Total Control: High Performance Street Riding Techniques

This book gives riders everything they need to develop the techniques and survival skills necessary to become a proficient, accomplished, and safer street rider. High quality photos, detailed instructions, and professional diagrams highlight the intricacies and proper techniques of street riding. Readers will come away with a better understanding of everything from braking and cornering to proper throttle control, resulting in a more exciting yet safer ride.

I also learned about steering my motorcycle more efficently. The author talked about how most people try to steer with both hands around corners, and while they believe that their helping the motorcycle, in reality, their hands are actually fighting eachother sub-conciously. I know, I didnt believe it either. What Lee Parks suggested doing, was relaxing the outside hand in a corner, so its barely gripping the handlebar, and to push with the inside hand ONLY to steer/lean the bike over.

HOLY CRAP! He was completely right. I'm not talking just a little bit, makes a 1/10th of a difference. I mean he was COMPLETELY AND UTTERLY on the money. I came into a 25mph turn on a road I like to test/learn my skills on, and I did as he said. I relaxed my outside hand, and at the latest point in the turn, I pushed with ONLY the inside hand, and started to turn. Only problem is, that my turning was so much more efficent, that I actually turned too much, and almost ended up as a pretty ornament on the inside guard-rail. Insane! I came up to the next tight left turn, and went a quicker than I normally would have (fear + testing out this new found turning ability), and I ZOOMED through it, without a problem. A 25mph rated turn that I normally took at 50mph, I was able to take at 65-70mph, just based on a new turning technique. This sh*t works people. These guys know what their talking about. And while you need to practice, I can completely see how some of these books are manuals on how to get into the racing world.


Total Control is spot on!   November 23, 2004
2 Wheel Tony
29 out of 30 found this review helpful

Overall impression:

First, the book "Total Control" was an exceptionally well paced and visually pleasing read! It is immediately obvious that you have spent a great deal of time and thought on the material placed within its pages. It's technical enough to clearly present the necessary data within the defined concept, without going so deep that it becomes difficult to navigate. Nor is it so simplistic that the reader would feel slighted by being overly "hand-held" or "kid-gloved". If there were three bears and some porridge handy, I'm sure "it's just right" would be the theme of the day.


Details:

While the majority of these concepts are not new to me, it is still nice to have someone else positively reinforce said concepts, and at times, distill them down to more accurate truths. This happened several times throughout the book when I would find myself nodding along with a passage, a bubble of remembrance surfacing in my mind as I recalled the event(s) that first led to the discovery of these factoids, usually in a much less desirable way. Often I had to set the book aside, while I mentally re-examined an idea I thought I knew backwards and forwards, yet was being presented from a different perspective. This of course, leads to additional insight and greatly increased understanding of not only the outlined principle, but also how these principles are all connected to one another. It's one thing to know a bunch of individual concepts, it is quite another to see them as a contiguous whole.


Without doubt, the most enjoyable chapters in the book for me are Ch. 4, 5, and 6 titled "Fear", "Concentration", and "Right Attitude" respectively. The truths contained within these three chapters are so profound, so absolutely and undeniably essential in every aspect of life, that I am amazed that so few people actually address it! I have been saying the very same things, although not nearly as well, for years. Yet the response is almost always the same: Disinterest, Scorn or flat out Denial. No, it's much better to focus on "hard" data like horsepower, torque, weight and so forth. Until someone goes to a track, and has the ex-racer / instructor absolutely walk away from them at any point on the track, while on a machine that makes 50% less horsepower and weighs 150 lbs more than theirs, then clueless that someone shall remain. I should know, I was that someone. Believe me when I say that it is a humbling, and if you have the right mindset, incredibly enlightening experience. Thank you for brilliantly explaining how the brain is the most important item to bring on a motorcycle ride!


Second favorite is the chapter on low speed U-Turns. A beautiful and clearly photographed example of how it should be done! I've lost count of the number of riders I've seen employ the exact opposite form, as if they were somehow going to yank a several hundred pound bike around 180 degrees, and consequently end up falling quite flat on the pavement.


Truthfully, I cannot fault anything within this book, except maybe the fact that I didn't write it myself!!

I am recommending this as a mandatory read for anyone who wishes to improve their motorcycling skills.




Excellent book - Better if your have some experience   February 15, 2006
Guillermo Castaño Acevedo (Bogotá, Colombia)
18 out of 18 found this review helpful

This is simply an excellent book. The techiques it presents for turning, braking, U-turns, driving with pigeons and so on are really excellent and works perfectly.
The initial chapters explaining the physics involved in driving are explained in order to be understood for everyone but at the same time are very technical and deep. You actually understand how your bike works.
It has a lot of illustrations and photos that help a lot the examples. A lot of them show the Correct and Incorrect way to do some particular exercise, so you can check both easily.

The book shows a lot of Sport bikes on their pictures, but it's not written only for sport bikes. The techniques and explanations works with any kind of bike.

My only warning: I don't think this is a good book for total novices, it's better to have some mileage before you read it.
But it certainly is an EXCELLENT book for any rider with a couple of months of experience.


Read 'em All, and...   August 26, 2003
M. Edell (Dunellen, NJ United States)
16 out of 16 found this review helpful

This book is among the best.

As background, I've been riding street/sport bikes for 18 years now, and have read nearly everything out there on the subject. Mr Park's book goes beyond Keith Code's (excellent) techniques list, exploring more diverse and usable territory like basic suspension tuning, body positioning, basic mental and physical conditioning, riding gear selection, and why racers do "X" as opposed to a street rider who should perhaps approach the same issue in a modified manner. He also does an excellent job covering more advanced matter, such as how to prep your bike for, and what to expect when you head for a day at a racetrack.

I got a lot out of this book. It's one of a select few I'll read again to brush up on my riding skills.