Cornerspin (Salisbury, NC)

Over the weekend, I took part in the Cornerspin training course in North Carolina.

The idea behind the school is to learn skills on the dirt that can be transferred to the street. All riders were on XR100 dirt bikes with less than 10hp motors. The tracks were purposely designed to have low traction in key areas. These two factors combined helped laser-focus the riders’ attention to tackling specific drills in the dirt, which had noticeable results when properly applied.

The school is run by Aaron Stevenson, an accomplished racer with a noticeable hunger for absorbing & transferring knowledge. In all seriousness, I found that his enthusiasm was the key to staying “tuned in” on every aspect of the training. Not only was he able to keep us engaged with inventive drills and ways of comprehending the information, but he also had us busting into laughter about every other minute.

This was a two-day, 9-to-5 training weekend, but Aaron’s passion for connecting with the participants kept us fixated on completing each drill.

More than anything, what I took away from the school was the importance of rider positioning. All throughout the weekend, Aaron and his secondary instructors were reminding us of our posture as we navigated the courses. Some drills were completed with one hand on the handlebar in order to demonstrate the contrast in control of the inside and outside hand. It was truly eye-opening, and clearly an exercise I’d never have attempted on the street.

I won’t go into detail on the specific drills since I’d rather not “give away” the course for free, but I would strongly recommend it to anyone looking to improve their skills on the motorcycle. This is the second training course I’ve taken – the first being the CA Superbike School at Virginia International Raceway. Despite the contrast in speeds and horsepower, I’d rank Cornerspin as an equal to the CA Superbike School in terms of knowledge gained.

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