…that is the qusetion.
So what are peoples opinions on Knee down scratching action? Is it a necessity for the speed your riding or more pose factor? You have the camp that believes its a good tool for measuring lean angle, distributing weight… then you have the people that see it as pose factor and until your banked over as far as the racers in the championship series, theres no real need for scratching. If you watch racers like Mike Hailwood, who was a god around that TT course, you’ll very rarely see his arse leave teh seat or a knee stuck a mile out…
I’m undecided… it does looked good and feels great, specially around other riders 
but I would say I rarely scratch… I move around alot and stick the puck out but never really with the intention of grinding it…
What ya reckon chaps?
Good question, though here’s what’s evident from track riding; To go really fast, you don’t put your knee on the ground, you end up spending too much time thinking about it, rather than thnking about the exit of the corner, and the next corner after that.
When I learnt to get my knee down, I was doing it all over the place at the track, but it soon became obvious that I was losing too much concentration on, when it was better spent on trying to maintain a higher corner speed. Nowadays when my knee touches the ground, it’s not intentional, my knee is just dangling as the bike is leant over far enough. I don’t lean off the bike a lot, just a buttock is all.
On the roads, it’s complete show-boating and unecessary, but always gets a laugh, as long as you don’t end up lowsiding into some armco or an oncoming car. The thing is with knee-down though, is that it’s such good fun! On the track though, I want to go fast, and that means being 100% focused on getting through the corners as quick as possible, the less things to think about, the better, so no intentional knee-down malarky for me now.
Here’s a couple of pictures of me from last summer…
Slower corner (Druids @ Brands), just learnt to get my knee down.
Fast corner (Silverstone GP), knee is touching with no effort, because the high corner speed makes the lean angle quite acute.
I have to agree with jay! I very rarely put my nee down nowadays and if I do I usually have to slowdown to do so! On the road? It’s not just unnecessary but you really will have to try hard to do so… here goes two pics of me at Almeria circuit in spain, as you can see the bike is leaning quite a lot and the speed cannot be considerate ‘slow’ at all but the knee is still not on the floor, nor mine or my friends ones. But it is still a lot of fun !
http://www.biochem.ucl.ac.uk/~cezar/PHOTOS/TrackDays/ALMERIA14-12/cezarracingF.jpg
http://www.biochem.ucl.ac.uk/~cezar/PHOTOS/TrackDays/ALMERIA14-12/cezarracing4.jpg
Sorry I couldn’t upload my pics.
Your pictures don’t show Cezar, you’re just linking them from your desktop, you need to upload them, or link them from your site. I need to change that behaviour of the forums.
Good posts… I guess once you get past that “I have to scratch my knee” syndrome it actually happens naturally as your more focused on what your doing so start going quicker… its true that spending too much time thinking about scratching leads to ****ing up a whole lot of other things…
Heres a pic of me on a track day… the angles there, the speed was there, but I was more concerned with getting a good corner than wearing out my sliders…
Blimey Floyd, you’re a big guy, you make a big bike seem small! 
Yeha Jay…tell me about it… this picture shows just how small I think… lol… and it is a big fecking bike!! (just imagine how small an R1 or GSXR 1K would look! 
)
It looks cool and feels good but on the road? I followed my mate the other day (a 7ft guy hangin off a Ducati 900 looks amusing to say the least) round a roundabout and what did I see - a bloody squashed flat coke can 
front wheel missed it by inches thankfully anyway best kept on the track me thinks!
Still looks cool though the chicks love it
Well I only just got the hang of knee down action last year and I’m defiantly not a show off, in fact we normally use a local business park roundabout to meet up on a Friday night prior to us going for a midnight blast.
I only tend to do a few laps before the blast if no spectators are present. I always stick my knee out when corning, not with the intention of getting my knee down, just habit; concentrating on getting the bend correct and back on the gas.
However last Friday I seemed to get my knee down a couple of times when I was not expecting it, this does make you feel good and the whole rideout was top class.
If you’re used to sticking your knee out, then that’s great, the more things you can do without much concentration, the better, it’s about reading the corner well and getting through it quickly and safely
To be honest, on the track I don’t really care if I’m a second quicker than the next rider. So what? I’d rather have fun, and fun (to me) is dragging your knee round the corner. I take some strange lines on track to make the kneedowns longer, but probably make make my laptimes longer too. So what, I’m having fun!
knee down is big and is clever
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ermm hello btw
Big, clever, fun and the girls love it… apparently. Hi Perkles!
Pure show boating on the road but I love it, regular do one extra loop at a quiet roundabout on the way home from work just so i can get that feeling. I feel like i’ve posted these vids on every forum i’ve been on but I guess that was the reason for taking them so will post em anyway 
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http://www.timmather.co.uk/video/z750_kneedown1.wmv
http://www.timmather.co.uk/video/z750_kneedown2.wmv
http://www.timmather.co.uk/video/z750_kneedown3.wmv
http://www.timmather.co.uk/video/z750_kneedown4.wmv
http://www.timmather.co.uk/video/z750_kneedown5.wmv
First trackday on the 18th of July at Cadwell so buyin some new pucks for then, can’t wait!!!
Nice one Tim, yeah its always a good feelin to get ur knee down on some good corners, just don’t do what I did the other day - went round a roundabout on the A23 which is full of really nice ones except the one I picked!! half way round with my knee on the floor and I go over what looks like the Canadian Rocky mountains to say the front started skating around all over the place was an understatement, got the heart going though which felt good heh heh.
dont think in 20 yrs of riding ive got my knee down,apart when my leg,arse and head follow move around on the bike to ride it as fast as i can,not 2 get my knee down,if my body position was corect i prob could cause i wear out my toe sliders,and hero blobs on the pegs
