bar to get a beer. It’s €3 for a 25cl plastic glass so after just one at that price, we enter negotiations with the bar people for a bulk purchase. However, we decline to pay €60 for 24 cans, so I produce 4 tinnies from my bumbag and we drink those instead!

Yamaha generation gap. A TZ750 in the background

Geoff, Chrissie and I wander off to another part of the circuit and sit in the sun, watching the bikes go by from a bank. Panning to follow the riders, I get some good photos, as well as the obligatory unidentifiable blurs and shots of empty track. I spread some suntan cream on my arms which are starting to turn red in the sun.

Who said Guzzis don’t handle?

After an hour or so, we walk back to meet Andy and the others (he has been off to get more beer from outside the circuit), and we watch the rest of the events, before racing for the day winds up with a 2.5 hour endurance race.

A famous number – an ex-Barry Sheene RG500

About 30 mins before it’s due to start, the heavens open, the temperature plummets and I wish I’d packed the fleece – a tee shirt and body warmer doesn’t keep my arms warm. We’d seen the clouds and decided to opt for the covered stand. Just in time, we take cover – good choice, the waterproofs are back in the tent!! Torrential downpour.

The endurance event gets under way

The rain soon stops but the race gets underway on a wet track under grey skies and almost immediately the pace car comes out as there is a crash at the top of Eau Rouge, when two bikes clip each other. One rider is certainly OK but the medical car seems to be there for a while.

No sooner has the race restarted than there is another incident on the far side of the circuit – we can see the plume of smoke from the stand on the old start/finish straight. Out comes the pace car again.

With an hour or so to go, the track is drying and the cloud breaks up to the west, allowing rich evening sunlight to flood the track. The contrast between the dark grey cloud hanging over Eau Rouge away to the east and the sunlight grass below is stunning. The spectacle of these classic endurance bikes of the 70s as they power up the hill is just as stunning.

Spa at its most beautiful – bathed in evening sun

The sun sets and the last hour of the race is run in the gathering twilight, the race coming to a halt just as the bikes’ lights are actually starting to light up the track. Given our early start, Chrissie and I forego the evening concert and head back to the tent for some sleep.

The closing moments…

Except the temperature has plummeted. For an hour or more I struggle to get to sleep and eventually pull out my waterproof jacket, spread it over the sleeping bag and finally warm up enough to fall asleep. Until it rains again.

Next morning is grey and damp. We make some tea, and get the tent down, and into the car, and decide to drive round to the other side of the circuit for the early part of the morning, where we can hop down to Stavelot and get a coffee at some point.

But the car barely turns over on the battery. Yikes, a 3 year old car with a dead battery. The doors had been open, and interior lights on, but only for about 30 mins before we shut up and went to bed. I give the battery a couple of minutes and try again. It just turns over, and just as I’m thinking we’re going to need the jump leads, it fires up. Phew.

We take a slow drive to give the battery chance to perk up, and park up at the Stavelot end, and turn all the interior lights out before opening doors! I put the waterproof jacket on this time, as it’s still chilly.

We’re watching Agostini and Read, amongst other GP greats when the heavens open again. We’re just in time to dive under the eaves of a circuit bar (closed) and stand there with a couple of Belgians, watching these guys splash past. They’re both well into their 60s and they’re out in conditions where most of us would be sitting under the nearest bus shelter waiting for the storm to abate.

I’ve seen wider tyres on bicycles!

After 2 more laps the session is red flagged – hopefully only because the track was flooding. The waterproof jacket proves not to be. That’s why it was in the charity shop!

Phil Read, still riding strong in the rain…
I had a Read replica helmet in the early 80s!

We take the opportunity of a bit of a break in the rain to drive into Stavelot and park next to a bar. Shame it’s closed, so we walk round to the next one that is open. I get soaked again. We drink a coffee, avail ourselves of the other facilities and then take a stroll round the town. We look into the museum foyer and pick up a few leaflets and walk round the abbey ruins.

Strolling down towards the river, I spot a plaque on the bridge. It commemorates the American forces who fought here in the Battle of the Bulge in December 1944 and January 1945. Stavelot was the scene of a massacre of approximately 130 men, women and children.

Just around the corner stand an M3 halftrack WW2 military vehicle. Whilst I’m reading the interesting english translation of the negotiations that went on in the 60s to add the original machine gun to the memorial, some police motorcycles come down the hill, followed by a couple of cars. It’s the Belgian national championship cycle race.

So we stand and watch car after car come down the hill. Meanwhile, we are mildly amused by the showdown between the impatient car driver who hasn’t realised why the car ahead of him is stopped at the main road and tries to go the wrong side of the junction, and the police rider who’s stationed there specifically to keep the cars stopped till the race goes past. He eventually reverses and wheelspins up the hill in the other direction.

Then the riders. A cry of “pave” as the breakaway group spot the still-wet cobbles over the bridge into town and some hasty braking as they slow before they hit the slippery surface. Over the next ten minutes, the chase group, the main bunch and the rag, tag and bobtail of the riders dropped off the back all come through, before the roads re-open.

