Road Cycling - I learned how to countersteer today!

After reading about using countersteering to turn at higher speeds, I had to learn how to do it. It just didn't make sense to me that steering your wheel in one direction could make your bike go the other direction. Here's how I did my first countersteer around a turn:

1) I was approaching a wide right turn in the road, and slowed down to about 12 mph
2) I got in the drops, put my left pedal all the way down, and put most of my weight on it
3) I gently started pulling the left handlebar
4) The bike leaned and started going left, and I thought to myself "See, it doesn't work!"
5) After a second or two, the bike started leaning and turning right! :eek:
6) The bike carved around the turn faster than I've ever turned before
7) In disbelief, I yell "YES!" and get a huge smile on my face :) :D

Yes, thats how it feels on the bike, on a motorcycle too. I always get a smile when I do a nice curve on the Harley.

If you can ride a two wheeled vehicle, you know how to countersteer. It's the nature of the beast - there's no other way, but most people are not aware that they do it.

When you turn, you have to lean into the turn. To start that lean, you steer to move the wheels out from under your center of gravity, this causes the bike to lean and hence to turn in the opposite direction from which you steered before.

You have been doing this since you learned to ride a bike. What on2wheels describes above is becoming conscious of it and becoming better able to control it.

One time when you become very aware of countersteer is when riding very close to an obstruction such as a drop off on the edge of a road. You want to move away from that drop off, but to steer away from it you must first countersteer toward it. If there’s not enough room for the countersteer, it seems impossible to steer away.

There’s a lot of mythology on where to put your weight on the bicycle, (stand on the outside pedal, put your weight on the inside hand etc.) but in actuality, it’s your steering which is moving where your tires meet the road in relation to your center of gravity.

[QUOTE=SchreiberBike]most people are not aware that they do it.
QUOTE]

true, so true..

I didn't know about countersteering until I read it here.. and I was already doing it since............ ;)

Anyway, you can only see and appreciate it at high speed.. Yesterday I made a 37mph turn w/ my roadbike, when i'm driving an SUV, i can only manage to turn that specific "almost" hairpin curve at 25mph.. :D