Don't look down, look ahead to where you want to go. Looking down at the pavement increases the sense of speed.
One thing I learned from riding a motorcycle at the track (admittedly not everything carries over) has to do with whether the vanishing point of the road is coming towards you or moving away from you. The road isn't actually moving, it is a matter of perception and that perception varies as you progress and become faster. If you feel like the road ahead is being "fired" at you, slow down, you are going faster than you are comfortable with and are probably going faster than you can react to. If you feel like the road ahead is "unfolding" in front of you, you can go faster than you are going.
Finally, words of wisdom from my sister who is madness maddened on descents: "15 miles an hour, 50 miles an hour, either way, its gonna hurt!"
So go fast!

Who are you who is so wise in the ways of descending?

Learn to countersteer. Weight the outside pedal, point your knee into the turn (watch videos of motorcycle racers, it's similar). STAY OFF PAINTED LINES WHEN CORNERING, PARTICULARY IN THE WET, THEY ARE DEATH. I'm a relatively fearless descender, that's because I know how to handle a bike @ speed (I ride motorcycles too) and because fear generally a bigger danger to you than almost anything else on the bike. Like they say in Star Wars or Dune or some damn scifi book fear is the mind killer. That being said, know what can actually doom you on a descent:

• Pick the right line through the turn

• Brake BEFORE the turn, carry too much speed on two wheels and it's often too late to NOT crash

• Look 50-100 feet up the road, not at the pavement 10' in front of your bike. On a descent it's too late to avoid anything that close to you any way. You need to see it BEFORE you get there.

Bike fit, bike resilience and flexibility, wheel stiffness/flex, relationship of bike frame flex to wheel flex, grippy tires, and very very important - less tire pressure than you think. Without a bike that will do it easily you won't be able to do it easily. It might not be you!

I had my first real descent this morning coming down from Jamestown into Boulder, CO. After a brutal climb (this was my first time in the hills), I was surprisingly fearless on the descent. It felt natural. I hit 48 mph.

I'm no expert but, keeping my body relaxed and finding a nice line to follow definitely helped. And try not to think about the concept that falling could easily result in death.

Edit: I was on a borrowed Giant OCR1. Solid bike for sure, but I imagine it would have been even better with a stiffer, quicker bike.

Machak, my steel Marinoni Ciclo, is custom built to my size ... and I alway run quite low tire pressure.

By bike racing standards, I'm friggin huge, so I descend like a rock. Growing up racing in WestVirginia where I got dropped on every climb, I had to learn to descend to catch back on.

My opinion, you are either a person who is good at descents, or you are not. It is all about confidence, and aggression.

The only thing I seriously worry about always is getting a flat at high speed especially on the front tire.

Anyone share this anxiety?

+1

I'm one of those guys who's blessed in that I drop like a rock. I think looking down the road as opposed to looking down at the road is the most important part of descending. Find a steep hill that's either straight or has very gentle curves and coast down it getting used to the speed. Start first up on the hoods catching wind and then when you feel comfortable start tucking and getting used to faster speed. Hopefully the joy of speed and trying to cut corners as fast as possible it will become addictive (note: don't do this on unknown roads so you don't have to worry about gravel).

Oh yeah ... that fear caused my lack of confidence before the crash. Expecially when I had a friend feel the rim on my front wheel after a particularly steep descent, and tell me that when my rim gets as hot as mine was (I could have fried an egg on it!), I am running a serious risk of blowing out my front tire. My rim was that hot because of brake usage ... or over-usage.

After that, especially on hot days, and especially on long descents, I would stop partway down to let my rims cool.

Yes. You have to realize that no matterr how good your skills are, thing outside your control can happen (front flat, car or motorcycle, coming into your lane, etc)

At 50+mph, if things go bad, its going to hurt. You have to ask yourself what level of risk you're willing to accept, and balance the risk/reward.

I learned a trick which really helped me ...... relax!

See in the past, I could climb a very short hill or an extremely gradual hill, but the moment I tried to tackle anything long, I would start wheezing and huffing, and my heart would feel like it it was about to pound out of my chest, and my legs would burn ... and within minutes, I would have to get off the bicycle, catch my breath, and then walk it.

Now, as soon as my breathing starts to get even remotely rapid, I slow it down and take it easy ... and I can climb just about anything.

Once I got over that hurdle, then I could work on my speed.

Why "stay away from your back brake in the rain"?

In my situation, I hit the front brake ... the next thing I knew my front wheel was turned around facing me, and I was thinking ... "THIS is NOT good!" I've been told that I would have probably gone down no matter what I did in my situation, but that I should have gone for the rear brake instead of the front brake.


