California Superbike School UK

S1000RR  FORUM

Help Support S1000RR FORUM:

This site may earn a commission from merchant affiliate links, including eBay, Amazon, and others.

schua2007

Well-known member
S1000RR Supporter
Joined
Feb 17, 2020
Messages
111
Reaction score
0
Morning all,

I've just booked Level 1 & 2 with California Superbike School. Anyone previously done? I'd welcome your thoughts, thanks
 
Morning all,

I've just booked Level 1 & 2 with California Superbike School. Anyone previously done? I'd welcome your thoughts, thanks

I did 1&2 years ago, although it was good I found there was very little track time for putting it in to practise and very little personal instruction.
Looked at doing 3&4 but then met up with an ex css instructor who set up his own school of 1-1. He comes under 'nemo moto' , wished I had met him before as 1/ his instruction was a hell of a lot better (he coached YOUR problems not generic) 2/ I learnt more with him than the 2 days at CSS.
There are others out there, just this was my experience.

Nemomoto Rider Development
 
Last edited:
I have done CSS and would agree with bananaman that 1 to 1 tuition is better value. CSS level 1-2 is very formulaic about riding 'drills' - these can be interesting to learn about the 'physics' of riding, particularly for new riders, but somebody specifically focussed 1 to 1 on your riding is likely to be of more benefit.
 
Last edited:
I've done all 4 levels of CSS - 2 in the UK and 2 in the US, where they do 2 day camps and the student/instructor ratio is 2:1. More supervision is better overall, BUT... most of us numpties have obvious and predictable faults that can be addressed by standard CSS days. Sometime you need to be told what you are doing wrong but you also need time to practice getting it right, and sometime the closer ratio doesn't give you the space to do that, so I did find that annoying sometimes. I think that rubbing off the roughest edges at CSS will be fine. I learned plenty at my last CSS session in the UK, and I've even been talking about going back this year with a mate that is thinking of getting back into bikes (and I haven't been on track for 2 years). However, I'll definitely be looking for closer instruction in the near future.
 
I did 1&2 years ago, although it was good I found there was very little track time for putting it in to practise and very little personal instruction.
Looked at doing 3&4 but then met up with an ex css instructor who set up his own school of 1-1. He comes under 'nemo moto' , wished I had met him before as 1/ his instruction was a hell of a lot better (he coached YOUR problems not generic) 2/ I learnt more with him than the 2 days at CSS.
There are others out there, just this was my experience.

Nemomoto Rider Development
Exactly same experience.

I've done 4 levels and in hindsight I say it's waste of moneys.

If you don't have a bike and just want to get some lessons and tracktime it's okay, probably the best option out there.

But if you have a bike and gear, just book one on one tuition on a novice level trackday somewhere at Brands Indy or Donny National.

Dean Ellison or Not so fast are very good instructors. They won't be cheap, you're looking at 600 a day but it's worth it every penny.
 
I think as the original OP has booked levels 1 and 2 I'd say go and enjoy it. They are interesting days, you'll get some track time and learn something. Thats what I found - all good. Levels 1 and 2 got me to where I wanted to be at the time which is a couple of track days a year. From there you can make a more informed decision based on the great advice above. As an aside my instructor was Andy Ibbot who I now follow on Twitter as he tries to build his life back together after suffering a massive stroke .
 
I think they should be two enjoyable days :) Will you be Rossi after them, no, but no learning is ever wasted.
 
Personally I like CSS and doing lvl 1& 2 will be excellent knowledge and training to be used in everyday riding, I think lvl one is throttle control and lvl 2 is all about vision. I have done all the levels and what I try to do is repeat a lvl 4 once a year at the beginning of the riding season to get my brain in gear, specially after the winter break. But I will admit that last year it?s seem like a lot of sitting around and less track time. But during the final session I was back to my best. Anyway I am also booked this year for lvl 4 at brands Hatch in June. I know this is a little late in the season, but I wanted to ride at Brands Hatch this year.
 
Any training is worthwhile. If you've booked these days then enjoy them!

One advantage of the CSS days is that you can experiment with bike control (throttle, gears etc) without worrying about holding people up or impolite passing as you might get on a regular track day with tuition.
 
Personally I'd highly recommend CSS - I've done levels 1-4 and whilst I probably made the biggest leap from the first level each of them did make a big difference to making me both faster and safer. I still try to practice the level 1 drills in my first session of a track day just to make sure you're reprogramming in the basics into your muscle memory because otherwise if you just go straight out there and try to push it gets a bit ragged. Each time you make a mess of a corner it's generally because you got one of the basics wrong.
 
Back
Top