ducatipaso.org

After the last several hundred miles of riding the Paso, and some of it fairly aggressively, I've got a question for everyone since I have not seen any mention of this....

How do you position your feet while riding your Paso?

For me, I ride with the "balls" of my feet resting on the peg for maximum ground clearance. This is how I ride all of my other sportbikes, simply because I don't want to drag my toes in the curves. This is how I generally position my feet and I move them forward some as I need to brake or shift....



Now, the problem that I've noticed with this position is that I have a tendancy to rub my boot on the rear panel of the bike.......and I am rubbing through the paint and will probably start rubbing into the bodywork itself.....

At least 3M sell suitable thin clear protection plastic(with glue) agains paint removing from painted places, but that is little too late now in Your case. I have used such with my bikes many times in my journeys with good result. That 3M is very good film, but cheaper is to go to book shop and buy samekind protection film(for books) and use it. Such dont least so long, as 3M but its also easier to take away from fairings, when need to change it.... Btw, i bught just quite similar Alpinestar boots, as You have. That toe protector is good to me, cause my old shoes have failed from that area(touched some times to surface).....

Terry,
Just keep you instep on the peg, not the ball of your foot. Have never scraped my foot or pipes. Believe that it is something to do with riding method. Cheers.

Fraser.

Fraser wrote:Just keep you instep on the peg, not the ball of your foot. Have never scraped my foot or pipes. Believe that it is something to do with riding method. Cheers.

Ummmm.....just this past Sunday I was hanging off the seat, dragging a knee through a curve, and ground down some of an exhaust mounting clamp......maybe I'm just riding it too hard?

Its not that hard to "ground " the paso . I dont understand why you would wear boots with toe scrapers on them and not want to scrape them, this is the measure of the man. I can see my socks thru the holes in my boots ( thats not really true ha ha ) Have a look at your eccentric chain adjuster and note wether your axle is at the top or bottom of the swing arm, you may be able to get another inch of ground clearance by moving axle to bottom if not already there . I have ruined 2 pairs of boots and mashed the pipes just ahead of the mufflers on my paso. Having said all that , I too find myself riding with feet positioned as you do, seems to be more comfy , but I do notice that with feet positioned as so there is more weight on my wrists. I also do the same on my SS so it aint the bikes fault

Guys, it's all to do with riding method. Get your braking completed before the corner and go through the corner under some throttle. You'll never/rarely touch down.
Cheers, Fraser.

Mc tool wrote:I dont understand why you would wear boots with toe scrapers on them and not want to scrape them, this is the measure of the man.

You should drag a knee first, and then, if you drag a boot slider with your foot all the way up on the peg as I position mine, you know you are just about at the absolute max you can go because you aren't too far off from dragging hard parts and then going sliding down the road. If you notice, the bottom half of my knee puck is ground down.....my left one is a lot worse.

My wife has to sit up straight in the seat because of her paralyzed left leg and replacement hip. She can drag her toes long before I'm even close to the toe sliders when I'm off the seat and dragging a knee. Plus, this way, my bike is a little more upright and I'm actually going faster than her......and she's riding a 2000 Yamaha R1 with lots of lean angle available.....and I'm usually on my ST2 with the panniers on it.

Mc tool wrote:Have a look at your eccentric chain adjuster and note wether your axle is at the top or bottom of the swing arm, you may be able to get another inch of ground clearance by moving axle to bottom if not already there .

The axle is down and a little toward the front....it is in the 5:00 position when on the left side of the bike....as you can see in the picture above.

Fraser wrote:You'll never/rarely touch down.

You can drag hard parts through a curve every single time.....if you are going fast enough. I know guys who drag kness and hard parts through every curve. They are just that fast. The one guy used to have footpegs that were only half width because he ground those down. He also wore hole through his boots......he gets off the seat, drags a knee first to let him know his lean angle, and then continues leaning until his boot/toe slider touches and he gets sparks from his footpeg shooting down the road. He's so fast, I'm lucky if I can keep him in sight for more than four curves....BTW, he used to race against Nicky Hayden before Nickey became famous.....and all he does is ride up-and-down the same road, all day long. He's got it memorized.

One of my local roads around here, there is one curve I like a lot. I make it a point to drag my knee through the whole curve every time I go through it....I try not to drag hard parts. I like staying on the road and not going down the side of the mountain.

Still believe that riding technique has the greatest influence. Many years ago I was acquainted with 2 of our top production racers that rode for Wellington Motorcycle Center; one constantly scraped his way through the corners while the other never touched down. They rode identical bikes prepared and provided by their sponsor. It was never clear who was the better rider, on the day either could win. However, they had very different riding styles. Cheers, Fraser.

Fraser wrote:Many years ago I was acquainted with 2 of our top production racers that rode for Wellington Motorcycle Center; one constantly scraped his way through the corners while the other never touched down. They rode identical bikes prepared and provided by their sponsor.

If one was scraping hard parts on the bike and the other was not, it was because the one scraping hard parts (or toes) was sitting more upright on the seat and was not altering the center of gravity much....he was right on the edge of possibly crashing. The guy who was getting off the seat and not dragging hardparts of the bike (but probably dragging a knee slider) had a lot more lean angle available and could go faster through the curves than the other guy if he wanted to.....Don't even try to say that the guy hanging off the bike was dragging hard parts before the guy sitting upright, because it is not physically possible in your scenario.

