I know that body position is a personal preference sort of thing, depending on bike, size, and what the rider is comfortable with. I guess I just want to get a wider variety of opinions on this because I have been getting some contradicting advice.

I have been pretty surprised with how much my body positioning and riding has "improved" since I started doing trackdays last year. I used to be very "crossed up" and have been trying to focus on getting my upper body lower. This had seemed to be working, as I stopped dragging my knee and I am carrying way more corner speed.

At the MRA race school earlier in the year, one of the instructors told me to "get my ass off the seat more, or I was going to low-side"...So I have been doing the 1 cheek on, 1 cheek off (although it is hard to really tell with the stock mushy seat) thing while still being able to keep my upper body reasonably low.

Fast forward to the other weekend, where I attended a school that focuses on Skills and Techniques for Advanced Riding...After a few sessions I get pulled aside by an instructor, and he tells me that I am hanging off the bike way too much, that it is going to tire me out quickly and it is going to cause me to lowside.

His reasoning was that on corner entry, the further off the bike you are, the less feel and control you have over the front end, and the less chance for recovery you are giving yourself in the event that you start to lose the front. Said instructor then showed some video from that session that he was taking, pointing out my horrible form hanging off way too far and another rider, who was considerably crossed up IMO, with his butt off to one side, and his helmet off to the other, and the instructor commended him on his perfect body position. When I tried to ask a question about this, I kind of got ignored. I did what the instructor suggested, and found myself feeling like I was going to lose it due to the bike being leaned a considerable amount more, I guess that is just a confidence issue I am having.

Now I realize that I am hanging off a but much relative to the speed I am going, as I can look at pictures of myself and others in the same corner and my bike is not leaned nearly as much. I can also see that with my knee either on the ground, or damn close, there is a distance of 2-3 inches between the ground and my toe. This says to me that I have plenty of lean angle left...or am I hanging off too much...

Also, as far as weighting the pegs is concerned. Right now I find most of my weight on my inside peg, and outside knee against the tank, with my outside arm sort of resting on the tank. Some people were talking of weighting the outside peg when driving out of corners to help stand the bike up. I always tried to get my upper body lower on the exits to try to stand the bike up more. With how my outside foot is situated, I can't imagine how the heck I could get any weight transfered to the outside peg.

One more thing that has me thinking. Going into a corner, I am braking and downshifting while still "centered" then moving my body and turning in. This is not smooth, and I know it. I was trying to rotate my lower body, then brake and shift, but it was a bit awkward to get under the shifter.

From what I have been gathering from instructors and watching faster people ride, I am thinking the "correct" way to execute a corner would be to, move lower body, brake/shift, then turn in and looking throught the corner will force your upper body down, then as you are rolling on the throttle, try to get your upper body lower forcing the bike up.

I am really just waiting for someone to tell me something that brings me to some sort of epiphany, where my riding will all of a sudden get smoother, but for some reason I imagine its going to be a bit more complicated than that :wink:

I look forward to any insight you can provide...

Thanks!