We wander back up through the village, wondering what the masks on display on the walls of many buildings signify [it's to commemorate a local carnival which pokes fun at the monks from the Abbey, the Carnaval de la Laetare des Blancs-Moussis, I discover via Wikipedia later]. It starts raining again.

We head back to the car and have a debate. We could go back to the circuit and catch the last hour or so of the endurance race (it’s split over the two days, somewhat bizarrely) or we can head off across country, and avoid a few miles of motorway. We’re both a bit knackered, so we decide on the cross country route.

I’d forgotten just how good some of the roads are for biking. The sun comes out as we head north west towards Huy, then continue north to pick up the motorway back to Brussels north of Liege, in beautiful clear skies, in contrast to the looming grey masses on the horizon behind us.

Along the way, we spot a field gun at the side of the road, with a memorial beside it. It’s to the 82nd Airborne, another American unit that was rushed in to the area in December 1944.

Memorial to the 82 Airborne

I take a snooze in the passenger seat for an hour or so, then resume driving near Bruges, and the last miles to the Chunnel are rapidly despatched. We have five minutes this time, just enough check out the malt whisky prices. Still “ho ho ho” prices, still cheaper in the supermarkets in the UK, so I pass, but we do pick up a couple of cases of cheap lager for summer barbeques and the like, before heading on to the train and back up to Canterbury, arriving back approximately 36 hours after we left.

Blipping the throttle on down-changes, gear shifting

Another question that comes up regularly is “should I blip the throttle on downchanges?”

I went away an analysed what I did, after a previous discussion on this topic. It’s not that I don’t “blip” but I don’t do BIG blips.

It’s a bit complex because there are a bunch of loosely interlocking issues.

First, I don’t block change (where you shift several gears at the same time) all that often – on the move, I prefer sequential shifting (where you shift gear one gear at a time) because I’m then always in a gear that will deliver drive, which seems to me to be the indicator of “right gear”. The usual reason that block changing gets suggested is that it’s quicker – but I’m not on a track trying to shave the odd second off my lap time, so I don’t buy that reason. By implication, if you save all your gear changes for whatever hazard it is that requires a lower gear, by implication you’re in the wrong gear until the last moment; given that situations can change very suddenly, this could present a major problem on the road. Sequential shifting is more likely to ensure a riders avoids getting caught in the wrong gear; it doesn’t guarantee your choice will be spot on, but you should be more or less right!

Second, even though I tend to use the brakes to slow rather than rely on engine braking, that doesn’t mean I can’t shift down through the gears one at a time as I decelerate. I certainly won’t force the bike to decelerate on the gears by forcing it down through the gearbox – I’ll only use engine braking if it can be done in the gear I’m already in – otherwise it’s brakes to slow and shift gear as required as I decelerate. Again, to my mind, that’s appropriate use of the brakes, as well as preparing me better for anything unexpected around the corner which may need a sudden reduction in speed.

Third, I don’t “blip” when shifting in the way that many riders do that sends the revs shooting up. Again, on the road there’s no real need for that, particularly with modern bikes with close ratio gearboxes. It’s a hangover from classic bikes that often had just four widely spaced gears! I just very gently tweak the throttle, get the revs up 1000/2000 or so rpm and shift smoothly with minimal fuss and noise.

Four, I use the clutch to ease the transition whether I’m block- or sequential shifting, letting it out over a couple of seconds, rather than dumping it straight away. Again, this is probably easier because I’m not relying on engine braking and so it doesn’t matter if the clutch is disengaged – the bike is still slowing. It makes for a very smooth change on everything I’ve ridden, with the possible exception of a 1980s Guzzi! It also allows me to “feel” that I’ve selected the right gear when changing down several gears at once – it is possible when block shifting to go down too low and a slow release of the clutch will allow you to feel this before things get too interesting.

For a newish rider, I’d recommend you shift each gear then release the clutch (slowly for a smooth change!), because it helps you feel exactly how the engine is working, and avoids sudden deceleration loads on the rear tyre.

The danger of shifting more than one gear at a time is that the engine delivers too much braking, the revs go sky high, and you can skid the rear tyre. This is most likely if you shift to first by accident. With a bit of experience, it’s relatively easy to feel the distinctively different shift into 1st, and either re-select second or ease the clutch out smoothly to avoid the sudden stop!

Also most bikes are generally reluctant to keep shifting down without letting the clutch out a bit to spin the gearbox internals over between gears. If you don’t let the clutch out to “feel” what the engine is doing, it’s possible to tap on the lever with nothing happening, and end up in a higher gear than the one you thought you were in, so you don’t have any drive when you need it. Going down a gear at a time and letting the clutch out avoids this.

I also use the clutch on upchanges, incidentally. I can’t see the point of clutchless shifts. Any “time” gain is irrelevant on the road, it doesn’t wear out the clutch and because you unload the drive chain downstream of the clutch it just has to be easier on the gearbox internals.