Also, someone suggested descending in the drops. If you sit up, don't you provide some extra wind resistance which can slow you down a bit?


I hit 51 km/h on a descent today. But it was a very straight descent, on a nice dry sunny day, on a good road.

Yeah, you don't need to be in the drops. You can get just as low by bending your elbows. I've tested it in 27mph crits, one lap on the hoods, one in the drops, etc. etc. and had no variance in performance. I do prefer the drops for comfort. I agree though that it's nice to pick up the extra wind -- I do that a lot on steep descents.

Regarding front/rear braking. When you're in a corner, the front tire provides "x" traction, and the rear provides "y." Some of that traction can point into the corner, keeping you from sliding out, and some of it can point backwards, slowing you down.

Since your center of mass is above the ground, when you brake, "x" goes up, and "y" goes down as weight is transferred to the front of the bike. If you're using rear brake, it's much more likely to lock up and slide than the front wheel. If you use the front brake, all the "Y" traction can be pointing into the turn, while the "x" traction goes up, and more of it can point backwards.

That said, if you're going fast enough to lock up the front brake, you're hosed anyway. If you are going to slide a wheel in a turn, you would want to slide the rear -- but that's not the objective... you want your tires hooked up.

In general, the rear brake should just be for trimming. In controlled slowing, rear brake is appropriate, and easy to modulate. If you want to play with the lock-up point, practice descending, and over-braking whil you still pedal. It becomes very obvious exactly when the rear brake locks up if you're pedaling. Of course, this needs to be an open and safe course. It is a good exercise though, to push it to the limit when you have control. You can also test your traction out in the rain this way -- just ease into the heavy braking, don't pop it all at once.

In my crash situation, I was coming down a curvy paved road slick with white mud. It looked like construction traffic or something had been using that road, and then it had been drizzling all day. As I started the descent, I thought I was getting myself into a bad situation, and I skidded a few times on the curves, but remained upright.

I rounded the last corner, and was on the straight stretch to the bottom of the hill, but just as I was breathing a sigh of relief, I noticed there was a 4-way stop at the bottom of the hill. The two people ahead of me sailed right through, but as I approached the intersection, cars pulled up from all directions.

I had to make a fast decision ... stop, and potentially slide out ... or go through the intersection and possibly get hit by a car. I grabbed my front brake .... and ended up in a heap on the pavement.

So here's my question ... was there anything I could have done differently to create a better outcome in that situation? Or was I doomed?

It is okay to use your rear brake, judiciously, when it's wet. Here is some great info on braking technique from Sheldon Brown that you may want to check out.


Of course, but the stability gained by being in the drops far outweighs whatever benefit you're going to get with wind resistance. You can open up your arms and legs and even sit up a bit while in the drops to increase wind resistance.


Every little bit helps, I suppose.

really the only things which would have changed any of that was different convergence of time and place - the other riders in front were just 'lucky' and really they could have been dead...
The other thing, is having a more cautious approach, something we all fall down on to some degree. The key to remember on descents is that braking and braking distance is completely revised from what happens on the flats. AS much as weight transfer forward a lot on the flat, its even more on the descent.
In fact any substantial rear breaking which might have any effect will have a close border for locking and skidding and going down.
Add less than optimum road conditions and the safety factor drops considerably.
Depending on road conditions and grade, stopping distances at the same speed can be 2x to 4x longer on descents. Depending on how much you're willing to roll the dice decides how much you're willing to shorten that distance. Sometimes the decision is taken away from you, in which case it becomes mitigating the possible consequences.
Lots of good points on descending given, but basic is a far enough forward vision. Looking far enough forward allows more/enough time to see potential issues and make good decisions. This is especially important where your vision is restricted by terrain (tight curves on hillsides). Especially important on curvy roads, look as far forward as your road position will allow - even if that means looking past the turn you're in, toward the coming turn. Looking short only allows you to see things which you no longer have control over because of reaction time and other limitations. Seeing things earlier means you see MORE, recognize issues BETTER and so make better decisions.
Practicing descending, as with anything else, develops confidence and improves abilities. Its always best to work on just a few points till they are well grounded in your skill set, then move on. And its best to start doing it at speeds which are comfortable and allow focus on technique or thought process. Then bring speed up as skills become more automatic.
Addition to other things mentioned, many twisty side roads are heavily crowned or cambered. Camber has a huge impact on tire adhesion as well as maintaining lines. Off-camber and camber transitions need to be heavily weighed into lines and speed (same for the center oil line).
Good descending is more than fearless bombing. And since its usually not limited by motor capacity, most everyone can become a good descender.

