TUTORIAL ON WHEELIES
Two points to keep in mind when learning to Wheelie:
1. Keep things simple. You only have so much attention, and its
best to keep it divided by as few things as possible. Usually, when
a beginning student is overwhelmed with trying to perform too many
unfamiliar actions all at the same time, he or she tends not to
perform any of them properly. The following approach to learning
will stress using the fewest number of control inputs necessary to
accomplish our goal
putting the front tire in the air.
There are, essentially, three basic factors you need to control
when performing a basic wheelie
1. Acceleration (throttle control)
2. Fore/Aft weight distribution (body control)
3. Side/Side weight distribution (balance body control)
Any late model 600+ cc sportbike that I can think of, in stock
form, will easily pull the front wheel up to 12-o-clock &
beyond in 1st gear if you do nothing else than keep your body
motionless and slam the throttle open once in the powerband. No
shit. You may think this not to be the case, but trust me unless
your bike is malfunctioning, its just that easy. The reason most
people fail is due to the fact that they unwittingly shift their
weight forward. Well get to that later. The point being theres
no need to bounce it up, theres no need to clutch it up, and
theres no need to roll off & on the throttle in 1st. Most of
these techniques essentially fool the rider into committing him or
herself to leaning their weight back - the rebound from the fork
springs is, in my opinion, negligible. And the control that some
people tout the clutch as offering you can easily be had with a
well-practiced throttle hand. That means theres a lot less to do
and think about when youre starting out, and that means youll be
a lot more likely to succeed, and a lot less likely to get hurt.
Even using these other techniques, youll still need to control
your throttle, your weight distribution, & your balance.
Theres just no sense in adding in more complication.
2. Keep things safe. That means finding a desolate stretch of
straight road with good pavement(an old airstrip or race track
would be best), wearing ALL your gear (gloves, leathers, boots,
HELMET, HELMET, HELMET), having friends with cages present, and
pre-ride checking your bike (tire condition & pressure, chain
condition & slack, brakes, shift lever & position, etc.).
It also includes using your head, thinking things through, and
above all, not trying to rush your progress. Theres no reason why
you cant learn to roll nice wheelies without looping it. Remember
just because you know of or have watched people walk away from
similar wrecks doesnt mean everyone does. The consequences of
looping a hi-power sportbike are a serious matter.
Now since Im going to recommend starting out rolling first gear
wheelies, lets address a few concerns.
Gearing and Gear Selection:
To begin with you wont need to gear your bike down. Like
mentioned above in stock form most any modern 600+ sportbike
needs nothing more, in first gear, than for you to not use your
body-weight to screw things up. So do not throw a bigger sprocket
in the back or a smaller one up front if you cant get it up in
first. Its your fault, not the bike. Youre only making things
more dangerous for yourself once you finally do stifle your
survival instincts long enough to let the wheel come up. Next
theres the issue of 1st gear being too twitchy. Well for the
experienced wheelie expert, 1st gear can be rather dangerous, since
the balance point (the vertical point where you have to hang the
front wheel to keep the bike from accelerating), is so high, and
1st gear does offer up alot of torque. But for the beginner, who
will inevitably slam the throttle shut the minute the front tire
comes off the tarmac, its not really an issue. And trust me even
as quickly as the front wheel can come off the ground in 1st, its
no match for your reflexes, unless youve just chased a few
percosets down with a pint of Jack Daniels. The fact is once you
get 2nd gear & higher wheelies up past midway point (and past
the point where you need a lot of torque), they want to come up and
over a lot faster than 1st gear wheelies do, since the gearing is
higher. Also 1st gear offers up tons of immediate engine braking.
That means that as soon as you let off of the throttle, the engine
braking effect literally sucks the front wheel back down to earth.
This will work for you even if you are unfortunate enough to end up
going past 12-o-clock. While this effect is apparent in all gears,
it is much more so in 1st, and seems to take effect right away
in 2nd, particularly, there seems to be a sort of time lag before
it kicks in. The main reason I like first gear is that it offers
the power necessary to bring the bike up while doing nothing more
than maintaining a static body positioning and controlling the
throttle. It allows you to free your mind and allow you to
concentrate on throttle control, height control, and balance. It
doesnt force you to make extreme body motions (throwing your
weight back) which, when coupled with everything else, could
definitely loop you quickly. In other words, I feel 1st gear to
absolutely be the safest gear to learn in.