Feedback on a course – from Carlo

Every course I run, I try to remember to ask for feedback, when a trainee has had time to think about it. I do get some, not often very much more than “great time, thanks very much” it has to be said, but from time to time I do get some considered and constructive criticism, which is excellent because it helps me make improvements to my courses.

So it was good to get the following comments from Carlo Rimassa last year, after he did the two day Bends/Double Bends course. He’d already done a fair amount of training, including a course with a well-known police run training school so it’s particularly interesting to see what he picked up over the two days.

I’ve split his comments up with the replies I made to the various points, to make it a little easier to follow and also to throw some extra light on the way particular issues were approached during the two days. It also hopefully offers an insight into the way courses are put together, carefully planned with serious goals in mind, and not simply a nice ride out for me.

“As promised, here are some thoughts about the two day course I did with you. I think the balance of the first day could probably be shifted a bit more towards riding. I found the notes about road signs quite informative and a lot of information was new to me. The practical part though was maybe a bit too disjointed, it was difficult to get into a riding rythm. The second day was good, and the rides long enough to enable me to establish some flow in my actions. I think you could maybe give some consideration to incorporate a couple of variations in your riding plan.”

Interesting feedback. Good to hear the information about road signs was useful! I find it an unusual ommission from advanced training, to tell the truth.

As for the “disjointed” comment, to be honest, part of the problem may be your history of previous training. In fact, what I am trying to achieve on the first half of the first day (after a short ride to assess the trainee’s standard) is precisely NOT to get into a rhythm, because as soon as riders feel comfortable, they start doing what they already know and NOT what I’ve asked them to do.

There’s also a danger of overwhelming the trainee with new info – the opening briefing tends to last around 45 mins, of which 15 or so is actually the intro to the course, then approx 30 to cover the core ideas of reading signs – which quite frankly is long enough to start most trainees glazing, despite the fact I’m really only expanding on the briefing notes they already have. I have more information I want to get over to the trainee in the first half of the first day.

So for two reasons, the initial rides are designed to be short exercises with a precise task to be achieved, followed by a brief review, then a bit more information. This is classic teaching technique too.

After lunch, the last hour or so of riding on Day 1 is usually where the “flow” starts to be achieved. Interestingly on the Double Bends second day, which I’ve planned as a chance for trainees to get on and ride a wide selection of bends precisely to get the “flow” you mentioned was missing from the first day, we didn’t get to ride some of the more interesting roads we would have finished the day on because you wanted to repeat some of the sections we’d already ridden. Having said that, it’s no problem for me, it’s up to the trainee to decide what they want to cover.

“I have to say not having radio did probably contribute to this: you are surely used to delivering commentary while you ride in front, not having it made those parts less useful than they could have been, and more difficult to spot your riding demonstrations. I’m sure you do, but check again your radio works in all its parts before you get to meet your pupil.”

[The radio malfunctioned!] Indeed, it didn’t help as some of the stops could have been avoided or shortened by use of the radios – two new radios have been ordered, delivered, and were in use by the next course. I had a spare but still haven’t got to the bottom of why the spare didn’t work. I’d checked that earlier in the year when it worked fine and it hasn’t been used since. Anyway, apologies for that.

“I found the “body outside, bike leant away from you” technique for turning very tight bends quite useful. I would have liked to try that more, maybe on a big, flat and empty surface, just doing tight figures of eight and circles.”

Given your previous training history, I’m interested that you found this a new technique – given that it’s simply a variation of what most Direct Access instructors teach on basic training to cope with U turns and tight turns, I’m not sure why it hasn’t already featured! There’s certainly something missing from other advanced courses if this is not covered. As for off-road practice of counterweighting, you could have done that – it’s part of the Survival Skills 2 day course – or the Slow Control short course. If you’d booked the 3 day “Survival Skills + Double Bends” course, it would have been covered along with swerving. But there’s obviously a limit to how much I can fit into each course, and there are those expectations to meet too – I think most trainees would be a bit put out if I started a bends course in a carpark!

Incidentally, this should show show readers that the different courses incorporate different material – they are not simply “the same stuff rehashed with a different name” as one advanced instructor suggested I was doing!

“That 90 degrees bend we found in the afternoon would make a great “testing ground”. You can approach it in several different ways, each testing important roadcraft parts: you could try to do it without braking or approach it with a racing line, braking well deep into it, or every other braking point variation in between. It’s an open bend with full visibility, so you could use it to test several body positions and approach speeds, up to and incuding those that require you to use more than your lane. And the presence of a side road right in the middle would enable you to stand aside and obeserve the pupil from a side. It requires a bit of time to turn around and do it again, but really, I think that bend has a great teaching potential.”

Main objection to that is that it’s not a particularly safe place to be turning the bike – it does get cars and riders coming along there at extremely high speeds who won’t expect a bike doing a three point turn. Safety has to be paramount – but the concept is something I’ll think about and see if I can incorporate a sensible loop at some other point on the course.

“That’s it really. I think that among the notes I took home, the ones that might affect my riding most were those related to your riding philosophy. I have always liked riding because of the mental challenge it represents, but if I incorporated more of your “easy ride” attitude I think I could improve further my daily mileages. Plenty to ponder for me over the coming season.”