I agree with what merlinextraligh had to say. It was very good and I wan't to emphasise that you should be descending in the drops. If your not comfortable in the drops then you need to change handlebars and adjust the bike untill you are. It realy makes that much difference.

When I'm descending in the drops I firmly push my hands into the inside curve of the bars and my left hand (rear brake) stays there and doesn't move. You hold firmly with the rear brake side hand and ONLY brake on the front. You can also push your weight rearward easily in this position.

Regards, Anthony

Having read the posts on the second page I should add that I suspect the accident you are refering to was most likely inevitable. Slippery corners on a downhill run are very treacherous and you realy need to maintain upmost control of your bike which is why I am strongly suggesting that you need to descend in the drops.

Sure you can use the rear brake to ****** your descending speed somewhat. If your descending in a straight line and you just wan't to regulate your speed then you could ride on the hoods and alternate front to rear braking to stop the front brake from overheating but as soon as you aproach a corner or ANY situation where you feel that you may wan't to stop/slow down quickly then you need to be in the drops, holding on firmly on the rear brake side and braking with the front wheel only.

While a front wheel slide is extrodinarily difficult to control holding the bars firmly in the drops will give you the best chance of controling it and preferably if you stay in control you wont be in that unenviable situation.

Regards, Anthony

Rear brakes: I started fishtailing when I had to suddenly brake extremely hard near the bottom of a hill. I was braking front and rear, and the rear locked up. This makes the rear wheel slide to the side, since the front is still slowing down. I recovered by letting off the rear brake. I try to practice hard braking at speed occasionally, using only the front brake.

I agree with the posters about repeating a known route, with no blind corners. If you can just concentrate on riding, and already know what speed you can do on the route, it's good practice.

On wet roads, I slow way down, I don't have any way to find out how much real traction there is.

Lots of good advice in this thread. I remember when I first started on the road bike and I didn't trust my handling skills going 35mph or more on a descent. The slightly slower twisty ones were a lot of fun, though. Go figure. I felt like I had a good knack for finding the right line in turns. The best thing is what you've started to discover: you need to relax your body so that your body can absorb any shock from the road. Some of the other riders you see may have tires that are grip better in corners, they may be better at countersteering and fine-tuning their weight distribution, or they may just be daredevils on descents. The next best rule is to never brake while you're turning. Brake when you can hold a straight line before the turn, and then if anything accelerate out of the turn. Just like with cars or motorcycles, this will help you stick. The more open the road (no blind corners), the more you can see far enough to really use the width of the road to your advantage, because you can tell if someone is coming at you, and you can plan your full line easier.

I also prefer to descend in the drops, but if I need to slow down and don't want to touch the brakes, I'll lean back, taking some weight off the bars, stick my elbows out some and try to make a parachute out of my body. It doesn't work as well as sitting up, but it's safer to me than moving all over the place or hitting the brakes.

As for your wreck, it sounds like you hit the brakes way too hard in panic. Feather them unless you're going dead straight through a pretty dry patch. Even then, don't grab hard all at once. If you're in a situation where you have to grab a ton of brake in those situations, you might be headed for a crash anyway, but I'd personally be in favor of doing what you know works about cornering (weight placement and countersteering) and hope the tires stick.

This is appropriate in some rain conditions, but in general, I prefer to trail brake into turns, then coast through them. Also, on a steep curvy descent, if you coast through a curve, you might accelerate so much going through it that you end up going too fast. You might have to go into the turn slow enough that you can brake through the entire thing -- and still be on the edge of sliding out.

Despite my recent posts indicating I'm slow on descents, I go over 40mph regularly. Also, I know exactly how you feel. I wiped out years ago at high speed -- got knocked out even with the helmet, lost some teeth, have permanent scars. For quite awhile afterwards, riding at speed scared the crap out of me.

My advice? Don't force it. Riding fast is like walking on a roof or dealing with dogs. If you're scared, your chances of problems increase drastically. Just ride the way that feels right and as time passes, you'll find yourself gradually speeding up again. If you relax, you are less likely to make mistakes and your body will help you adjust to problems that pop up.

I agree that it sounds like you hit your brakes too hard. The faster you go, the more gentle you must be. Sometimes your best option is to control your crash rather than try to avoid it entirely. This takes more mental discipline, but it really makes a huge difference.

40 mph is clipping right along!!!! I'm descending curvy descents right now at about 16 km/h (10 mph) ... I think I mentioned that I'm often descending slower than I'm climbing.

On the first descent after the crash, which resembled the crash (rainy and curvy), I had to stop 1 km down the descent, pull over to the side of the road, and shake for a while. I must have looked like I was about to go into convulsions because another rider pulled up behind me and asked me in a very concerned voice if I was going to be OK. I've gotten better than that now ... a bit.