Exercises for riding and honing skill sets. Do you practice such?

Several days ago I had a conversation with someone involving the gym at work. The local gov. healthcare package includes the "Prime" gym membership system included (though you have to sign up and pay the taxes) but allows you access to gyms around the country.

The perk has allowed me and the other half to return to the gym and get ourselves less "fluffy".

In times past I would practice various exercises and the like for specific activities including target shooting, archery and photography. Along with art and music. Each exercise is practiced to build an aspect of the body most used in that specific activity.
So during this conversation, the question was asked of me if I did anything like that for riding.

I do in fact, and am interested in finding a second level and further advanced level classes to hone motorcycle skills especially for emergency situations and buildup the muscle memory for such.


The skill set classes that i am thinking of perusing would be how to handle emergencies, various road issues, and the like.

So the discussion went on for about an hour and just got me thinking if anyone else does this.

i am aware of various 'advanced classes" but wondered also about the exercising.


Your thoughts?

When I was headed to the Rally Mongolia, 8 day navigation rally, I trained 7 days a week for 8 months to help make up for my lack of skill. I worked full body to build power and endurance and teach my body recovery with minimal time. It worked very well despite finding out by the end of day 1 my trainer and I had missed 1 muscle: trapezoid! Funny as **** seeing as it’s one of the primary ones you use all day long off-road.

Now I'm working on getting back into reasonable shape doing one workout of 90 push ups, crunches and bodyweight squats in sets of 30 with 1 minute breaks alternated with pull ups and chin ups working up to 3 sets of 7 today.

I alternate these with 2 or 3 different yoga workouts on DVD 7 days a week.

This is my current regime when I’m away from home at work living in camp or hotels and it’s doing pretty well for most muscle groups and seems to keep me going riding off-road or long days on the road.

I turn 51 in a few weeks and so far so good.

Now I need to keep it going when I’m home on days off.

i do various upper body exercises, but the most important thing i do is row. I have a concept2 indoor rower. outstanding workout for riding. builds grip strength, arms, shoulders, lower back, stomach and legs. perfect. 30-45 minutes several times a week. gets the aerobic benefits too while being low impact on older joints. (i am 59)

Perhaps I am confused, but I think you were asking about motorcycle exercises rather than physical training exercises. If I am mistaken, well then...... never mind.

I just finished taking the MSF Advanced Rider’s Course for the third time. The course recently was modified to reduce classroom time and increase range time. There are ten exercises that involve emergency braking, swerving to avoid obstacles, low speed weaving maneuvers, trail braking, decreasing radius cornering and work on body positioning and weight transfer. These are the sort of drills I think you are asking about.

I think you lose a tremendous amount of the benefit these drills can provide if you do not have a trained coach watching you and providing immediate feedback. Without a coach you may just reinforce bad habits and lose sight of the more subtle aspects of the riding task being preformed (for example where your head and eyes are oriented, foot position and body position). Depending on your riding ability you may be at risk of injury if you attempt some of these exercises without the input of a coach. It may also be difficult to find an appropriate place to conduct the exercises and in a safe environment.

I have suggested that our local MSF conduct an abbreviated version of the ARC at the beginning of the riding season. The course would be 4-5 hours conducted completely on a range. A prerequisite would be competition of the full ARC within the previous three years. I think this sort of course would be a great way for riders to get their heads back into safe riding after a long cold winter.

Attended the "live to ride" police motorcycle training course in Hawthorne, Ca. this summer. Obstacle course with figure 8's inside 22 feet, circles inside 12 feet diameters with cones, emergency braking, "getting off the bike" skills in reducing radius curves, high speed track riding, counter steering through cones from 20-35mph [ increasing the speed to 35 in 5mph increments ], etc.

One of the best courses I've attended to learn how to control the bike in tight spaces/urban environs etc. Put on by Hawthorne PD a few times a year for free, they take 30 students and have 8 motor officers in attendance. Broken up into 4 groups with each group moving through a skills set, then each group moving to another obstacle/course of training throughout the day.

Having ridden for 40+ years and taken one other motor officer course covering 80 hours to cert for duty on a bike many decades ago, this course was a great refresher and worth the 800+ miles round trip on the bike to attend.

Find something like this in your area if you can. Worth the day in skills advancement if you find something similar. Motor officers are some of the best trained riders in urban settings, you'll learn more in a day with that type of training than decades of riding without it.

akbeemer said:

Perhaps I am confused, but I think you were asking about motorcycle exercises rather than physical training exercises. If I am mistaken, well then...... never mind.

I just finished taking the MSF Advanced Rider’s Course for the third time. The course recently was modified to reduce classroom time and increase range time. There are ten exercises that involve emergency braking, swerving to avoid obstacles, low speed weaving maneuvers, trail braking, decreasing radius cornering and work on body positioning and weight transfer. These are the sort of drills I think you are asking about.

I think you lose a tremendous amount of the benefit these drills can provide if you do not have a trained coach watching you and providing immediate feedback. Without a coach you may just reinforce bad habits and lose sight of the more subtle aspects of the riding task being preformed (for example where your head and eyes are oriented, foot position and body position). Depending on your riding ability you may be at risk of injury if you attempt some of these exercises without the input of a coach. It may also be difficult to find an appropriate place to conduct the exercises and in a safe environment.

I have suggested that our local MSF conduct an abbreviated version of the ARC at the beginning of the riding season. The course would be 4-5 hours conducted completely on a range. A prerequisite would be competition of the full ARC within the previous three years. I think this sort of course would be a great way for riders to get their heads back into safe riding after a long cold winter.

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Actually, I am referring to both.

As an avid target shooter and archery type along with being a photographer and various art work and learning music, I learned long ago about specific exercises for specific muscle groups to do the job, whatever it is.
ALONG WITH the training from various sources that refine and expand the abilities in each discipline.


I work in the tax assessment field doing mapping and the skill set for that revolves around GIS and geographic aspects along with deed research, and all sorts of fun stuff like that.
BUT because 90% of it is on the computer, I have to exercises not only my hands to fight off Carpal Tunnel Syndrome, but need to walk around to prevent leg cramps and exercise hard to keep the hypertension away, to whit my family is susceptible and in an office setting is sugar for that fly as it were.

So for the motorcycle, the exercises I refer to are not only physical, but skill set and mental as well.

For example: I am in a gym that has a pool. So not only am I doing weight training and cardio, but I am also doing buoyancy resistance and floating techniques to sharpen the balancing abilities.
With buoyancy weights, your literally working the reciprocal of gravity and doing the opposite of weight training.
But doing this in a pool also means you have to learn to balance yourself and the result is strangely enough like counter steering.

Training by local motorcycle groups is something that is sore fully needed here along with specific road, emergency, environmental and other specific forms of conditional training for the motorcycle to give the rider a much better chance at getting out of situations where the unskilled is not.