That’s good to hear. I sometimes find I’m at odds with other trainers on my “plan for what goes wrong” and “Keep it simple” strategies, but they’ve worked for me for many years and I do think they are more applicable to the vast majority of riders than “max progress and perfection” style” riding. Tortoise and hare. At very least, I think the contrasting approach does, as you mention, get people thinking which to my mind is one of the most important outcomes of the course.

“Thanks again for your time.”

You’re more than welcome and many thanks for your attendance on the course!

Spanner in the works

Last year I was out on a course and after a few minutes it became obvious the trainee’s brake light had failed. At the next opportunity, I pulled up and told him, suggesting we pop into Halfords and get a replacement bulb. He looked a bit blank; “oh, the dealer normally sorts out that kind of thing, I don’t know what kind of bulb it takes”.

My turn to look blank, but I pointed out that he really needed to sort the bulb, and we diverted to the store.

Once there, I had to show him which kind of bulb he needed (bog standard twin filament brake/tail light) then he wandered round the bike looking at the tail light assembly with a vaguely bemused air.

The problem, he confessed, was that he didn’t know where his toolkit was to remove the lens.

I suggested he wouldn’t need tools to replace the bulb because it would probably be changed from under the seat, but we’d find the toolkit at the same time.

Next issue… “OK, how do I get the seat off?”

I began to see a common thread here.

A polite enquiry about whether he’d actually read the handbook that came with the bike was greeted with a slightly shamefaced shake of the head.

Maybe I’m showing my age, but the idea that checking and changing a brake light bulb is something you leave to the dealer shows firstly a stunning lack of practical knowledge about the bike, secondly a slightly worrying attitude to safety and thirdly a much deeper wallet than mine!

Though years ago I changed the cam chain on my old Honda 400-F on the kitchen table, I’m no great shakes with a tool box and prefer to leave most of the complicated stuff to a mechanic.

But modern bikes don’t need the kind of work the 70s stuff I cut my teeth on required; there’s no fiddling with feeler gauges or timing meters now! Even for the totally non-mechanical, there are some tasks you need to keep on top of between dealer services, and a few things you can repair at the roadside to keep you moving without recourse to the recovery services.

At the barest minimum for your own safety I’d suggest you need to be able to check and adjust the oil, chain and tyre pressures, check the brakes, maintain cables and levers for smoothness, check battery fluid level (if you can!) and change fuses and bulbs. The rest of it can probably be left reasonably safely to routine servicing.

Start by reading your owner’s manual. It may not be a literary work but it’s amazing what you can learn about your bike. Where’s the toolkit? How do you get the seat off? These and other questions will be answered.

Check the toolkit to make sure you can actually perform basic tasks. Add any small tools necessary – some toolkits are spartan, and might be missing altogether on a used bike. A small LED torch is useful for night time problems.

Find out how much fuel your reserve tank holds, and which way the tap turns. Same if you have warning lights: when do they come on, how much fuel is left? Calculating your emergency range is useful on motorways. I once ran out of fuel on a borrowed bike because the owner had never used reserve because she was afraid of running out, but had the tap the wrong way. I failed to check the tap position and when I got to reserve, there wasn’t one!

Long fast rides can burn oil on some bikes. Know how to check the oil level – if there’s a dipstick, do you screw it in, or rest on the lip? Is there a sight window and where is it? Where do you top up, do you need a funnel?

Long wet rides can wear the chain, so check you’ve spanners to fit the rear axle and locknuts on the chain adjusters – if the locknut AND adjuster are the same size, it’ll be tricky to tighten with only one spanner! Ensure you can actually undo the rear axle with the supplied spanner – it’s often done up with power tools and far too tight. And don’t overadjust the chain – check the tension with someone seated on the bike and learn the correct amount of slack.

Locate the fuse box. It’s worth checking a second hand bike to make sure all the spares are in place – older bikes use glass fuses and modern ones use mini spade fuses, neither of which are easy to find. Whilst you’re down there, lift the battery out if it’s not sealed and check the fluid level, and top up if necessary.

You’ll usually find spare bulbs in automotive stores and bigger garages, though some bikes have unusual headlight bulbs fitments. Mini-indicators need a special bulb, so it might be wise to have spares. If you need to undo screws to access a bulb, be careful not to damage the screw if it’s tight – they often corrode. It’s a good idea to remove them periodically and use copper lubricant on the threads. Changing a headlight bulb in a fairing or taillight bulb where the holder is under the seat hump is far from easy in the dark, so it’s a good idea to take a look at where they are before you need to change them.

I’d avoid a digital pressure gauge; the battery’s always flat in my experience! An old fashioned pencil gauge works fine for tyre pressure checks. Check for damage and tread depth – look for the tyre wear indicators, which are little bumps in the bottom of the grooves. If these are nearly flush with the surface, the tyre will need replacing very soon. I suggest you carry a puncture repair kit and to know how to use it (read the instructions BEFORE it’s dark and raining!).

