Changing your riding style

You bet, just takes a lot of practice and repetition

Yes, even the pros always look to improve

I used to be able to get around quick, but would tire myself out quick. I spent lots of time at the gym trying to fix my endurance until a friend of mine looked at my bike and saw my stock shrouds with 80 hours on them barely had any wear on them. I told him I never learned how to grip with my legs and just learned to ride without it.


I started to learn how to use my legs as a grip on the bike and I feel a lot more in control of the bike, especially going into rough corners where I hoped the rear end would slap into the rut, but now that I grip with my legs I know that 99% of the time the bike is going to track much better and more straight into the corner. I can ride at a fast pace for longer and have very consistent lap times from the time of the smooth track in the AM to the rough track in late afternoon. I go through shroud graphics a lot faster too now.

Stand up everywhere. Except, of course, for an occasional apex.

Learning how to be smooth, let your legs and bike do the work, and how to keep momentum through the corners made the biggest difference in my speed.

I was able to go from aggressive and fit to much smoother and slower by gaining 30 pounds and getting 30 years older, lol!

Seriously... Focus completely on hitting your lines perfectly, keeping your body position correct and being smooth. Stand up a lot. Spend your practice days working on the basics and go however fast you can go while riding as “perfectly” as possible, slow down a bit to be more accurate if you have to, and you probably will. This will create habits/muscle memory that will save your ass when things get sideways when you push your speed during a battle. And have patience, my speed seemed to plateau for a time, then after working the basics for a while suddenly I’d be able to go faster and smoother. This will help keep you off the ground too.

Watching a lot of gopro from the outdoors lately and it's crazy how the pro's stand up everywhere. But it's not really standing per se. They ride with such a low center of gravity with their butts just barely off the seat. Something I'm gonna concentrate on next practice day.

It’s crazy to watch a third person video of someone who is tall and lanky like Anderson use their body all over the bike vs someone like Webb who’s short and uses just his legs and feet to control the bike.

I'm working on it myself. I'm 58 and spent most of my riding life doing trails and just riding. I ride very old-school... upright body, tucked in elbows, etc. I'm not a natural athlete at all. My son is a natural and looks new-school which made me think there's something more to it than just looks. So, I've been having him coach me and I've been watching The MX Factory videos and things are finally clicking.

First thing I've learned is that you can do everything wrong. Advice to "stand up" is no good if you stand up wrong. I stand up way too upright, creating a pivot point that creates a teeter-totter effect. Okay... so "put your butt back". Great, unless you do it wrong and just push your butt back and then _arch_ your back and shoulders.... this makes it really hard to look forward and is really hard on the neck. Finally, watching MX Factory vids... he says "straight back" but the back is NOT straight. He's got his butt arched like a porn star, his back in a dip, and then his chest pushed forward the bars. I tried that and BINGO.... my neck doesn't hurt, I absorb bumps, no weight on my arms, my legs grip and my son waves me over and says "That looks good'. And I got a job in this new vide... never mind. So, you need to do the motions RIGHT.

Another bad habit I have is letting my head snap forward on jump landings. We're working on this and yesterday worked on it until I got it. What I discovered is that I sit too far back. This is an old-school trait compounded by the fact that I'm instinctively afraid of my front suspension. I'm used to crappy XR250 or KDX200 forks that I grew up on and I don't trust my MX suspension. I put too much weight on the rear which overloads the shock and doesn't create forward momentum on the landing. I figured this out by... this is hard to describe... LANDING the bike instead of just "letting it land". When I did this the first time, I was leaning way up (for me!!!) and the forks suddenly rebounded HARD. So, all of a sudden the bike reacts differently which says that I'm doing something different, for sure. I did this a few more times, then stopped and slowed the rebound down 2 clicks. Much better and all of a sudden I'm landing on BOTH suspension components which immediately gave me a MUCH plusher landing and that's when I figured out I was over-loading the rear. My son gave me a thumbs up.. and he doesn't give those easily. Point of all this being that a lot of little things came together and CLICK... there it is!!!

For me, it takes a lot of time and effort and practice to get rid of bad habits. In archery, I shot fingers for 30 years. When I switched to a release, ALL KINDS of bad habits came out that I had no idea I had. It took me 3 years to re-train myself and I don't crash and break bones when I do it wrong. But....I've now got 3 State Championships to show for it. Maybe I'll get there with dirt bikes.

barcia has said himself that he has tried to change riding style but its not working out for him, the aggressive high rev style is what suits him.

Every time I changed bikes I have to change the way I ride, went from 250f to 450 back to 250f 250 2 stroke 450 back to 250 2 stroke, each time I changed bikes was a small learning curve to get the acquainted to how that specific engine and chassis works

At the moment I want another 450

THIS. Tomac especially. Watch some of his rides at Southwick. He rails those outside lines so far back on the bike, but he is hovering just above the seat. Your average rider could not even do that (physically) at half that speed for 1 corner.

I've been riding 23 years. I'm 35. I bought the big $300 pack of Gary Semics DVDs a while back. Worth way more than any pipe or sticker kit I've ever had, and it allows me to help almost 10 kids between 5 and 10 years old develop better habits on my private track (for free).
Skill wise I reached a peak around mid pack B speed that only exercise and education could improve. If I could go back 23 years I'd pay for a good suspension job, no engine mods, and schooling/DVDs. I've had built engines that didn't do anything except tire me out, and pull a gear higher or longer. I've spent so much time over the years watching free YouTube videos, and that helped, but if you really want to get better technique/style, riding schools, and buying better video sets are really worth it. I definitely wasted too much money on the wrong things over the years, and see a lot of riders doing the same.

It’s hard to break bad habits. I was lucky enough to be on a 8 year break and listened to my cousins talking about form and technique. Years of thinking about that while not riding made it easy to fall into those habits right away when I started riding again

Probably one of the things I enjoy the most about moto is trying to evolve my style, even as an old fart. Watch the pros, get as much off track video as you can of yourself and try to do what they are doing (much slower of course!) Getting coaching is also very beneficial if you have someone knowledge around.

Ha!!!! Same thing here. I used to have to _practice_ keeping a finger on the clutch and brake. Five year break and I come back riding on a TTR-230 and my fingers are automatically in place. I like watching helmet cam footage of myself now and watching my fingers on the levers... I'm not even aware of them and there they are, doing their job!!! Weird.