So that Reg Pridmore isn't a teacher or pro?
I'll edit, now that I have some time.
Keith Code (one of those "pros") has a specalized bike, with hard mounted extra handlebars on it. His idea is to prove that you can't steer a bike without countersteering. Dunno about you, but I can steer with my hands off the bars completely, at times.
Reg Pridmore, one of the oldest/most experienced instructors (and yes, ex-champ) around, teaches that you can steer a bike any of a number of ways. He challenges you to put the book down and go ride.
(He's right.)
Once the bike is turning (i.e., after turnin point), you WILL turn the bars into the corner. Period, end of story. If you countersteered and never turned in, you'd either turn the wrong way or fall off. Even pushing a bike around the garage, you HAVE to turn the bars in the direction of travel.
It actually works this way in a car too, if you think for a moment. If you're pulling into a parking space, you turn the wheel in your car pretty hard. What, 180degrees? 120? 200? something like that. Now, if you were cornering around the same radius corner on a track at 20mph, how far would you turn the steering wheel (in your car)? Right! You'd turn it the same amount, becuase that dicates the amount of angle that your front wheels have, and thus where the car is going to go. (I'm assumming infininte traction here, incidentally.. in truth, turning into a parking space at 60mph would be ugly for you and the cars parked around you as well.)
Okay, on a bike then. You turn into a parking space at walking speed. How far do you turn the bars? About the same angle. You can turn them a touch less if you lean the bike into the turn (under you, as the MSF preaches), or you can hang off and turn into that space with the bars turning in (you'll look silly when you hit the nose of the car parked in the opposing space, though).
Now, let's take that same tight left turn into a parking space, and put it on the open roads. How far do you turn the wheel in a car? Same as ever. How far do you turn the bars on the bike? Same as ever. Let's assume you've got infinite traction (!), infinite cornering clearance, and are on a bike at 100mph. How far do you have to turn the bars to get through that corner? That's right, exactly the same as at any other time.
Let's try this a different way. If you're on a skidpad, 600m diameter, and you're doing 100mph. You're in a steady state corner that never ends (think, on-ramp from hell). The faster you go, the more you're going to lean, becuase you need to do that to stay balanced as the added centripital force pushes the C-G to the outside. At walking speed, the bars are turned IN THE DIRECTION OF THE TURN, and you're leaning a tiny, tiny amount. At 100mph, the bars are turned roughly the same amount (it isn't, becuase the tire is on the shoulder becuase of the lean and you're compensating for a different wheel radius, but it's close), and the bike is leaning much harder, just to remain balanced.
Still with me? These are all simple concepts, we're just taking them a piece at a time. Every single track book, instructor, and so on, will agree with all of these, that I've ever read/dealt with.
Okay, now for the tricky part. You're on the entry runway to the skidpad. You're doing 100mph on the bike. You hit the point of no return and HAVE to turn the bike in or go off the road (the track is a giant P shape, if that explains things). To corner and remain balanced, you will need to get the bike into that leaned position.
Let's stop, ala Keith Code, and define lean. It's when the bike's contact patches are not under the C-G. Normally, this would mean you're falling off the bloody thing. However, when you add in centripital force, you're balanced. Right? Everyone still with me?
Now, another way to look at it is that you HAVE to lean to stay balanced when you turn. If not, the C-G will be on the outside of the contact patches, and foom you're going to go smootch the guardraill. Imagine staying dead upright and trying to turn! BANG, to the outside (and wall) you go!
So you are entering this "P". You can either move the contact patches around (best done with countersteering, a quick flick and the rubber is well off to one side), or you can lean in with your body and move the C-G around. Which is quicker, a quick flick of the bars or moving your bodyweight around? Well, remember if you move the bars (the contact patch moves underneath the bike) and not only does your body become offset but also the weight of the bike. BANG and you're leaning over hard. If you move say 200lbs of body around, the bike will lean, but it'll take time for your weight to move the 300-600lbs of bike under you, to lean.
In either case, the bike is still leaning, and you can continue.
Now, it becomes interesting. The bike is at lean, say 30 degrees, and you're sitting bolt upgright. You're doing big circles at 60mph.
To go faster, you have to lean farther, right? Well, no. You can hang WAAAAAY off the bike, and probably reduce the actual lean angle to 28 degrees, and go faster. How is this possible? The total C-G shifted towards the inside.
You can stay bolt upgright and lean the bike a touch more. The total C-G moves inside, and you can go faster (retaining your balance, as the increased centripital force counteracts this).
You can lean the bike down and lean the "wrong" way too. Same effect, the total C-G moves inside, and you can go faster. However, the bike is most likely to start running out of ground clearance this way. That's why racers hang off, it moves the actual bike the least, and increases cornering speed for a given amount of lean angle on the bike (improving ground clearance as well as the tire contact patch gets tiny when you hit the edge).
Now, you're in a constant corner. Your body position doesn't really matter for this example. All that matters is that you're going say 100mph and turning. What can be done to turn harder when the corner tightens up? You can countersteer, moving the contact patches out slightly, and leaning harder. You can hang off farther, pulling the bike down with you. You can spin the rear tire a touch and the contact patches will move away from you, changing the C-G to contact patch angle. All are legitimate, and you can see examples of each, on certain corners at some tracks.
Reg Pridmore's CLASS is the only track school that seems to teach this stuff, and thus is the only one I'd bother to go to (other than track time, wheee!!!!!!). I know the fundamentals of riding, I've ridden on a LOT of bikes, on varying surfaces, in pretty much every condition. The other classes that I've read up on seem to teach "for track only" stuff, but Reg's material says this is how the bike works, understand it, go faster becuase you know what you're doing. That sounds like what I want.
While you're flaming, I don't own a busa, so obviously I can't ride. heh.