The whole purpose of sliding off the seat is to move the center of gravity toward the inside of the curve and it also lowers the center of gravity of the bike and rider. By moving the center of gravity this way, in and down, the lean angle of the bike through the curve is less than if the person sat upright. This allows for more ground clearance = therefore higher corner speeds.

What this means is that when the rider who is sitting upright in the seat is scraping hardparts on the bike, the rider who is getting off the seat is at less lean angle and in return, can go through the curve even faster.

Here's an interesting little article on the evolution of motorcycle riding styles...

http://www.motorcyclistonline.com/featu ... index.html

"Lower the combined center of gravity of the bike/rider and you go through the same corner at the same speed, on the same line with less lean angle."

I don't know how else to say it other than sitting upright and dragging hard parts is generally quite a bit slower than the guy hanging off the bike and dragging hard parts....it's simple physics.

Terry,
Not disputing what you say, was just pointing out that there are different riding styles. Paul Smart was one of the early hang off the side styles; a benefit for the limited clearance of the 750SS. Cheers,
Fraser.

Fraser wrote:Not disputing what you say, was just pointing out that there are different riding styles.

Sorry....I must have misunderstood you. I recently had a guy try to tell me that he can ride as fast as anyone while sitting upright and I told him it was physically impossible due to ground clearance issues if he wasn't altering the center of gravity like a person who does slide off the seat. I know a group of guys who ride ridiculously fast, and I'd bet my next paycheck that no one can keep up with them if they refuse to get off the seat. The laws of physics just won't allow it.

I will openly admit I tend to ride a little fast on the street....too often. I was dragging hard parts on my ST2 while trying to keep up with my wife on her R1. The ST2 simply doesn't have the ground clearance that the R1 was. She was never touching hard parts, and I was grinding my bike away. Out of necessity, I started to hang off the seat, and now, I not only can keep up with her on the ST2, but now she is dragging toes to keep up with me.

Different riding styles do make quite a difference, and in some cases, certain riding styles are practically overkill. It's like my wife, a friend of ours, and me when we go riding. We all go through the exact same curve, at the exact same speed, but my wife is sitting upright and may not even be scraping her toes with her R1, I'm behind her on the ST2 and while off the seat a bit I may or may not be scraping a knee slider, then, our riding buddy is on a Honda CBR600RR and is constantly sliding off of the bike and dragging a knee through every curve. All he manages to do is wear himself out with all the activity of sliding back and forth on the seat. He does say he likes following me because watching me gives him a real good indicator of the curve and our speed in the curves. The times I do not opt to slide off the seat, he knows we aren't pushing it too hard and he can relax a little bit, but if I'm off the seat and my puck is on the ground through the whole curve, he knows he better be ready for a tight curve for the speeds we are going. I use both styles of riding, but the style is determined by how fast I am going relative to the curve...and which bike I'm on. I know I do NOT like to scrape hard parts on the bike.....that just means that one little screw up will put me in the ditch.

I like that Keith Code article that I posted above, mainly because he talks about the progression of riding styles to what we have now.

Hi Terry yeah I see the axle at the 5 oclock position ( should a opened my eyes ay ) I geuss that while the science of getting a bike round a corner depends a bit on the level of technology available at the time , mostly its the same just that we all apply it differently. I used to be the last of the late brakers ( Id still be hard on the anchors 1/2 way round the corner ) but I had to change that when I got the paso as I find it likes the power on round the corners ( somebody has already mentioned this ), and with the webber you only have a choice of either on or off , not only does the whole plot go smoother and faster but I also get much better ( and more even wear ) tyre life . Im a " sit upright " rider on the paso , mostly coz I fit into the seat so well ( piss and pies ) I dont have that much room to move and , well with the SS , I reach my own limits before anything grounds . At the end of the day , if you are having a good time then you must be doing it right. The important thing here is Its not how or what you ride its that you ride ! so go rub some more paint off those side covers ha ha

i ride with the balls of my feet on the pegs and have the same marks on the fairings because of it. id love to say ive been decking out the exhausts of the paso on corners or getting my knee down but i dont trust the tyres enough. theyre not as grippy as modern rubber, especially on rough irish (usually wet)roads.

Style is irrelevant. It comes down to managing momentum. I learned this the hard way 30 years ago. If you weigh more than 120 pounds you can forget your dreams of going faster than anyone else in your favorite gp style.. You can not mutate the laws of physics. Without an opposing force any object in motion will travel in a straight line. Straight into the gaurd rail,been there done that,or straight into the trees. A paso will take you anywhere you want to go in a style that is rare these days. It is really the only style anyone should need these days. Forget about who is faster than you and have a good time.

higgy wrote:If you weigh more than 120 pounds you can forget your dreams of going faster than anyone else in your favorite gp style..

120 pounds would be 54 kg????
Now, I understand because I'm an awful rider....
I weigh about the double
But, as far as I know, many GP riders are heavier than 54 kg....

Perhaps, only Capirossi is about that weigh.

Ciao