Ducati Monster Forum

Total Control: High Performance Street Riding Techniques -  Lee Parks
A Twist of the Wrist II - Keith Code
Proficient Motorcycling: The Ultimate Guide to Riding Well - David L. Hough

+1 on Twist of the Wrist. Haven't read the others, yet.

+1 on Proficient Motorcycling

Great titles  wt:

Have not read it yet, but there is a part II to Proficient Motorcycling: The Ultimate Guide to Riding Well - David L. Hough

Total Control is a great place to start, TOTW II was way better than one

Sport Riding Techniques by Nick Ienatsch

I found it to be very informative. read, ride, read and repeat!

+1 for Parks and Hough too!

Sportbiking: The Real World by Gary Jaehne

Nothing earth shattering, but a good, simple book, with some good stuff on riding in the wet...

+1 on Total Control

It's even got pictures  wt:

I've read all 3....Code and Parks have 2 different approaches to the same thing more or less, but I like Lee Parks' book especially...I feel like it's more accessible to those who want to learn good cornering technique, but may not necesarily know much about it....I also really like his chapter on how one's fear of something can actually translate into a negative result (ie: crashing)...Keith Code's book, IMO, is more geared for those who can already proficiently ride a spotbike, but want to to so at a higher skill level.....

Both "required reading" IMHO for those who want to get the most out of their bikes!!  wt:

If you guys are going to recommend a book, can you include one sentence about it so we know why (or for what aspect of riding) you're recommending the book? Otherwise, if I haven't heard of them, I have to go with a list to the bookstore and pull out all of them in order to figure out which one covers the kind of topics I desire to read about.

Couldn't have said it better myself.  Both great books, but read differently.

+1 on Total Control by Parks.

While we're doing book reviews, one that didn't do as much for me: Ride Hard, Ride Smart by Pat Hahn.  While he starts out with some pretty insightful analysis of the Hurt report, the balance of the book starts to wander quite a bit, and his writing style -- LOTS of rhetorical questions, sometimes a couple a paragraph, just got to me after a while and made it harder to pick out the useful bits here and there.  Pictures are good, though, and sometimes kind of funny.

Another +1 on Total Control. Even I could understand it!

+1 on A Twist of the Wrist II  I was able to put the reading to practical user very easily.

I've read A Twist Of The Wrist II twice now, having just finished it for the second time a few weeks ago.  Even though it's much more street oriented than book 1, it's still mostly information you'll need for the track.  It makes the assumption that you're trying to go as fast as possible and push your bike close to its limits.  There are good hints in there about how to be smooth, but there are several other books I would have to recommend that you read first.

The book that had the biggest influence over my riding was Proficient Motorcycling by David L. Hough.  That is the one that really explained why the delayed apex turn is the way to go on the street and that is the one that caused me to change the way I ride.  I no long have what Keith Code calls "survival reactions" because I've learned to get all of my braking done before entering a turn, enter the turn from the outside of the lane, and finish it off at the inside while giving the bike a bit of throttle.  There are a lot of other great hints in that book to make you a safer rider.  I would also strongly recommend his second book, More Proficient Motorcycling which has additional good information.

I also recommend Total Control by Lee Parks before the Keith Code books.  It has some great advice in it and has exercises to go try in most of the chapters.  It's the kind of book where you should read a chapter then go ride and try out whatever that chapter is trying to teach.  It's written for motorcycles of all types, but is still a bit biased towards sport bikes.

I have read Total Control, Smooth Riding: The Pridmore Way, A Twist of the Wrist I & II, and Ride Hard Ride Smart.  I felt that of all these books Ride Hard Ride Smart was the best.  True there is a lot of garbage in the book but man there is a lot of insightful stuff in there too.  Smooth Riding is good as well. The rest of the books weren't really worth my time.  If you are an experienced rider looking to improve on your street riding techniques read Smooth Riding and Ride Hard Ride Smart.  If you are a beginner the other books should suffice.   

Riding with Rilke, just got it.  About a guy and his trip cross crountry on a monster, he started with a bmw then bought one on the way.  REally kewl.

A very interesting book with some Monster content, but no help on how to be a better rider in there.  I have a copy of that book.

+1 Total Control by Lee Parks.

What about Twist of the Wrist II as DVD?

Is it faithful to the book? Any Better or Worse?

Happy Xmas!!!

G

For Christmas my wife got me
- Total Control
- Twist of the Wrist I
- Twist of the Wrist II

Should I even read Twist of the Wrist I? It sounds like everyone just loves II.

Total Control has just been delivered to me by the courier.. :)

Just ordered Total Control and Proficient Motorcycling!  [moto]