Podcast #23 - Track Dynamics Series - Entry Corners

All right, welcome to podcast number twenty-three. And again, I appreciate everybody taking the time to listen and uh work on your knowledge objectives. That's exactly what all this is about. So I appreciate everybody taking the time to do that. and uh to write in and the comments are great. Um thanks for some of the donations. I really appreciate that as well. All right, so here with this podcast number 23, we're going to continue our series on track dynamics.

And this is going to be the second part of our series, uh our three part series, and we're going to talk more on entry corners today. So let's back up a little bit. Um let's let's make sure everybody gets a little bit of a refresher on this um of what what we're trying to do here. What we're trying to do is establish Essentially track dynamics. Let's take advantage of what lasts longest.

in in each corner, right? Not every corner is the same. And we want to be that adjustable rider. We want to be that rider that can go to any racetrack at any time. By identifying the corner. You look at the corner and you say, oh yeah, yeah, yeah, the entry's longer, so I know I need to do this, or oh, that's an exit corner, so I need to do this.

Oh, the radius of that corner is long, then I need to do this. And this is part of being that rider. And that's why how so how do these professional riders, how do they go to racetrack? And they go so fast, so quickly, it's because of all these things. Oh, it's got a huge radius and a big entry. Oh yeah, yeah. I use my brakes lighter and longer. Oh my gosh, that's the corner that leads on the longest straightaway. I am never going to miss my apexes. So

That's really what this is all about is taking advantage of your environment and literally making your job so much easier. So exit corners, we talked about that, right? Getting the bikes loaded and pointed to take advantage of the exit. And yes, that will absolutely take you to a very good, very safe lap time.

But what that leaves out is this next step. And that that next step is something that we all have a problem with, um, which you know, looking at the amount of people that listen to my over slowing corner entries uh podcast is uh is a topic that's near and dear. So Let's let's break that down and start to explain it. Entry corners. So an entry corner is simply where the deceleration zone is

is longer than the acceleration zone. And most tracks, almost every track has deceleration or entry corners, a longer deceleration zone, but they don't have a lot of them. Yes, you can go around, work on your exits, have a great lap time, but when we're starting to really get down to the nitty-gritty and starting to to condense that, we need to look at these entry corners.

I spoke on the last uh podcast about the 180 degree corners and how we look at those. So anytime that we have a hundred and eighty degree corner, we'll break it up into an A and a B. A and a B. And we break it up into an A and a B because the A portion it doesn't really go anywhere, right? The A portion is is really the entry. And then of course we have the B section, the B the B portion, uh, which is the exit portion, and we've already talked about that.

So with entry corners, because the entry lasts longest, we want to take advantage of that entry zone. We want to take advantage of that deceleration zone. And this is where it really comes into play where you start thinking about where I want to release my break and then what's a report card for how well I've taken advantage of that entry corner.

And entry corners, right? The deceleration zone is longer than the acceleration zone. That's what an entry corner is. 180 degree corners, we break that down into an A and a B.

How you adjust for the radius on on entry corners again goes back to where you want to let off the brakes. But most entry corners, and there's there's just so many darn, there's so many of them, but um for the most part on entry corners. You do end up using your brakes lighter and longer because that's what that corner has to offer, right? Is a is a usually a longer radius. There are entry corners, however, that the radius is shorter. And you'll use your brakes right up to the apex.

So a little some of it does depend on the radius of the corner. Some of the shorter radius corners, yes, you use your brakes up to the apex. Some of the longer radius entry corners, you use your brakes to or past the apex lighter and longer. Again, it's how you adjust for that radius of the corner.

Um, I don't know, I guess I give some a couple of great examples. One of my local tracks, Thunder Hill, turn five, is an entry corner. The radius is very short, so we use our brakes up to the apex. Whereas a corner like corner two, uh turn two is a is an A and a B. Turn two, we use our brakes lighter and longer because the radius so much bigger. Another great example of that is Barber. We were at Barber a few weeks ago, barber turn two, um, very short radius, but also an entry corner.

Whereas we go to barber turn five, we break it down to an A and a B. The A usually breaks up two or past the apex. So again, entry corner. We want to take advantage of the entry because that's what lasts longest. The report card for entry corners. is simply uh where am I letting off the brakes?

Typically with entry corners, you use your brakes to or past the apex, depending, you know, obviously how big how long that radius is. But that's how you define an entry corner. Use your brakes to or past the apex. There's your report card. So Most of us typically are over slow our entry corners. And we overslow them because we don't, we don't realize, oh my gosh, you know, look at the entry so long, and we don't have a really good braking technique for that.