Use of the rear brake:
This is a controversial issue. Many advocate its use as another
tool that one can use to avoid a loop (which, if used properly, it
is); others doubt its ever going to get used by beginners until
its too late. My feelings on the subject are mixed. Personally I
dont use my rear brake very much at all during normal, everyday
riding. Because of this, the use of the rear brake would, for me,
definitely not be instinctive when trying to save a wheelie gone
bad. I have, unfortunately, learned this fact the hard way when
trying to save a 12-o-clock. I believe I thought of hitting the
rear brake as my ass hit the pavement. On the flip side if you do
regularly use both the front & rear brakes, you might want to
keep that thought in the back of your mind as a last-ditch save
attempt. The thing that worries me most about the rear brake,
however, is that even if it is used in time, it is very likely
going to be used in panic, which could easily lead to a wreck just
as bad as if the bike had simply looped over backwards. Personally
I feel that the use of engine braking (a passive safety feature)
to pull down 1st gear wheelies is safer, and of course, much
easier, since all you have to do is let off on the throttle.
Finally, especially if you dont use the rear brake consistently,
but even if you do, keeping it in mind does use up some
concentration that could be spent elsewhere. So think about the
issue, and make your own decisions on this one.
Use of the Clutch
This has already been covered, but I want to say it again. For
first gear wheelies, do not use the clutch you dont have to.
Sure you can use the clutch to feather the power in and control
your height, but this is also something you can do equally as well
with the throttle, with less wear & tear on your bike, and most
importantly, while spending A LOT less concentration. The only
reason I would change my opinion on this point is if youre coming
from a dirtbiking background where youre already WAY familiar with
the use of the clutch where its become instinctive. Otherwise
I say dont use it.
OK Time to Pull Your First Wheelies!
So with all these points in mind, youre ready to start. You have
all your gear on, youre on a safe, modern sportbike (it could be
any bike, but this tutorial only applies to modern sportbikes),
youre on a safe road, and you have buddies standing by to help you
if things to awry. Start out on your bike looking down a long
stretch of open highway. Sit as you normally would on it you
might want to sit a little further back on the seat if you sit WAY
forward during normal riding (like I do), but you dont have to go
to any extremes. What you do want to do is to make sure to support
your body with your stomach & back, rather than with your hands
resting heavy on the bars. This is the way you should ride anyway,
but is especially important for wheelying. You want to lock your
legs down on the bike so that, as she starts to come up, you dont
pull back on the bars to hold on, which could possibly cause you
to open up the gas more than you want to. Also you need to be
loose on the bars to be able to modulate the throttle (though this
will come later). Essentially you want your hands, your throttle
hand especially, free to move without supporting your body weight,
and this can only be accomplished, at least starting out, if youre
anchored down on your bike using your legs & torso. As you
progress and gain more experience, you can always loosen up a bit
on the bike later. But for starting out stay locked down &
keep your arms loose.
Now, start tooling down the road, in 1st gear, up until you reach
the powerband, which will be anywhere from 4-8K, depending on your
bike. I dont look at the tach when pulling up, and you shouldnt
either. Its just one more thing to detract your attention that
could better be spent elsewhere. Youll be able to feel the power
coming in. Anyway once you do feel yourself getting into the
powerband, do only one thing and this is important ONLY ONE
THING. Open up the throttle quickly to full blast. Do not move your
upper body forward, do not move it back. Do not shift your hips. Be
a robot just move your wrist! If youre in the meat of the
powerband, and you didnt subconciously shift your weight forward
the front wheel just came up! I guarantee it! And if it didnt,
read back through this paragraph, think about not moving your body,
and try again, possibly at a slightly higher RPM. Rinse &
repeat.
OK Time to evaluate your first wheelie:
If you got the wheel up, contratulations!!!! But - you probably set
it right back down. Dont worry about it - this is natural. You
probably either cut the throttle, shifted your weight forward as
you felt the front end come up, or, most likely, a combination of
both. But you learned something for yourself. You learned that
the bike WILL come up on its own. You learned that, at this point,
you dont have to do anything other than open the throttle at the
right time to make it happen. Now its time to start thinking about
how to keep the wheel up a little longer, and get it a little
higher. Lets first think about what would happen if you just kept
things the way they were you didnt move your body, and you kept
the throttle pinned. What do you think would happen? Thats right
youd loop it! But what would it feel like? Well It would feel
like an exponential curve
The first 3rd or so of wheel lift would
proceed relatively slowly (though it wont feel that way to you!)
