Road Rules
Road Rules
College of curves
It's pitched as the "Switzerland of Ohio" tour, which sounds pretty implausible considering Ohio stands as entry to the vast, flat Midwest. But about 100 miles into Larry Grodsky’s Stayin’ Safe Motorcycle Training school, it becomes obvious how wrong perceptions can be.
“People just need to look at a map to find there are fabulous roads out here,” says tour guide/head instructor Grodsky. As one of the country’s only on-the-road riding schools, Stayin’ Safe (412/4215788; www.stayinsafe.com) has trained
more than 1000 riders since 1993, among them boxing’s heavyweight bad boy Mike Tyson and Ted Koppel, host of ABC TV’s “Nightline.”
Grodsky, a former Motorcycle Safety Foundation instructor, rides point for two-dozen weekend-long tours each year, passing through Tennessee’s Smoky Mountains and here, in the lush, remote hill country of Southeastern Ohio and West Virginia. The school was launched after Grodsky realized that riders from flatter parts of the country weren’t prepared for the type of elevation changes and curves provided by a ride through the mountains. And many students graduating from parking-lot MSF courses, he said, were eager for advanced on-the-road training.
I enrolled in SSMT’s “Alpine” tour a couple of years back and found that, along with revealing new roads to students, Grodsky’s school reveals way more about riding techniques and how to safely read a strip of curvy road. Not bad for $650, including one night’s room and board.
More recently, I again tagged along, this time not as a student, but rather to observe Grodsky’s teaching regimen. The riders were mostly middle-aged professionals aboard sport-tourers. All confessed a need to improve mid-corner smoothness and to generally feel more confident in their riding skills. Grodsky and assistant instructor Leon Winfrey maintained communications with the two groups of three riders through use of helmet radios.
The radios allow instructors to analyze a student’s progress with a remarkable immediacy-fire into a corner too hot and you’ll hear what you did wrong before you’ve reached the next apex.
Don’t bother talking back or trying to explain yourself: Instructor radios are the only ones that transmit. Grodsky says that with about “a four-second window to respond to a situation, the dynamic doesn’t provide time for discussion.”
His constructive critique is, however, interspersed with plenty of encouragement for properly executed moves and a heaping helping of useful, everyday street smarts. For example, Grodsky is a fervent believer in reading roads for clues to where cars may enter from hidden driveways, mammoth SUVs may cross centerlines, or where gravel may lie.
Stayin’ Safe is no racing school, but the riders do maintain a comfortably brisk pace throughout the day. The object is not to enter corners at maximum velocity or lean angle, but with a proper entry speed and good sight lines and, therefore, the best chance of emerging from the other side upright.
Each day covers a demanding 250 miles, which can be a challenge for riders unaccustomed to tackling hundreds of tight corners in one serving. But rest stops are frequent and provide both recovery time and a chance for candid discussions of how well (or poorly) the group handled the previous road’s hazards. And if the opinions of your instructors aren’t enough, Grodsky utilizes a handlebar-mounted video camera to record each student as they dip and lean through what really are some of the most dramatic backroads this side of the Swiss Alps. The first day’s ride ends with a happily tired group discussing their efforts over dinner, and a night’s stay at McConnellsville, Ohio’s Outback Inn.
The second day involves an additional 250 miles of Ohio twisties, a few final looks at individual progress on the handy cam and finally, a half-dozen more confident, assured motorcyclists heading back home. A fledgling roadracer may be disappointed with SSMT’s almost rigid adherence to sensible cornering speeds, and Grodsky’s pull-no-punches assessments of his students are not for the faint of heart. But street riders of any experience level with a passion to elevate their skills would have a hard time doing better when it comes to comprehensive streetriding instruction. Mike Seate
