Riding a straight line, which is harder than it sounds

1Watch

Thirty feet of chalk

No traffic and nothing dramatic. A drift of about eight inches over thirty feet, which on a road is the difference between your bit of it and somebody else’s.

2The idea

The cheapest good drill in the course

The governing body for cycle racing describes it in one line: two rows of markers one to two feet apart, twenty to thirty feet long, and you ride between them. Half tennis balls, chalk, anything that will not hurt a wheel if you hit it.

It is worth asking why something that small gets taught by everybody. A corridor turns wandering into a thing you can see. You either stayed inside it or you did not, and there is no arguing with a chalk line. Nothing else in this badge gives you that clean an answer about your own riding.

3The idea

What the standard actually asks for

The national cycle training standard puts four criteria next to each other and they are all about the same minute of riding.
Ride along independently for at least a minute.
Pedal steadily, using gears if it has them.
Control my speed.
Cover the brake levers while pedalling.

That last one has a criterion of its own and it is easy to skim past. Covering the levers means your fingers are already resting on them, so the only thing left to do is squeeze. It takes the reaching-for-the-lever part out of every stop you will ever make.

4Look

Where you are looking

The one watching the front wheel is the one who wanders. You go where you look, which is a fact this course is going to use twice more before it is finished.

5Decide

Halfway down the corridor you feel yourself drifting left.

Look down at the wheel and correct itLook at the far end and keep pedalling steadilyStop pedalling and coast until it settles

6The idea

Slow is the hard part, and there is a reason

A machine is more stable the faster it goes, so the wobbliest parts of every ride you take are the first few feet and the last few. The corridor is deliberately run at the speed where holding a line is hardest, which is why it transfers straight to junctions, queues, and setting off next to a kerb.

The racing body’s own coaching note for this is one line and worth stealing: maintain pedal pressure. Keep some drive going through the machine rather than freewheeling and hoping it settles by itself.

7Your turn

Four runs, one corridor

Do all four combinations. The two that keep you inside the lines are the two the coaching notes tell you to use, and now you have watched why.

8Find them

Which of these are part of holding a line?

Tap the ones that count.

9Say it

Three words for the corridor

Two instructions, and they are the two that get dropped: look where you are going rather than at the machine, and have your fingers already on the levers rather than somewhere near them.

10Do it

Before you leave this page