Whilst you’re looking at the tyres, spin the wheels and check the brakes aren’t dragging – if they are you’ll wear the pads out and possibly warp the discs – get it sorted if you don’t know how. And make sure you have some meat on the pads (anything less than a couple of mm needs changing now rather than next service) and that the discs aren’t worn. If they look visibly worn, they probably need replacing.

Check cables for stiffness and fraying and get them replaced if necessary. Keep the pivot points of the bar levers and the foot controls well greased. That’ll keep the controls smooth as well as preventing unnecessary wear – it’s amazing how many “sticky gearboxes” are down to the gearshift pivot being dry and worn out.

A few minutes taken learning a little about your bike can save a lot of frustration at the roadside later!

Get paid to ride!

This is has been sent onto me by Malcolm Palmer:

I’ve been contacted by Sandra Woodjetts at the Transport Research Laboratory (Crowthorne, Bekshire, RG40 3GA). They need motorcyclists (and cyclists) for some track trials.

They’re on the weekends of 11th & 12th, and 18th & 19th July.

Food & drinks provided
£35 paid for attendance
£10 fuel allowance (for motorcyclists)

Interested?

Sandra Woodjetts:
swoodjetts @ trl.co.uk
01344 770721

Please note – riders must be 25 or over. The event is at the TRL research centre at Crowthorne.

There will be a signalised crossroad set up on the large central area and cyclists and motorcyclists will be filmed as they ride through the junction. Participants should be arriving about 9am. It will be a full day on the track with each session lasting about 40 minutes(2 morning 2 afternoon), there will be a break for about an hour between sessions as there will be 2 groups in turn on the track. There will be a lunch break, food and drink will be provided. I’ve been advised that bringing a book might be a good idea for the breaks!

From the Archives – BTEC Part 2

One of the things I get asked from time to time is how I obtained my BTEC in advanced motorcycle instruction. This is the second part which covers the assessment of practical training carried out by Malcolm Palmer and Steve Dixey.

A couple of weeks before the second practical assessment part of the BTEC, Malc dropped a couple of training scenarios in the email, and asked for a draft lesson plan for each.

My initial view of this was that it would only take a minute or two to knock up the required plan, as both scenarios were something I have dealt with dozens of times in real courses.

So of course, because of the pressure of work through August and September , I left everything to the last minute. When I looked at the first scenario (fairly new rider having problems with bends and following boyfriend), my initial thoughts ran along the lines of:

“don’t take anything for granted and go for a ride along a road with some nice bends. The rest of the lesson would be based on what I detect as a problem from that point on. I really wouldn’t work to much of a plan because it’s ‘problem solving’, not training to a syllabus or set plan”.

Yet another email to Malc got a helpful reply:

“But would you arrive ‘cold’? No ideas of what to expect i.e. what clues are iin the information provided? Would you bring along anything besides yourself & your bike?

“You’ve already started to plan, like it or not, by choosing a road with ‘nice’ bends! And what does your experience tell you to expect? Look back at the clues in the scenario again.”

I began to see what Malcolm was driving at… several hours and several drafts later, I had fleshed out that bald statement and presented a lesson plan.

Back came the reply – close but no cigar. Another evening and one final rehash and I had it. Any teacher would be instantly familiar with the format. Every activity is clearly explained with the aims of the exercise, the time to be taken, the results to be achieved, a way to assess the results and the resources required, right down to pen and paper.

Now you might well argue in ‘real life’ we run sessions in a much more flexible manner, because we have the knowledge, experience and skill to do adapt quickly to a ‘real person’ when they meet us for training.

That might be true for an experienced instructor but the planning format gives us major benefits:
1. We can identify and work on specific objectives to ensure that learning takes place;
2. Our knowledge, experience and planning skills are clearly demonstrated (not only to any external assessor, but also to the trainee, and heaven forbid, anyone looking at the course after the event with a view to preparing a liability claim).
3. Having identified the key information using the format will make planning (and training) more accessible.

Furthermore, a relatively inexperienced instructor will have a much better chance of doing a decent job if he/she follows a carefully prepared plan. In my opinion this is something that current instructor training would be well advised to look at.

I do think that taken to extremes there is a danger that this kind of approach forces a “one size fits all” training onto riders and instructors alike in the same way that CBT does, and takes away individuality, but that’s something else altogether and for another column.

Back to tbe BTEC. I turned up at the venue in Newbury, and was met by Malc and introduced to Steve Dixey from the BMF (in person – I’ve known him online for many years), and a gentleman who turned out to be an external moderator from Edexcel. I was on assessment with copper, writer and road tester, Ian Kerr.

Initially I spent a little time going over my portfolio with Steve to fill in a few holes in my explanations and to answer a few penetrating questions. After a short Highway Code/Roadcraft multiple guess test, next up was an interesting exercise. Ian, as a class one police licence holder, was to assess my riding and I was to try to ride to advanced standard, and Malcolm would assess us both. When we got back Ian and I sat down independently and assessed my ride.