The second third would go quite a bit faster, and the top third
will be well you wouldnt know what hit you! Now what if you
kept everything else the same kept your body stationary, but just
started to roll the throttle off a bit once you got past the 1st
third of travel? One of three things would happen here youd
either roll off too much & drop back down, roll on not enough
and keep ascending, or roll off just the right amount and, for a
very brief time, stay put at that height. Because the bike is still
accelerating (& therefore making more power), you cant just
hit this magic point at this relatively low height & hold it.
But you can stay there momentarily. And you can learn, through
practice and experience, to roll on/off the throttle to maintain,
increase, and decrease your height. And thats exactly what you
need to go out and do now practice holding your wheelies up a
bit.
Practice adding distance
OK Youre back out on your safe road, with your safe bike, your
safe gear, & your safety net of friends. Start out first as
before just pulling up little popcorn wheelies to get the feel
of things. Once your comfy its time to try to add some distance
& height. There really isnt very much to explain here its
mostly a matter of practice and experience. But basically, you want
to try to start letting off the gas slowly, rather than slamming it
shut, as the wheel comes up. Be prepared to spend a lot of time
perfecting things. This is really all a matter of feel. Trust me
if you put some real time into this, youll learn to roll on and
off the throttle in order to keep the front wheel somewhere in the
air until your bike runs up against the rev limiter. Of course, how
quickly your bike revs out is determined by the height of your
front wheel
as you approach the balance point (described above),
the engine will accelerate less quickly. If you reach the balance
point, it will stop accelerating entirely. Let me state, for the
record, that I DO NOT recommend trying to ride 1st gear balance
point wheelies, especially just starting out. But as your height
increases, youll be able to ride out longer & longer wheelies.
Its just that simple. And as you practice, youll find yourself
getting higher and higher. Its just a matter of gaining comfort,
which will come in time. Take things very slowly, adding in,
through multiple practice sessions, a little more height and a
little more distance, but no more than youre comfortable with,
each time. If youre interested in how high youre going, it
oftentimes helps to have yourself video-taped. It also helps, once
youre comfortable managing your height and have some free
attention to spare, to glance down at the tach and see how fast
youre still accelerating. Remember as your height increases,
your acceleration will decrease.
I mention running up against the rev limiter a lot, only because,
if you do nothing other than maintain a non-balance-point height,
and you keep the wheel in the air, you will inevitably run up
against it, causing you and your bike to come crashing down to
earth in a bone-jarring (& sometimes bike damaging) manner. And
starting out youre almost guaranteed to hit it at least a few
times. But this is definitely something that you want to avoid.
So at the same time that youre trying to modulate the throttle
to bring her up controllably, you want to practice monitoring your
speed (via engine noise and/or watching the tach), and attempt to
start rolling off the throttle before you hit the rev limiter. You
also want to start practicing rolling back into the throttle as the
descent occurs in order to soften your landings. All of these
things, as mentioned above, will come with time and practice.
Theres no other substitute.
Advanced (for a beginner) Techniques
So after a lot of practice and hard work, youre now consistently
pulling up first gear wheelies, to a descent height, under power
alone, and holding them until just before the bike peaks out. Now
where can you go from here? There are a number of things you may
want to work on. You may want to work on leaning your body back
now, which can help bring up your wheel quicker, at lower RPM, and
therefore allow you to ride out your wheelies for longer time &
distance. This is good practice for 2nd gear power wheelies, where
youll have to use some body english to pull them up. You can
practice using the clutch to pull them up
once again for the same
reasons getting them up quicker, at lower speed, and rolling them
longer. Once again this is also a good intro into 2nd gear clutch
wheelies. You can continue to seek higher heights, and reach the
illustrious balance point but once again be warned the 1st gear
balance point wheelie will bite you quickly if youre not careful.
You can start trying to pull 2nd gear power and/or clutch wheelies,
or try shifting up into 2nd gear from 1st. Its all up to you. But
above all make sure you lay down a firm, solid foundation of
the basics before trying to attempt the more advanced
manuevers.