So this is where we go and we think about where we want to let off the brakes. If you can get your track map out and you can identify those entry corners, you you literally can put an X or a dot or whatever, thinking, okay, that's the optimum place where I want to let off the brakes.

And then once you know that, then you can start to go execute it when you're out on the track. How we execute that goes back to, oh, here's those fundamentals again. How we execute that goes back to our vision, right? Our eyes, seeing where we want to let off the brakes and then bringing our motor controls into a pl into um play. which was we start the process with that initial breaking. Isn't it crazy how these fundamentals come into play? Huh, who would have known? Anyway, so entry corners.

They're massively important, right? That is some, you know, you get to a point of where your your exits are fantastic and uh you know you want to accelerate, but you're losing time on these entry corners. So first thing is we need to identify What are the entry corners? Where is the deceleration zone greater than the acceleration zone? Fantastic.

A lot of those end up being 180 degree corners, as I said. So, and we're going to give you a good report card for that in just a second. So first of all, let's identify those corners. Let's identify where is the optimum place where you should be letting off the break to take advantage of that. And then let's put ourselves in a position to execute that. And where that happens is with our eyes and our initial 5% of our break.

and our last five percent of our breaks. The longer the radius of the deceleration corner, the longer and lighter the brakes are going to be. The shorter the radius de uh decelerate uh entry corner, right, the more brake pressure you straight up and down, but you're still going to use those brakes up to that apex or very, very close to it. So the report cards are where am I letting off the brakes? And if you're not sure about that, how much neutral throttle do you have?

There's absolutely some corners where the radius is so long you're going to have neutral throttle. My goal around any track is not to have any neutral throttle. So if I'm lag if I'm if I'm struggling with my entry corners, grips, you know, of course we have to make sure grip is grip is um okay and everything's in in and your bike is working properly.

But that's where I'm going to look at. If everything's working well, I'm going to think about where do I have neutral throttle? Am I taking advantage of those entry corners? Am I off the break so soon that I go back to neutral throttle that I have to wait for the exit? So I'm trying to shorten up that amount of time at neutral throttle on those entry corners. So that's the absolute where I'm gonna use my brakes lighter and longer. A lot of things that you'll see on these entry corners.

As we go to the brakes too hard, then we get off of them, and then go back to the throttle, then you go back to the throttle, and you go back to the throttle too hard, and then you miss your exit a packs and then your drive socks, and then you're wanting to change the gearing on your bike when all you really needed to do is respect what the corner offered.

So think about where you're letting off the brake, decide if that's optimum or not, and then see how much neutral throttle in that in that corner. And that's what tells you how you could adjust. How you then adjust is by putting your eyes into play. and putting your break pressure graph, right? Your break graph to adjust for it.

And this is what separates those riders, right? This is being an adjustable rider. This is realizing, dude, I'll go to any track. I'll go to any track there is and I'll be able to adjust for it. That's why I Any one of my guys, I can go to a track and we can literally have the track figured out in three or four laps because we understand our track dynamics and understand our environment. So, pretty big deal thinking about where am I gonna let off the brakes.

Putting it on a track map of where you're letting off the brakes and finding out how much neutral throttle you have. So let's get those entry corners going. Let's identify them that identify them and let's take advantage of them. Yeah, and one other thought on that that I that I was uh as I was looking through my notes is, you know, I work a lot with um uh some of the smaller bike riders and they're like, Oh my gosh, we should never use the brakes.

I'll tell you the biggest thing that I work on with some of the small bike riders, right? The Ninja 250, the R3 riders, the even the KTM riders. uh uh i yeah, they want to be on the throttle so much'cause the bikes are so slow. Where they lack is the entry corners. I don't I don't have to worry about them on the exit corners'cause they're easy.

Where we work on is getting the bike um getting the bike in and slowed and pointed correctly on the entry corners. I almost don't have to worry about the exits or very good at that. But using those entry corners and taking advantage of them. I can almost guarantee all those riders, a lot of those riders on the on the smaller bikes need to work on these entry corners quite a bit more. And that's that's where the that's where the the it really separates everybody. So

Entry corners. Let's identify them. Let's make sure we're identifying entry corners where the deceleration zone is greater than the acceleration zone. Let's look and think about what does that radius have to offer. where we should be letting off the brake, and then ultimately how much neutral throttle do I have am I taking advantage of that. So

Yep, this is a good one. It's a very difficult one, but we've covered it in a lot of the other podcasts as well as this one. So there you go with entry uh entry corners.