Predictably I rode like a plank with all the eyes watching my every move and barely scraped through with an advanced pass so I have every sympathy with the trainees when they have a bad ride. Interestingly given our very different backgrounds, even though there were predictable areas of disagreement on progress and comfort braking, our marking sheets of the ride were eerily similar.

After lunch, we ran through the mock lessons. The on-road training scenario was complex enough to be reasonably challenging whilst nothing I had not seen before. The main problem in teaching select “chunks” of the lesson plan as prepared is determining exactly what is to be taken as seen and said, and exactly where we are in the lesson, but Malcolm’s briefing and play-acting made it reasonably straightforward for me to determine exactly what was expected of me and to brief and debrief the nervous” rider accordingly.

It was a moderately tough but thoroughly enjoyable day. Steve and Malcolm were efficient but friendly, and it was interesting to have along a police rider as a contrast in styles.

So, now all I have to do is wait for the the result!

From the Archives – BTEC Part 1

One of the things I get asked from time to time is how I obtained my BTEC in advanced motorcycle instruction. Here’s the first of a two parter that recounts exactly what I did to qualify via the “accreditation of prior learning” module.

If you’re a regular visitor to the Survival Skills site, you’re probably wondering what happened to the regular updates. Work and BTEC commitments is what.

The basic training school side of things took off in a big way, and I have been working pretty much flat out nearly every day and some evenings too, filling in the odd gaps with the advanced courses, so thanks to those on Survival Skills courses who’ve been very patient with the limited gaps in the diary this summer. Hopefully, next year we’ll have another full time instructor working alongside me and our part-timers to spread the load.

Many of the remaining evenings have been taken up polishing course work up and getting myself up to speed for the BTEC in Advanced Motorcycle Instruction put together by South Lincs BMF that I sorted out at the beginning of the year to replace the appallingly badly organised Driver Education course I began an age ago at Middlesex University.

Both courses use an “accreditation of prior learning” (APL) element for instructors with previous experience to replace a traditional “taught” course. The idea is that you show the assessors that you have not only been teaching riding skills, but that you have used the courses you have taught as a learning experience for yourself to develop and improve your own skills and the training you deliver, thus avoiding the need to spend weeks in the classroom being taught what you already know. For those with limited or no experience, the classroom option is available, by the way.

The required format for the BTEC was slightly different from the Middx course. This meant the original submission I had made to Middx was a useful background document, but still needed the fleshing out with the hard evidence that I had never got round to. The main exhibit for the defence was a portfolio profiling the kind of things they want to see.

Sounds easy? Yes, at first sight. Easy enough to provide photocopies of my driving licence and CBT card. Not too difficult to provide copies of my current training notes. But to demonstrate learning?

Fortunately I’m one of those people who NEVER throws anything away. That does mean the office is knee deep in paperwork and old bike magazines but it also means I had a fighting chance of finding some of the old training notes, course details, briefing notes, debriefing notes and so on, as well as the upto date stuff.

Eventually I had assembled a large A4 box-file of notes and papers, printouts of e-mails from trainees and the resulting course notes, items from the website and Visordown and the various magazines I have had articles published in.

First up was an interview to determine whether the portfolio was up to the job and to see if I could justify the learning I was claiming. It wasn’t quite the grilling I had expected – Malcolm Palmer popped over to meet me in Oxford and spent a long evening chatting informally over several mugs of tea and a plate of fish and chips, whilst going piece by piece through the file. However, it was thorough – around 4 hours later (too late for a quick pint) Malcom left me with a list of what he would like included and copied for the formal submission for APL.

Job done, I thought. Ha.

Now I had to sift the original documents, copy those I needed to submit, and annotate them to explain what they were and why I was submitting them. What seemed like a couple of hours work dragged into weeks of hunting for the original files on the PC and long lost back up zip disks, discovering they were formatted for an extinct version of a word processor noone else ever used and reformatting them to print a readable copy, or where the notes were handwritten or the PC version was long gone, scanning and printing page by page a copy for the portfolio.

Eventually, everything was neatly placed in a large red ring binder and dropped off to Malcolm the evening before the second part of the APL assessment.

…. to be continued ….

 

Originally published on the website 20 Sept 02

Getting the right training for struggling new riders

Picture this…

• You’re a late 30-something female… passed the test on a 125 in 1995.
• You rode a 125, then a 250 for a couple of years, and were then involved as pillion in an accident with a U-turning driver in France, which resulted in a leg injury and a hospital stay.
• A year on and you have to give up biking – everyone is out to get you.
• 10 years on, you finally pluck up courage and buy a ‘99 CBR 600, to find you can’t ride it.
• You spend time and money doing refresher training with a couple of training schools.
• Even after that, you find you can’t ride your bike.
• Six months down the line, your confidence shot, you post a plea for help on an internet forum, just someone to ride with and help as a last resort before you sell the bike and give up biking.

At which point I spot the thread on www.kentandsussexbikers.com.

