7 Simple Tips to Find More Speed

 1: Practice Specific Race Scenarios

Set up your practice sessions to simulate a true race scenario (duration, track conditions and intensity levels). Skills associated with racing require that you are able to manage yourself and an environment around others with the ability to adapt to changes of pace, positioning and where decisions have to be made quickly. You have to learn how to get the most out of your performance environments by setting up the closest scenario possible so that you can adapt and improve both physically and mentally as a racer.

 2: Warm Up 

We all have experienced the fact that our lap times get faster as the race transpires. This is because the body is warmed up and the muscles are performing at an optimal level. The trouble is we allow the first two laps of the race to warm up our bodies which results in slower lap times early in the moto.

 3: Eat a High Quality Snack

To top off your blood sugar levels, in your muscles for movement and in your liver to feed your brain for processing, eat an easily digestible snack 10 minutes before your practice or race.  Through our research, we have determined that when a rider struggles to get up to and maintain potential speed it is directly related to food (quality & quantity).

 4: Practice Your Speed Work Early in Your Riding Session

Now that you have topped off your blood sugar levels with an easily digestible snack and jump started your metabolic engine by warming up (ideally for 20 minutes), you can now handle higher intensity levels.  The key to breaking into faster lap times is to implement your speed intervals early in the workout so that you develop both the mental and physical skills necessary to create consistent speed and eliminate late moto fatigue.

 5: Break Speed Ruts

Capture your lap times for 10 lap moto as well as a 20 lap moto. What you will find is that there is not much difference in your speed no matter how long the moto lasts. This is a perfect example of a speed rut.  In the world of human performance, the body should always be able to perform at a higher rate of speed for a shorter period of time; we refer to this as the inverse relationship between volume and intensity.

 6: Implement Fundamentals

Instead of focusing on throwing more effort into going fast, slow down and apply the appropriate skill set to maintain speed and momentum throughout every lap. The most inefficient racer is the one that bounces off the face of everything and blows through every corner – losing momentum which results in lower lap times. If you want to improve not only your overall speed but also your endurance, focus on applying the skills developed through your riding coach that include the utilization of your break, clutch, throttle and body position.

 7: Film

Every factory team films, why aren’t you?  If there is a section that you can’t figure out, film the riders that did.  This is helpful prior to heading out for your first practice – what is the fastest approach to a section, body position, etc.. Duplicate what others are doing to get through the section fast on your first lap verses taking four laps to get up to full speed.  Most everyone has a smart phone these days with a pretty good camera, so use it! Keep in mind that the brain learns in many ways, watching and implementing are two of the most powerful to increasing your speed!