UmneyDurak

Anyone actually practice it? There were two crashes in todays crit, and of course a pile up after the initial crash. What I noticed is a lot of aftermath was caused by people just locking the rear wheel, and just plowing in to already downed riders. Actually heard tires pop in both crashes (wasn't the cause), which I assume is from sliding rear tire on the ground. In second crash a guy just layed down the bike and went in to the already downed bikes. I think he also target fixated on downed riders, and could have avoided it if he didn't.

enjoi07

put your weight back, brake hard front, feather rear. but emergency stops never happen like that, you still see pro's fishtailing all over the place. watch carpediem's latest video at the end, i don't know if it was on purpose (probably not) but guy starts fishtailing and is able to "jump" his wheel to a correct line.

UmneyDurak

Works for me. *shrug You do what you practice, thats why I was curious who actually practices this skill.

echappist

+1

Freire did a beautiful one on this clusterf**k of a stage

https://www.steephill.tv/2010/tour-de...otos/stage-04/

unterhausen

that was just amazing, he was fishtailing like crazy.

to the OP, if you want to practice, do it. It's your skin.

unterhausen

that was just amazing, he was fishtailing like crazy.

to the OP, if you want to practice, do it. It's your skin.

enjoi07

while i was responding, i realized i had never really practiced the skill. and i have fishtailed in a race (who hasn't!). i think i may throw on those old tires soon to try some.

UmneyDurak

Why use old, and I assume worn, tires?

UmneyDurak

Just a tad dramatic, no?

enjoi07

they are not really worn, i have random low end tires given to me from friends. i'll probably throw them on in case i skid, i don't want to be doing that on my 2 month old conti's.

agoodale

I practice probably once a week at the end of a ride going down the steep hill that leads to my house. I try to imagine something in the road and then throw my weight back and brake hard (but not hard enough to skid). Even though it's not a panic situation I'm hoping the muscle memory of getting in that position will help when I don't have time to think.

CrimsonKarter21

Take preventative measures and ride at the front.
It's really hard to get there, but the energy you save makes up for that. Otherwise, you're braking in every turn and sprinting out harder to compensate.
If you get in the break, there's almost no chance of crashing, and diesel riders like me save energy by riding at a consistent, very high speed and not having to sprint every corner.

If you want to cover all of your bases, then practice controlling your bike in a field or something. A few races ago, the course had a short, steep hill, and a 90* turn onto a cobbled road. The center had really rough, rounded cobbles, with smooth sections on the sides. The race got very strung out there and guys were taking lots of risks on the twisty descent at 50mph. Two guys got tangled when it flattened out, but still at 35mph.
I was 5-10 riders behind it and the crash spread from the right side of the road to the left very quickly. I grabbed a handful of brakes, but I was too close and merely bunnyhopped over a crashed bike.
The peloton still attacked when they heard crashed carbon, but I got through it unscathed, even though I got dropped, along with everyone else.

UmneyDurak

That was the entire point of this thread. Seems like there is too much of this, and hope for the best:

carpediemracing 

It's easy to practice without having to skid or swap tires etc. When you come to a stop, try and stop as close as possible to a "non-object" like a white line or something.

First rule - emphasize front brake. The rear is your canary in a coal mine - it's there to let you know the rear is unweighting. It's basically useless otherwise.

Second rule - try and lift the rear wheel up using the front brake. You'll be able to do it slowly and gradually, coming to a stop with the rear wheel floating off the ground (maybe an inch - it feels like a lot but it's so little that most people around you won't know you're on a unicycle at that moment).

Third rule - first pick "non-objects" like white lines or a pebble or a crack or something that won't break your bike if you mess up. Later you can try using a wall, garage door, car, etc. One of my end-of-ride rituals used to be to come flying into the driveway, do a stoppie of sorts (rear wheel lift) and stop about 1/2" from the wall surrounding our driveway. (Now, with a steep climb to the garage door, I don't do it anymore).

You don't really "practice" stopping, at least not beyond doing it a few times. By doing stuff like "end of ride rituals", you become fluent with various aspects of the bike. You learn how it handles. And in a panic, you don't think, you just do. Hopefully you do right. You can't foresee and practice for every situation. But if you master handling the bike, then, by default, you master handling the bike in a given situation.

I think mountain biking (and probably cross - but I don't do cross) would help immensely too. I mtb for maybe 10 years, dunno how much that affected my on-road bike handling.

cdr

Grumpy McTrumpy

do some rides around here. most hills are steepest at the bottom and end in a T intersection with a major road.

rydaddy

I was in the same race. The first crash, in turn 2, a guy clipped the inside hay bale and swept through the pack. I was right behind him and avoided it on the inside. I looked back and saw two teammates go down. The last crash happened just ahead of me and I'm not sure why.

Earlier in the race I had to slam on the brakes to avoid a near miss. Lucky nobody plowed into me.

arexjay

Davis E4s? That whole race was kinda sketchy, lots of corner divebombing (which caused the first crash, which I was in), lots of four-wide cornering. Did you get caught up in either of the crashes?

arexjay

Yep, that guy jumped out from behind me on the inside and tried to squeeze though, and there wasn't even close to enough room. Clipped the hay, took out the guy in front of me. One dude broke his elbow in that one, luckily I only have a bruised hip and possibly broken fork.

The last crash took out my teammate, and he told me that the guy just slid out in the apex of the turn. We thought it might have to do with the brick or white crosswalk lines, as we saw a P/1/2 woman slide out in the exact same spot while off the front.

umd

Here is some emergency braking (at the end of the clip)

CrimsonKarter21

Another piece of advice I can give is to look where you want to go, not where the crash is. When you start focusing less on the clearest path through the destruction, and more on the destruction itself, you're going to get sucked in. It's kine of like in baseball where you point to where you want to throw.

Creakyknees

I much prefer to steer around the crash. I've avoided several this year, don't recall touching the brakes much at all - instead I'm looking at the clean path thru the carnage.

UmneyDurak

Avoided both, managed to catch on after each one. The second one on corner 4 with 2 laps to go I just was on the inside and the crash happened on the outside. Frankly I felt safer being on the inside then on the outside.

Yep looking where you want to go helps a lot. Not only in avoiding crashes, but cornering in general.

merlinextraligh

If you mountain bike, the move to push your weight way far back when you brake comes to you pretty naturally (or you'll do a lot of endos on steep trails) which helps in a panic stop on the road.

Pkmnwill

Hey My friend ate it going twenty in the bike lane very very close in front and I pulled a fat wheely and bunny hopped him luckily my bike isnt carbon