There are several well-intentioned “come for a ride with us and we’ll look after you” posts, but as she isn’t far away, I suggest a short ride, with radios, so I can look over her riding. She jumps at the chance and we meet up the next evening.

Before we even get onto the bikes, she mentions that one of the big problems is that she finds it very difficult to operate the clutch. It is something I’m planning to look at in any case, but I take the invitation. I see she’s tried to do something about the problem – she’s gone to the trouble of fitting a rather trick dogleg clutch lever, but the essential problem remains; with small hands, she simply can’t reach the lever to operate the clutch cleanly.

Why? There’s no free play. I spin the cable adjuster round, and wind in some slack and invite her to try. With a couple of cm’s free movement at the end of the lever, we check that mod works when she starts the bike up. Suddenly she finds she has more control over a slipping clutch.

Just before we set off, she reminds me: “I can’t do right turns and I’m really slow” she said. “OK”, I thought to myself, “we’ll start with some easy left turns, an open road and see what you CAN do.”

Off we go. The first thing I notice is that even though we’re stopped and tucked into a quiet corner of a petrol station, her foot goes straight up onto the rear brake. Once the motor is running and in gear, because the clutch isn’t biting quite where she expects, she hops along few paces like a one legged bird to maintain balance.

Hmmm. Memo to self – remember that for the debrief.

Once we get to the exit, she manages the pull-away (left!) reasonably well, given the clutch wasn’t biting where she expected it. Out through the town and off down a nice road towards Rye. She negotiates the junction quite cleanly if a little bit hurriedly in the foot and handwork department as she decelerates and turns, then surprises me with a fair turn of speed out on the open road; on one or two bends she knows she’s little quicker than me, but on the awkward downhill bends she doesn’t know so well, I have to click the radio on and suggest using the rear brake to control the speed and to keep hands off the front.

We arrive at Rye, with me reasonably happy with what I’ve seen so far, and set off on a lap of the town, which involves two right turns at mini-roundabouts and another couple where bits of the one way system merge. She runs very wide on each and is clearly tense. “Ah yes… I see what you mean.” Her take-offs from a standing start are also awkward and unbalanced; she’s keeping her left foot rigidly on the peg at all times.

So we stop and have a chat. First of all, I ask her about the ‘Safety Position’. “You mean, when you keep your foot on the brake at all times? I try to make myself do that.” Uh, right, thought so. That’s been drummed in so hard on basic training – and on her refreshers it turns out -that it’s seen as a ‘RULE’ and more important that balance and sensible control of the machine.

I tell her, to her palpable relief, that she can put both feet down if she wants!

I explain that the ideal use of the rear brake round town is to stop the bike smooth and level after you’ve used both brakes to slow down; but once stopped it’s of limited use except on a hill. We have a further chat about the brakes in general. She’s happy about the use of front and rear brakes, but it seems no-one had mentioned that particular use of the rear brake, nor that it’s a useful brake when going down (as opposed to pulling away on) hills.

Second, I explain that moving all the decision-making about brakes and gears can be moved back 10 or 15 metres giving her the chance to get the bike balanced in plenty of time and freeing up her concentration away from the controls, so that when she arrives at a junction or a bend, all she has to do is negotiate it. That makes sense to her.

Third, I suggest if she’s having trouble with right turns, angling a pull-away from a side turning slightly towards the direction you want to go will help – there’s no need to stop at 90 degrees to the white line.

Then I mention counterweighting. Blank look. I remember she did her test on a 125, and we didn’t talk about that much back then. But what about on her refresher training; “did you practice tight turns?”. It appears so but with no mention of counterweighting, and she had lots of problems with them.

I’m not surprised if they didn’t mention or use counterweighting.

Given that we’re just out on a ride, and not doing my course, we’re not near a handy carpark, but I briefly explain the theory and make the best use of a wide factory entrance to demonstrate.

Anyway, I then suggest we try that on another lap of Rye, as she’s now got enough new stuff to think about; feet, rear brake, getting the gears/brakes sorted earlier, angling stops and counterweighting. Thank heavens for the radio!

Off we go back to the town and she practices the counterweighting on the way in, then with prompting over the radio gets all the gears and braking sorted early so she can concentrate on a bit of counterweighting on the tight corners.

Qualified success. Not perfect but much tidier turns, not running nearly so wide. Not bad for ten minutes discussion and five minutes riding!! We stop briefly and she’s happier.

We leave Rye behind and enjoy one of the roads across Romney Marsh, at which point the only car that caught us up passes us. So not too shabby in the speed department either.

Though her steering has been pretty tidy, I felt there was an underlying hint of nervousness about getting round unknown corners, translating itself into a slightly hesitant approach. Nothing awful, but not very positive at times.

So I mention countersteering. Blank look. This is getting predictable unfortunately. Not her fault at all, she can only repeat what she knows. And clearly she doesn’t know about countersteering.

Again, as we’re at the side of the road, I don’t have my diagrams, models or videos, but I do my best to explain, and although she struggles a bit to follow, she’s prepared to put it on trust and give it a go. I also mention the differences between dropped bars and the flat ones on her training bikes and the need not to lean on them when trying to steer.

