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The biggest names in music came together at the VH1 Divas Duets concert in Las Vegas.
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D-Mann served as the stunt double for host Queen Latifah.
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Copyright 2008, D-Mann Inc. |
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Those first two inches are the hardest part. Before you ride your bike next time, put both feet on the ground, and push as hard as you can on the front end. Then let it come back up. Practice bouncing the front end up and down. Push hard, and let it come back up. While riding your bike, you can get a similar behavior, by using the throttle. If you whack the throttle open, the front end will come up. At its peak, if you shut the throttle down, engine braking, in combination with the weight of your front end will cause it to go back down. When it's at the bottom of its stroke, if you whack the throttle back open again, you can use the expansion of your front springs, along with your acceleration, to help lift the front wheel. In fact, it doesn't take much at all, to do this.
I'll use my GSXR with stock gearing as an example. I would get going in first gear, so the tach was at about 8500 rpm. Then I would shut the throttle down, then whack it back on. Tugging at the bars a little also helps. This snapping of the throttle is a much quicker movement then rolling your throttle on. Not as quick as you can do it, but I guess that the entire movement should take about 1/2 or less of a second. Basically, go from steady state, shut down, then full open. After some practice you will learn how to time it with your suspension.
Using the Clutch
So you still can't get the front wheel to come up? I actually find that clutching it up, gives me the most predictable wheelies than any other method. Why? Its much easier to do exactly the same thing over, and over. Basically get rolling in 1st gear to an RPM of about 1/3 to 1/2 of your maximum hp. This is what worked well on my GSXR-600, when it had stock gearing. I would go to about 5000 rpm in 1st gear. Pull in the clutch, rev the engine a time or two, to time it so that the throttle would be wide open and the clutch releasing as the tach swept 9-10k. The next thing you know, your front wheel is way up in the air, and your RPM's are at about 8,000 with the throttle full on. At this point, I would have to roll off some, to find the balance point of the bike. As you learn to do this on your own bike, start out conservatively on your clutch release point, and gradually increase the RPM's each time you try it, until the wheel comes up so high you have to roll off the throttle a tad. You may want to cover your rear brake while you are learning this as well, in case you go too high. Standing up fast, will also help put the front end back down if you over do it. Remember these things!
Shifting
Ok, so now you have the front wheel up. How do you keep it up? Shift! It's actually much easier then it seems. When you can ride a long ways in first gear without being full-throttle, you are more than ready to shift. My favorite way to shift, is without the clutch. If you haven't done clutchless shifts before, practice on two wheels first. To do a clutchless shift, apply upward pressure to the shift lever, while you are full on the gas, then just
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Daigle's work as a pro JetSki racer and stunt performer was the best thing to happen to wheelies since the invention of the Kevlar clutch... |
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Mike Seale
Street Bike Extreme |
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