Haha, that one popped up on my Instagram feed the other day, no idea how to find it again to post here though
The way Bayliss rode though, his body weight was still ‘in’ the bike, the load on the front tyre must have been huge, that said that’s maybe how he got away with it...
Now with all due respect to Mr Doohan, that is a weird position! Looks like he was sticking his butt out while keeping the rest of his body over the bike. Is that era style related?
Found a couple other pics of Doohan, and he does seem to have developed a style - or a technique - of his own.
There's a vid about the evolution of GP riding styles on YouTube. I'll see if I can dig it out and post it Found it. He starts discussing Doohan's style generally from 9:27 but although he says nobody else had used the style previously, if you go back a couple of mins, it seems earlier riders had been adopting a similar although less extreme body position.
Wasn't some of doohan's later riding style due to past injuries?,hence the development of the thumb rear brake.
as said, injury stuff. As the years roll on, your spine can change enough to prevent left hand/right hand cornering symmetry, let alone as a result of injury. If you have ever ridden with a group this becomes apparent. The rider might think they are sitting evenly astride their motorbike but observing from behind shows a clearer, more accurate picture.
When I did the CSS one of the first things the instructor asked me after following me for a few laps to observe my riding style was whether I had historic left shoulder or back problems. He was spot on as I have a vulnerable left shoulder from repeated dislocations when playing American football in my late teens and 20s. In fact I suffered a subluxation (partial dislocation) again this summer and trapped my radial nerve, causing weeks of agony and lost sleep. Unfortunately I didn’t even have a heroic story to tell about how I dislocated it again, as I did it when trying to untuck my left ear that had got caught in the lining of my helmet