The first attempts to use countersteering on the move only elicit a tiny wiggle from the bike, but by careful use of an analogy of sliding a drawer in, she gets the idea and suddenly the bike’s turning faster and zipping across the road. A mile or so down the road and there’s quite a nasty little S bend over a blind crest. She whizzes round and with no problems deals with another sharp bend at the top of a long straight road where there had been a fatal bike accident only days earlier. That had clearly worried her. The little bunch of flowers at the side of the road are mute testimony to a rider who didn’t survive his ride.

A few more awkward bends, including a nasty decreasing radius turn that caught me out years ago are put behind us and we’re almost back at our meeting point. We pull in, doing a “dreaded” right turn nice and smoothly onto the forecourt, and pull up.

Almost her first question is “do you think I should sell the bike?”

I reassure her that she’s ridden quite well, and that her speed is quite OK – she’s not a mobile chicane by an stretch of the imagination. The ride wasn’t perfect, there are faults to sort out, and skills to build, but she’s safe enough and now knows what the worst of her problems are and what to do to fix them.

I point out that “too slow” is relative. Relative to being able to stop in an emergency. Just because some riders are faster, it doesn’t mean they’re making the right choice about speed.

By now it’s 9pm, and getting dark, so we head off in our own directions, she with a big grin on her face, me with an impromptu gift of a chocolate bar!

I ride back, having on the one hand a good feeling about having helped keep an aspiring rider on the road, and on the other I’m having an internal rant about the “training” schools that took her money for “refresher” training and failed to fix her problems.

Neither took her out on her bike, as I understand it.

One of them stuck her out with a bunch of learners, I think on 125s, so I very much suspect that will have been with a CBT-only qualified instructor, and quite obviously his main job would have been to look after the new riders.

But she’d also been on a 500cc school bike, presumably with a DAS-qualified instructor.

And… not to mention counterweighting when she can’t do even moderately tight turns? Appalling.

And countersteering? I know it’s not officially sanctioned by the DSA but it’s a key technique for DAS and a “must know” in my book, particularly when someone is having steering issues. Unbelievable.

I’ve always defended CBT/DAS instructors when the argument has cropped up about who is best qualified to fix what are actually fundamental and basic riding faults in riders with a full licence – some advanced instructors certainly aren’t!

But I have to say this experience has left me wondering about the quality of training from the local schools. It quite clearly failed this particular rider badly. It’s likely the school simply making a fast buck by bunging her on a part-filled 125 course, but the wider question is whether the instructors were up to the job. It doesn’t look like it. And if not, why not?

None of the faults were obscure – they would be something a DAS instructor would see virtually every course – and a hangover from learning on a 125.

Rather more worryingly, both schools are offereing instructor training. Are they simply churning out clones of their existing instructors?

And the really scary thing? DAS instructors from these schools will no doubt use their DAS card to get onto the advanced instructors register (RPMT) at some point, probably persuaded to do so by the school itself so they can offer advanced training. So much for the DSA’s claims of quality control.

The worst of all possible worlds.

Latest from Lucky 13

Just a reminder, and a heads-up to those who haven’t seen them before!

The Lucky 13 series of cartoons continues to roll out on the Acem website.

Latest is on night time hazards.

They’re aimed (mostly) at new and returning riders, in a “Joe Bar-style” format if you haven’t seen one.

Words by Yours Truly, artwork by a design studio and translated into 8 languages now by the look of it!!

Dell drop Mini 9

Almost as soon as I’ve bought one and written about its delights, Dell have announced they are to drop the Mini 9 from their range. The story was reported on the PCPro newsletter this morning. It might even be that the last Mini 9s have already been sold – the Dell site didn’t seem to have any options to purchase them.

Dell are apparently pointing people at the larger Mini 10, which has a bigger screen (though with a weird resolution, which drops many XP dialogue boxes off the bottom), a larger, easier to use keyboard and a bigger 160Gb hard disc.

I can’t help but think Dell are missing a big trick here.

The Mini 9 is comfortably the smallest netbook out there. With this kind of form factor, users aren’t looking for ergonomic hundred words per minute keyboards or cinemascope screens to play a day’s worth of ripped movies stored on the HD.

It’s the tiny overall size and weight of the device which allows it to be slipped into a small bag (or in my case, a small tailpack on the bike), the wireless connectivity that allows me to hook up to a network and run a browser, check my email and type a reply pretty much wherever I am, with the robustness (hopefully) of a solid state drive that won’t die a horrible death from being bounced around.

My guess is that these netbooks have actually proved TOO successful and have snaffled sales from the laptop market. I suspect Dell and the other manufacturers who all seem to be upsizing and upgrading their own netbooks from bum-basic but functional to bigger screens, more RAM and bigger HDs, are attempting to blur the line between a netbook and the lower spec’d laptops.

Ah well, as long as they can fix it under warrenty for the next 10 months if it does break, and as long as I can still order a spare battery in the next day or two to pop in the drawer as a spare, I’ll be happy!