Total Motorcycle Community Forums

I keep two fingers on my brake most of the time. I only need two to stop her .

My rear brake is very touchy. Twice I've locked it up without meaning to, luckily both times I came through it okay. But it wasn't fun at all. I can't reach the front brake with any less than all four fingers extended. And the clutch lever is hard to pull, so that requires all four as well.

So now, I use engine braking the most, because sometimes I have to scrub some speed quickly. At such times I feather the front brake with all four fingers to warm it up while down-shifting quickly, and use the front brake together with the engine braking. I've been trying to work out how to integrate the rear brake without locking it up, because it's important to use it too. I want to learn to have the best overall control possible with my bike. It's very hard to feel that rear brake though. I'm going to try using it more at lower speeds to get a better feel for it.

I'm riding an 1100cc cruiser, and I've only had it a month and a half, which is about how long I've been riding (as passenger, excluded).

I always cover the clutch and front brake if things look like they're gonna get a sphincter-factor. I talk myself through the temptation to use them in a panicky manner. So far, so good.

LS1GOAT wrote:

shane-o wrote:

Grey Thumper wrote:Just trying to get a feel for how people do it around here. Is there an absolutely right way to cover your levers, or is it a matter of personal comfort?

At any speed above say, jogging speed, I cover the brake lever with my pointer and middle fingers, and grab the left grip with all five fingers.

At slow speeds (filtering through traffic, U turns, etc.), I cover my clutch with pointer and middle fingers, and don't cover my front brake lever at all; all 5 fingers are wrapped around the throttle.

When I'm going really slowly, I've found it smoother to modulate speed using the clutch and rear brake (got this tip from Captain Crash). Plus I've accidentally grabbed the front brake during a U turn and almost dumped the bike.

I dont go near my levers unless im going to use them, or I suspect I may need to use them.

In fact, Ill go as far to say, its bad practice to cover levers like your suggesting, cause while ya doing that ya dont have total control over ya bars.

Dont forget, its not braking alone that keeps you alive, its anticipation, safety space, and your overall control over ya bike.

Jus my opinion.



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Covering your breaks will shave off probably at least half a second of reaction time for most riders. At 40MPH, half a second is about 30 feet. I'd much rather have that 30 extra feet of insurance over what little control you lose by covering your brake with two fingers.

umm, cover your brakes when you ANTICIPATE a hazardous situation. if you cover the brake at all times, your throttle control may well be crap or sketchy at best, and more often you will brake whenever confronted with a sticky situation. you will slam the front brake causing your tire to lock up, and likely a crash, or you will stop too fast causing the cager following too close behind you the inability to avoid pancaking you, likely resulting in an ambulance ride. this would not happen if you kept off the brake, and considered power throttling your way to a safe recovery.

u think that's stupid? i have accelerated my "O Ring" out of far more dangerous situations with cagers than i have ever braked or slowed down for. your bike has superior control and stability if you learn to twist the throttle, instead of repeatedly gripping the brake. or maybe our riding style is different.

but i cover the clutch almost one hundred percent of the time. downshifting will protect you too.

Personally, if I'm in slower rolling traffic I'll do the "cover 2" when I"m in heavy traffic that moving fast (busy highway) I do the "cover 4".

Vid with practice tips:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yQpJDux_M-w

The idea on covering is to shave response time so I tend to cover in situations where time is brutally important...like driving through the nieghborhood at 3:30pm when the kids are running around playing...

There is absolutely no consensus on this. I will not offer an opinion as everyone has their mind already made up.

Indeed. A Texan by the name of Colin Edwards once said, "There is no one way, just ride the $#!% out of it."

TexasPhotographer wrote:There is absolutely no consensus on this. I will not offer an opinion as everyone has their mind already made up.

Might I offer that an opinion would be a good thing? We all do things differently for different reasons. While you may cover all the time and I only cover around other users or when hustling fast--both those are reasonable reasons for reasonable actions.

And the mind you change--might never even post.

TexasPhotographer wrote:There is absolutely no consensus on this. I will not offer an opinion as everyone has their mind already made up.

Aw, c'mon. Just cuz everybody has a preference doesn't mean that your opinion doesn't count! I'm curious.